You can find all of your photos in the Recents folder. The Recents folder is the master folder that contains all the photos that you’ve taken with your iPhone's camera and/or have imported from external cameras or devices.
The term Recents is not completely accurate because you can find your whole history of photos in it. However, the name Recents is as good a name as any, as it quickly shows you the most recent photos you’ve taken or imported.
How to select photos to create a new album
Your iOS Photos app lets you create as many albums as you like, which keeps your photo collection organized. To discover how to quickly create and populate a new album, follow these easy steps:- Within your Recents album, tap on the word Select.
- Tap several photos to create a sample Album. At this point, it doesn’t matter which photos you select.
- When you see little blue checkmarks on each photo that you tapped (see the following figure), tap the little up-arrow share icon at the bottom left of your screen.
After you select your photos, tap the up-arrow Share icon at the bottom left of your screen. - At the bottom of the new screen, tap on the words Add to Album. You’re prompted to create a new album.
- Tap on the words New Album and name your new album. Your newly created album now contains your selected photos. You can access this album from within My Albums.
How to remove a photo from an album
Deleting a photo and removing a photo from your album are not the same thing. When you remove a photo from an album, you’re not deleting your photo. You’re just removing it from that particular album that you are viewing. The photo will still be visible with your Recents album.Follow these steps to remove photos from an album:
- Within your album, tap the Select option at the top right of your screen.
- Tap on the photo that you want to remove from your sample album.
- Tap on the words Remove from Album, as shown.
Remove from Album doesn’t delete your photo. It just removes it from the album.Removing a photo from your album doesn’t delete your photo. It only removes it from the album. If you want to delete the photo entirely, simply tap the word Delete. To rescue a photo that you deleted by mistake, go to your Recently Deleted folder located at the bottom of your Albums section.
Using albums wisely
Here’s the most important organizational tip: Every photo should have its own album!
One of the biggest complaints that beginner and amateur photographers have is not being able to find a specific photo quickly. You can save so much time by placing each photo that you take or import into an album. In fact, every photo that’s in your Recents album should have a home within a custom-created folder with a logical naming structure.Here are some common folder name ideas that make sense for organizing your entire photo collection:
- Italy Trip 2020
- Grandchildren
- Business receipts
- House ideas
- Nature photos
- Hockey games
How to find photos of a single person
The People feature within People & Places of the Albums section is a great way for you to quickly find most or all photos of a single person. Using clever facial recognition, this feature shows you all photos of you and then all photos of other friends or family members. Your iPhone uses artificial intelligence to categorize the people who you photograph most, including yourself.
The Places feature uses location data to determine what city and country your photos were taken from. This feature usually works only for mobile device cameras, such as iPhones and Android devices, and less so larger cameras, such as DSLR’s and mirrorless-style cameras.The People & Places feature is just another great way for you to quickly access photos that previously would take a lot of scrolling to find. Being a good iPhone photographer is one thing, but the complete photography workflow also includes quick access to your entire photo collection. With this and other search tools, you will be well-positioned to access your photographic history quickly.
How to sort your files by media types
The Media Types area (within the Albums section) is a quick way for you to access certain types of media files. Here’s a brief description of each search parameter, illustrated here:
The Media Types section helps you quickly search for only certain types of media files.- Videos: A collection of all videos that you’ve filmed.
- Selfies: Each selfie that you’ve taken of yourself with the front-facing selfie camera.
- Live Photos: The location of all Live Photos (they look like mini video clips).
- Portrait: Each photo with Portrait mode turned on.
- Time-lapse: All videos created with sped-up motion.
- Slo-mo: Your slow-motion video collection.
- Bursts: Each photo that you shot with Burst mode.
- Screenshots: Photos (screen captures) of your iPhone screen.
How to use the Other Albums section
The last three options within the Other Albums section are- Imports: A collection of all photos that were not taken with your iPhone’s camera. This collection is usually populated with photos that you’ve imported from your larger DSLR or mirrorless-style cameras.
- Hidden: A collection of photos that you’ve hidden to keep private. You can hide any photo by selecting that photo, choosing the up-arrow share icon, and then tapping the Hide option. Hiding photos is useful for when you do public slideshows using your Photos collection, but don’t want anyone seeing certain images.
- Recently Deleted: The location of all photos that you’ve deleted within the last 30 days. You can retrieve photos from the trash can, but after 30 days, they will be deleted forever.
