Shuffle Photo Order For Slideshow Mac
- How Do You Shuffle Photos In Slideshow On Mac
- Google Photos Shuffle Slideshow
- Windows 10 Shuffle Photos
- Photo Shuffle Slideshow
- Shuffle Photo Order For Slideshow Mac
In the Photos app on your Mac, select the photos you want in your slideshow. You can add or remove photos later (see “Add or remove photos and text in a slideshow,” below). Choose File Create Slideshow Photos. Click the Slideshow pop-up menu and choose New Slideshow. Type a slideshow name in the Slideshow Name field, then click OK. Open the System Preferences Desktop & Screensaver. Select one of the photo templates for the screensaver in the left column. Set the source in the right column to 'Photo Library'; wait until your photos Library appears, select your album. Enable the checkmark 'Shuffle Slide order'. There is no preset for random order – but you can switch to random order ('shuffle order') while the slideshow is actually playing: 'While a slideshow is playing, move the pointer to make the slideshow controls appear, and then click the Settings button' The settings button is the little cog wheel icon next to the close X button.
The other way is to create a slideshow in the sidebar. Here you have the option of setting the duration of each slide to match that of the music (in my case, I had a 20 minute montage), but there is no way to randomize the order -- you have to drag by hand to set the manual order.
My idea is to title the photos with a random number, then sort by title, thereby randomizing the images. Run this AppleScript in Script Editor to do just that: Note: This solution assumes that you have created a separate iPhoto (v7) library for the slideshow, as it re-titles all the images in the library. It is easy to change this to only randomize a specific album; just change the album name in the script from photos to the album name.
After running the script, select Choose View » sort by » Title in the menu. Then select all, and create a new slideshow in the sidebar. Its order will be randomized.
[robg adds: I modified the script to add the comments and comment out the tell album line. To use the script, please follow the instructions to provide an album name and remove the tell album... line's comment marker. I did it this way because this script will re-title your images, and I didn't want anyone accidentally overwriting their laboriously-applied image titles in their main library. Creating a separate slideshow-only library is the best solution; iPhoto's help explains how to create a new library if you're not familiar with the process.]
When Apple replaced iPhoto with the new Photos app in OS X Yosemite, we lost the ability to shuffle (randomize) the slide order. This was a big loss for those of us who have to quickly create slideshows from a large number of photos for a party or school event. Often we’ll have several photos of the same subject taken about the same time. If you play back the photos in the order they were shot, parts of the slideshow seem repetitive. By shuffling the order of the photos, you can make the slideshow more interesting without spending time sifting through the whole album to find the best ones.
Hopefully Apple will reintroduce that feature back into the Photos app sometime soon. Until then, here’s a quick way to randomly play back a collection of photos in your Photos library.
Use the screen saver
If you don’t have iPhoto installed on your Mac, the only way to shuffle the photos in a slideshow is to use the built-in screen saver. It’s not as full-featured as iPhoto as you lose the ability to control the slide time, transitions, titles and so on. However, if you need that kind of control in creating your slideshow, you can use iMovie instead.
Click the System Preferences icon on your dock,
or select it from the Apple menu.
Click on the Desktop & Screen Saver preferences.
How Do You Shuffle Photos In Slideshow On Mac
Select the Screen Saver tab and then choose from one of the photo-related screen savers like “Ken Burns” or “Classic.”
Use the Source menu to choose a set of images in Photos (e.g. an album, moment, place).
If you don’t see “Photo Library…” at the bottom of the Source menu, you need change your Photos preferences to use the Photos library as the system photo library. To do this, launch the Photos app.
Then go to the Photos menu and select Preferences.
Make sure that you’re in the General tab, and click the “Use as System Photo Library” button. Afterwards, the button should become greyed out.
Go back to the Screen Saver preferences and click on the Source menu. At the bottom of the menu you should see the “Photo Library…” item. Click on it.
Now you will see all the collections from your Photos library. Select a collection and click the Choose button.
Google Photos Shuffle Slideshow
The last step is to check the “Shuffle slide order” box.
To start the slideshow right away, click the preview image.
Background music
The screen saver slideshow doesn’t have any options to play music, but you can make up for that by with iTunes. Before starting the screen saver, launch iTunes and start playing one of your playlists.
Limitations
This method isn’t perfect––the screen saver doesn’t give you much control. You can’t change slide duration and transition types. Nor can you fit the slideshow to the length of a song or playlist.
Windows 10 Shuffle Photos
Photo Shuffle Slideshow
For quickly creating a random slideshow, though, this is the easiest (and cheapest) option available.
Shuffle Photo Order For Slideshow Mac
If you have any other tips and tricks, let us know in the comments.