OSX Folder Action to automatically import files added to a folder in Photos.app

ImportPhoto.scpt

property imageFiles : {"jpg", "pef", "dng", "jpeg"}

on adding folder items to theWatchedFolder after receiving theDetectedItems
	repeat with theItem in theDetectedItems
		set theItemPath to POSIX path of theItem
		set ImageFile to POSIX file theItemPath
		tell application "System Events"
			if name extension of theItem is in imageFiles then
				tell application "Photos"
					set DestinationAlbumName to "Inbox"
				
					if not (exists container named DestinationAlbumName) then
						make new album named DestinationAlbumName
					end if
					
					import ImageFile into container named DestinationAlbumName with skip check duplicates
				end tell
				tell application "Finder"
					delete theItem
				end tell
			end if
		end tell
	end repeat
end adding folder items to

Great Script! Eye-Fi should buy it from you! Thanks.

To setup you will need to place this file in the following folder:

/Users/your_username/Library/Workflows/Applications/Folder Actions/

You need to configure eye-fi to download new files to a folder on your computer. Once this is done, you need to right-click that folder and go into Services-->Configure Folder Actions
In that Window, make sure folder actions is enabled and choose "Import Photo" which should appear in the list.

For this to work well, Photos.app needs to be always running on the target computer.

Thanks for this!
It works perfectly when I add files to the watched folder manually, but when the are automatically imported using the Eye-Fi Center, it won't do anything...
Any thoughts?

Thanks natcl for writing this! It's very useful.

Is it possible to go one step further and automatically add the newly imported images to a Shared iCloud as well?

Hello,

I'm not sure shared albums are accessible via AppleScript but you could try changing the name of the destination folder to the name of your shared album:

set DestinationAlbumName to "Shared_album_name"

I checked and I don't think shared albums are available to AppleScript sadly...

thanks for looking into it!

I don't seem to have a Library folder in the path you directed that I put the script - /Users/your_username/Library/Workflows/Applications/Folder Actions/

If I try to create a folder called Library, it says one already exists, but I can't see it using Finder. Any suggestions?

The Library folder is a 'hidden file', so you will need to change your settings to show hidden files and folders. You can search for how to do that. It's a little obtuse :)

FYI
My PC did not have a folder called ~/Library/Workflows, because I have never launch Automator app. After launching it, I could see ~/Library/Workflows/Applications/Folder Actions.

Will this import images as referenced images if you have the option unchecked in Preferences. I made an automator script similar to that and it seems to import the pictures within the Photos library... Thanks !

I tried to use this script to import Camera uploads (dropbox) but Photos reports that an import is already started, is there a way that the import only starts after the folder content is unchanged for x seconds?