Image Capture not seeing all photos on iPhone

louis86 wrote: … Image Capture is not seeing recent photos on iPhone.

That is most curious! Maybe we can narrow it down.

• Is there a specific date that starts this?
• Are these pictures .jpeg or .heic, or both?
• Are you using iCloud? If so, do you use Optimize Storage?
• Have you done a force re-start on the phone?

Force restart iPhone - Apple Support

This is different from a simple Power Off. I had to continue holding the button down past the "slide to power off" message, and then I released the button only after  the Apple Logo appeared indicating a re-start. 

• Have you tried Re-starting the Mac in Safe Mode? This bypasses certain potentially disruptive processes, and it often helps. Safe Mode is different for different computers, so see this: 

           Start up your Mac in safe mode - Apple Support 

Image Capture has been around for decades, and I'm not sure that Apple spends much time on it. I've seem some strange things that I can't account for, but this is new.

louis86 wrote:

Force restarted iPhone and Safe Mode started Mac, had no effect. Took some new photos after this and Image Capture does not see them.

I can get the photos by Image Capture on our other iMac to HDcard

Maybe Image Capture preferences are corrupted on that Mac? Try to move the following files to the Desktop (just in case before deleting them) and reboot and try again:

~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.Image_Capture.plist

~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.imagecapture.plist

Also do not use any 3rd part virus apps or "cleaners" because they often produce obscure errors and corruption. macOS built-in security is all you need.

There are two kinds of photos, that cannot be downloaded manually from the iPhone:

• Photos synced with iCloud Photos - if you are using iCloud Photos on the iPhone, you will get random results, because Image Capture can only show you the photos that have been downloaded from iCloud, but not the optimized versions. have you checked, if iCloud Photos has become enabled on the iPhone?
• and, as Matti already has pointed out, syncing with Image Capture is i one-way only. We can sync photos to the iPhone, but cannot sync them back. we have always to keep the high resolution originals of the synced albums on our Mac, if we want to keep these photo.

There may also be photos shared with you, that are shown in Photos on the iPhone but have not yet been saved tp Photos, so Image Capture may not show them.

Here are the standard troubleshooting first steps (that we maybe should have started with:)

To narrow things down, try these steps:

• Restart the computer (of course)
• Re-start in Safe Mode. This bypasses certain potentially disruptive processes, and it often helps. Safe Mode is different for different computers, so see this: 

           Start up your Mac in safe mode - Apple Support 

• Rebuild your Photos Library--close Photos and re-launch by option-command-clicking the app icon. If you use iCloud Photos, it’s possible that this will cause a re-sync that lasts long enough to make you nervous.
• Use another library if you have one, or make a small test Library with a few pictures in it and see if the same thing happens. You can create a new Library by closing Photos and then option-clicking on the Photos icon.
• Make a new user and see if the same problem recurs with it. 

For the iPhone, try a forced restart:

Force restart iPhone - Apple Support

This is different from a simple Power Off. I had to continue holding the button down past the "slide to power off" message, and then I released the button only after  the Apple Logo appeared indicating a re-start. 

The idea is to find out if the problem is with the Library, with your account, or with caches and login items, and stuff like that. One of these steps may fix the problem, but their failure to work also helps figure out what's happening.

louis86 wrote: …Unfortunately my iMac can't go beyond Ventura. And ImageCapture had been working OK with it until last month.

I think we knew that. The latest Ventura update, from August 20, is macOS Ventura 13.7.8, which is not what you listed. You should try an update…

Crazy!

The one thing that I see that's different is that you're running Ventura, an older OS and older version Image Capture trying to read from a newer iOS might be the problem, but it's not supposed to happen. That's hard to test. I have older computers, but I'm not there right now to test. I don't have anything running Ventura, though.

I'll let you know if I can reproduce this…

I have a computer using Big Sur, and Image Capture works on it with my iPhone 16.

So, what else is different about your computer for your phone? How much free storage do you have on each? Do they each of 10% of their storage free?

Wow-- it's great you caught that! I had said, "Any other apps that, like "cleaners," that access all files? 3rd party searchers?" I guess I should have included "anti-virus" apps, though I don't know if I can list everything that accesses all files. Those things are not only useless on a Mac, they can cause damage. Good work!

I just checked, and it works for me, as usual. I'm using 15.6, but it shouldn't matter, I wouldn't think.

It sounds like you've done this before in Ventura and iOS 18, and it worked-- is that right?

Hidden pictures don't appear, by the way.

louis86 wrote: …I do have Bitfender and Malwarebytes but have them turned off. Based on advice from you and others I will probably remove them. Turning them off did not fix the Image Capture problem. 

Good idea!

You have me double checking-- but Image Capture still works for me, even with recent pictures. What's different?

What iPhone do you have? Do you have any other Image capture or processing apps? Any other apps that, like "cleaners," that access all files? 3rd party searchers? on iPhone or on Mac?