How to cull hundreds of event photos on a Mac

The slow part of an event shoot isn't editing; it's finding the fifty usable frames among hundreds. This workflow runs in Flipic alone, with no catalog import.

1. Let the app find the obvious rejects

Open the folder in Flipic and press ⇧⌘K for Cleanup Mode (Beta). It checks every photo on your Mac and groups similar bursts, exact duplicates, closed eyes and blurry or out-of-focus shots, suggesting the sharpest blink-free frame of each burst.

Nothing is deleted until you press Move to Trash, and ⌘Z undoes it. Detection can be wrong, so look before you delete.

2. Page through and rate

Press → through what's left and 1–5 to rate. Rest the pointer on a face and press 0 to check focus at 100%. Or run a slideshow, click to pause on a good one, rate it, click to resume.

Ratings are standard XMP: inside JPEG and HEIC files, in a same-name .xmp sidecar for proprietary RAW, leaving the RAW untouched.

3. Hand the keepers to your editor

Choose Lightroom, Photoshop or Capture One in Settings and press ⌘E on a photo to open it there, the RAW if one sits next to the JPEG. Lightroom picks up the star ratings on import, so you can filter by them right away.