Seeking Photos app alternative

sumacfam wrote:

I want to use my own organization system, not what PHOTOS thinks I want. I have no need for the COLLECTIONS features, but I have no way to disable it.

Import via /Applications/Image Capture.app. Put images and movies in Finder folders and browse via Finder QuickLook (select image(s) and hit space bar to view and down/up arrows to browse).

If needed, use some 3rd party app like GraphicConverter to edit metadata (dates, locations, captions, keywords, file names etc) and pixel data or maybe also to browse those Finder folders.

Backup with Time Machine or Carbon Copy Cloner.

sumacfam wrote: I want to use my own organization system, not what PHOTOS thinks I want. I have no need for the COLLECTIONS features, but I have no way to disable it

In macO.S26, Memories, Trips, and all that stuff in in a Collections section that isn't shown unless you want it. Stuff you actually use can be put in Pinned, and that has a little open/close arrow so that you don't have to see it when you don't want:

I have stuff in Pinned that I might use, but mostly it stays closed, and Albums is the first open grouping that I see. Utilities is now at the end, after albums. I use Recently Saved a lot, so I've put it in Pinned at the top. Since it stays closed, I sometimes forget what's there, though. I can't believe I've forgotten Sequoia already, but I don't remember having to look at that stuff, anyway.

I'm not sure at all what organization system you need, but Photos seems tremendously adaptable. You can pull folders in from Finder, and they automatically assume the same hierarchy, for instance. Smart Albums allow us to achieve almost any sort of grouping. Perhaps it would help if you looked at this:

Organizing photos with Folders & Albums - Apple Community

People use Photos for hundreds of pictures to hundreds of thousands of pictures. The Library that I share with my phone and iPad has about 16000 "favorite" pictures, but I have archive Libraries, as well.

What's your budget?

How many items in your library? How much does it grow annually?

You shooting raw or Jpeg? Phone or Camera? Point & Shoot or DSLR?Mirrorless?

What features do you want that Photos has, and in addition to those.

Answer those and we might be able to point you in a direction.

I haven't found anything especially disturbing about Tahoe. But then, I just go on doing my stuff.

Finder is great at managing files, but it can't take advantage of the special attributes of images. Photos is an Image Management System, and so it offers organization opportunities that are just not available for a system designed for other things. You can certainly make lists in Word, but to take advantage of lists of numbers and calculations, you use a Spreadsheet. You don't want to be limited by the wrong kind of organization options.

sumacfam wrote: … I have scanned a lot of old family photos to restore.

That's an ongoing (apparently never-ending) project. I've been scanning old family pictures, as well-- some going back to the 1870s.

Of course, the only date that the scanner knows is the date of scanning, so it's a bit of work to determine the actual capture dates of the pictures and enter those. Photos provides fields to enter Titles, Captions, and Keywords to help, and I use Titles and Captions for dates, especially trial dates until I can narrow it down. But the dates themselves can be changed, and Photos allows that, as well.

Images can contain information in "metadata" that is unique to pictures, and that information, like Capture Date, Captions, and so on, travels with the picture and can be used by other image viewers. File managers like Finder, designed for a variety of files that don't have this kind of metadata, generally ignore it.

That's not much information. What is it you want to do that's different?

Thanks for telling us what you don't want. It would be helpful if you answered the questions posed.