How to Upload Photos From Mac to Online Storage

The net was always supposed to give us a hassle-free way to store and manage our stuff — just in practice, even storing photos and videos has remained a massive headache. Just as services like Apple's Photo Stream have popularized the power of deject storage, they accept as well revealed its limitations. Huge RAW image sizes, indistinguishable photos, 1080p videos, and years of library database bloat were all good reasons to merely leave the photos sitting on your hard drive — and pray the drive didn't stop working before you backed it all up.

But as the price of storage has fallen, and broadband access has become more pervasive, more than and more companies are competing to make the cloud the default place to shop your memories. For a few dollars a month and a few hours of upload time, you get features unavailable on most free desktop photo-editing software — and the peace of mind that comes with a cloud backup. These aren't just for pros lugging around DSLRs, either: many of these services are fantastic options for even the most casual photographers looking to back upward the photos from your phone. And they're all better than Facebook for organizing, managing, and even just storing all your shots. Then which app is the all-time for storing and accessing all your media from any device?

We'll take you through 10 top services, from household names similar Dropbox to newcomers like Everpix, highlighting each service's best features while calling out whatsoever deal-breakers along the way. All of these services "work," simply depending on what you lot're looking for (east.k. RAW back up, a search bar, and even adaptive mobile video streaming) i choice might be best for you. But don't worry, we'll list our favorites, as well as a nautical chart at the lesser of the folio for breakdowns of key features and details, compared app by app.

Sticky TOC engaged! Do not remove this!

iCloud Photo Stream

iCloud Photo Stream

Apple's Photograph Stream feature is, similar well-nigh software made by Apple, built for the average person to utilize. It's likewise built for iLifers — people who own iPads, iPhones, and Macs and prefer apps to websites. If you lot're i of these people, Photograph Stream offers a seamless but limited solution to photo storage and syncing.

More than of a photo "syncing" tool than a full-blown storage solution

Photo Stream takes the photos on your iPhone, iPad, and Mac and syncs them beyond all three platforms (there is express Windows functionality via a free control console). Photo Stream effectively delivers an always-upwardly-to-appointment timeline of your 1,000 most recent photos, no affair which device you lot're using. You can share photos using Shared Photo Stream to friends with iOS devices, or create a web-based photo gallery anyone can look at. Information technology accepts RAW images, which pros will appreciate, but information technology doesn't support video.

While Photo Stream but syncs the most recent 1,000 photos between your devices, iPhoto for Mac, which is tied to Photo Stream, holds on to every photo you ever take on your iPhone. It's a quick manner to automatically back up the photos on your iPhone, simply is far from a cloud-storage service for your stuff. Since iOS doesn't (still) let background syncing for third-political party apps, Photo Stream is the merely manner to instantly upload your photos in the background without having to remember to exercise so.

Photo Stream works well, but different every other competitor listed hither, there's no "deject" photograph fill-in, no way to view all your photos except on your personal Mac, no video support, and no apps for non-Apple tree platforms — including the web. It's more of a photo "syncing" tool than a full-diddled storage solution.

Dropbox

Dropbox

After acquiring web photograph-service Snapjoy back in December, Dropbox rolled out a new "photos tab" that acts as a timeline of every single photograph yous've uploaded. It's a peachy mode to visualize all the photos you've already stored on Dropbox, and for the showtime time it'southward made the service expect similar a existent solution for our photo storage woes. You can create albums, share them with friends, and view everything in "Windows Explorer" view if you'd rather drill down into folders.

Dropbox was built starting time on desktops and its mobile photos experience tin be dreadfully wearisome

Where an app like Loom focuses most on its mobile experience, Dropbox was built first on desktops and its mobile photos feel can exist dreadfully slow — especially on older devices — and doesn't offer much in terms of options. Additionally, Dropbox loads all your photos in full resolution, which means they're boring to open and accept upward much more space if you exercise decide to save any. While you can share a selection of photos from your phone, there's no anthology back up, no "relieve for offline" if y'all want to use Dropbox instead of your Camera Roll, and no photo editing. Finally, Dropbox only lets y'all stream the start 15 minutes of whatsoever video y'all've uploaded, which could be a turnoff for some potential users.

If you're already a Dropbox diehard, it's the easy winner hither. The company seems dead-set on crafting an excellent photo storage service, and unlike your average startup, Dropbox isn't going anywhere, which offers some serious peace of mind. Plus information technology offers automatic image backup on your devices with Camera Upload. Yet for those who want a dedicated photo-storage service with a squad of employees working solely on photos, it'due south worth trying out another options.

Everpix

Everpix

Everpix has the fastest, sleekest interface of whatever app we tried. It embraces the inherent construction of your photo library, automatically group items into events by appointment, fourth dimension, and even by the content of your photos (call back "animals").

Everpix tries to hook you with nostalgia

Gratis users can see every photo they've taken for the past twelvemonth, and for $4.99 a calendar month or $49 a year, you tin upload every photo yous've ever taken onto Everpix's servers. (Yous can get some free upgrades hands by connecting your web and iOS accounts, for example, and past uploading photos from your estimator.) Photos can be viewed on the web or on the iOS app; Everpix has likewise released a limited Android app for automatically uploading photos, with a more fully featured app on the style. Similar Loom, Everpix generates smaller versions of each photo for each device you're using, which means yous can save a ton of local storage space.

Everpix tries to hook you with nostalgia, borrowing a page from Timehop. Each day, the service will send you a "flashback" of photos from a year agone. You can besides trade photos within the service using "photo mail service," which will add specific pictures to a friend'south Everpix collection automatically. Its website loads incredibly quickly, and offers several views for browsing your photos, including a gorgeous timeline that loads photos in reverse chronological order as y'all scroll, and a view that only shows photos information technology has imported from Instagram or Facebook. Yet, there'due south no way to create albums online — you can only view photos past engagement, by source (folders you lot've synced from your computer) or using Highlights, a collection of photos that Everpix thinks are your best.

Everpix is barely 2 years old, and it shows in the feature set up: there'south no editing, no video, and no powerful browsing capabilities. Only while the service remains nether construction, the features information technology has built then far are rock-solid and a delight to utilize. Everpix might non take the name recognition that some of its peers exercise — yet — but it's beautifully designed and loaded with potential.

Picturelife

Picturelife

Picturelife is a comprehensive and speedy service for uploading all the photos and videos on your Mac and iOS devices to the cloud. Information technology pulls in both from your various devices, and fifty-fifty services like Facebook and Instagram, making them attainable via mobile apps and a web interface.

While it's not the most elegant or simple service of the bunch, it might have the near complete characteristic set, and it even syncs seamlessly with your existing iPhoto library. It lets y'all view everything yous've uploaded in one timeline, create albums, tag faces in your photos, meet a map filled with photos you've taken, and more, but there'south oddly no manner to view photos from one source. Whereas other services allow you easily meet which photos came from your iPhone and which photos came from your Mac, Picturelife forces y'all to see it all.

Perhaps the all-time approximation of a desktop photo library

Fortunately, Picturelife'south search functionality is excellent, providing at to the lowest degree an indirect route toward separating different sources. You tin search for "pictures taken by an iPhone 5," "pictures from 2008 taken with people," "pictures tagged as 'Family,'" and even "Pictures in New York in Winter." It doesn't always work as expected, but the feature is still miles ahead of most other services' search functionality. Picturelife is powerful — perhaps the all-time approximation of a desktop photo library — but it's not always logical.

Loom

Loom

Loom is an app for Mac and iOS built to store all your photos and sync them betwixt every device you ain. The service bills itself equally the "space camera roll," an online storage solution that's part Dropbox, part Photo Stream. It aims to replicate your photo library on the web, without adding too many additional bells and whistles.

Loom works great as a Photo Stream replacement

Uploaded photos are instantly attainable from the web, likewise every bit from the company's iOS app. On Mac, you lot can cull specific "sources" to upload, or y'all can only drop photos in a Loom folder. Like with Dropbox, photos you upload evidence upwards immediately on your other devices. Peradventure Loom's most useful feature is that information technology frees upwardly storage on your mobile devices by creating dissimilar versions of your photos for each screen size you'll be using. And then, Loom caches photos you oft view on your device so you tin browse them even while you're flight or on the subway. In m total, Loom can free up more than 90 percent of the storage previously reserved for photos and videos on your iPhone or iPad, according to company founder Jan Senderek, while interim a lot like the default iOS Photos app.

Loom works great as a Photo Stream replacement and as an online storage site for the photos on your Mac, but it offers very few additional features, like whatever form of search or editing. Sharing options are as well incredibly rudimentary, and since streaming video is a lot more complicated than compressing photos, Loom won't support viewing video for some other few weeks, at least.

Flickr

Flickr

When Marissa Mayer took over as Yahoo's CEO, the internet responded with a plea: make Flickr awesome over again. Ten months later, Mayer responded with a redesigned site, full-width photos, and a whopping 1TB of costless storage. It came on the heels of a well-received update to the iOS app that combined excellent filters and a redesigned photo feed to make the mobile feel more like Instagram. A more than recent update to the app gives you the ability to customize your filters, and adds a new suite of pro editing tools.

Flickr remains a elevation-notch experience for serious photographers

Flickr remains a top-notch feel for serious photographers. Information technology stores images at multiple resolutions, offers fine-grained privacy controls, and has a public API that integrates the service into dozens of 3rd-political party apps. It'south even begun alluring back some of the users who abased it in recent years as the service savage into fail; those users are helping to recapture some of the social feel that made Flickr an early on leader in photo sharing. Tap the globe icon inside the app, for example, and Flickr will show y'all popular photos both around the world and taken close to your location — a smart and delightful style of using Flickr'due south huge photo library for the do good of its users.

There are still some gaps: Flickr'due south user interface feels sluggish and dated compared to some of its competitors, and the company's app for uploading photos from the desktop hasn't been updated since 2009. There's also the fact that video uploads are capped at 1GB. Still, it's hard to shake the feeling that Flickr is making a comeback.

SkyDrive

SkyDrive

Microsoft'due south SkyDrive is kind of like Windows Explorer, but on the web. It offers a solid 7GB of gratis storage for all files, photos included. Pictures can be sorted into albums, played as a slideshow, or even embedded on tertiary-party websites. Private photos get a beautiful lightbox display — primal metadata is shown in an elegant sidebar complete with people tags, sharing options, and a Bing map showing where the picture was taken. In another overnice bear on, anthology covers are animated, slowly cycling through their contents to aid you pick the right album a lilliputian more easily. Microsoft has released no-frills only functional apps for Android and iOS; if you accept a Windows Telephone, the SkyDrive app will let yous auto-upload your pictures. SkyDrive also offers desktop apps for Windows and Mac.

Feels similar it's built for storing files, not photos

SkyDrive'southward biggest drawback compared to its competitors is that it feels like it's built for storing files, not photos. You lot can't and so much every bit ingather a picture using SkyDrive, never mind adding a filter or a whimsical sticker or caption. For basic photograph storage, SkyDrive is a bully, costless selection — just for anything else, you'll probable want to look elsewhere.

Stream Nation

Stream Nation

Stream Nation is a cloud storage and streaming service for photos and videos, with the emphasis on videos. Stream Nation has large potential and lots of features to boot, but it doesn't have the design sense and open-mindedness to be your storage and streaming solution merely yet.

Enough of features, but more than focused on videos than on photos

When you starting time log in to Stream Nation, yous take the option to import files from your computer, your mobile device, the spider web, your Dropbox, and in an interesting turn, from YouTube, Vimeo, and other video sites. One time some of your content is uploaded, the service transcodes it to various formats so you can access information technology on the go using an iOS device. Photos and videos download and stream quickly on mobile, while taking reward of Netflix-esque adaptive streaming to ensure smooth playback. Features like the power to tag content, check the resolution of a video you're watching, and salvage content for offline viewing on mobile will please power users. Plus, all of your content is backed up not just to Stream Nation, but besides to Amazon servers, which provides some welcome peace of listen.

Stream Nation has plenty of features, but feels more focused on videos than on photos. The service shows a lot of potential, merely for now feels just one-half-broiled.

Google+ Photos

Google+ Photos

In an effort to jumpstart its nascent social network, Google has poured tons of resources into Google+ Photos. The company gives you 15GB of space for free, to be shared across Gmail, Drive, and Google+. That'southward a lot of free storage, and if you choose to upload your photos at "standard size" (two,048 pixels broad) Google won't count it confronting your total amount of available space. (You tin can hands have advantage of this feature by turning on the auto-upload feature on your Android or iOS device.) Dissimilar most of its peers, Google+ too accepts and displays RAW images. If y'all run out of free storage, Google will sell you up to 16TB more. (Prices start at $4.99 for 100GB a month and go upwardly to $799.99 a month for 16TB.)

Google is more interested in y'all sharing your photos than merely storing them

Google's acquisition of Nik Software has resulted in a built-in photo-editing suite that lets you adjust colors, modify the exposure, sharpen the image, utilise Instagram-like filters, or decorate your picture with googly eyes and tiaras. There's also an "automobile awesome" feature that performs a diversity of tricks, the best of which makes a GIF out of related images. The results are sometimes inconsistent, but when it works, information technology's delightful — and something no ane else is doing.

The downside of using Google+ as a photo platform is that it's congenital into Google+. Information technology'due south always a chip nerve-racking to upload all your personal photos to a social network, no thing how granular the privacy controls are. Google is more interested in you lot sharing your photos than simply storing them, and the network's heavily promoted circles are still fashion more trouble to manage than the company will admit. Still, Google+ is ane of the about robust cross-platform photograph solutions bachelor.

SmugMug

SmugMug

Long a favorite of professional and semi-pro photographers, SmugMug refreshed its look last month to remove visual ataxia and permit photographers to customize their portfolios more easily. Photographers can now choose from 24 clean, elegant themes, and changing them up is as like shooting fish in a barrel every bit clicking a push button. Customization options don't stop there, either — the company has created a set of powerful tools that let you do everything from inserting a custom logo to adjusting the margins of your page.

Dissimilar the other services reviewed here, SmugMug doesn't have a free tier. After a 14-day trial, you'll have to pay $twoscore a twelvemonth for a bones plan and as much as $300 if you plan to sell your photos directly through the site. And if you want to upload files in RAW, or upload any file bigger than 50MB, you lot'll need to buy a separate SmugVault subscription to handle the storage. Information technology'll likely only toll you another few dollars a calendar month, depending on how much storage y'all demand, only it feels like a cheap move for a site that caters to professionals and the huge photos they have.

Information technology'southward a site created by professionals, for professionals

SmugMug offers Camera Crawly on iOS: an app that comes with a variety of filters and editing tools, with some free and others paid. On Android, you'll find an official SmugMug app that offers a fuller experience. If SmugMug feels a chip less social than some of its peers, that'due south by design: this is a site created by professionals, for professionals. Simply if the primary thing you need is a great-looking manner to showcase your photos on the web — and don't mind paying for it — SmugMug is worth a wait.

The Verdict

The Verdict

Power user choice: Picturelife
Average user selection: Everpix
Free option: Google+

Are yous a casual lensman looking for cheap, easy, space storage? Or are yous more than serious, seeking a professional person-grade feature prepare for editing, displaying, and fifty-fifty selling your piece of work? How you answer that question will assist you lot decide which photo-storage solution is for you. Our favorites were a couple of relative newcomers: Picturelife, which boasts the most complete feature set of the services we looked at; and Everpix, which earned top marks for its design, ease of apply, and emphasis on helping you really savour all the photos you've taken. Both are relatively inexpensive; Everpix will basically requite you a free ii-yr trial just for downloading the desktop app, uploading some photos, and linking it to your smartphone.

While it'due south not perfect, deject storage is finally a reality

They're non perfect: Picturelife's design leaves much to be desired, and Everpix has some painful characteristic gaps, starting with its inability to display videos or RAW files. But they're also immature, and iterating at a rapid clip. Other photographers will desire to closely evaluate Google+ and Flickr, which cater to those who want more fine-grained controls for editing photos, creating albums, and sharing them. But what yous proceeds in features with those services you lose in speed and ease of employ. At that place's no all-encompassing photo and video storage service quite yet.

Ultimately, storing and managing a large photo library withal takes way more work than it should. But while information technology's not perfect, cloud storage is finally a reality. Backing upward your photos will bring you real peace of mind, and your options are getting better all the time.

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Source: https://www.theverge.com/2013/8/29/4560364/best-cloud-storage-photo-apps

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