Amazon Drive Failed to Upload Cloud Cam
Earlier this year Amazon appear "unlimited storage of images" for subscribers to their Amazon Prime service. (Prime is called "Premium" in some countries.)
Amazon Prime is a subscription service that currently costs 49 euros 50 euros per calendar month in French republic. The cost is similar in other countries, eastward.grand. USD 50 in the USA. Prime gives you a number of premium services from Amazon. Exactly which services that are included depends on the Amazon site y'all subscribe to (or perhaps the country where you are), mainly:
- Ane day commitment at no cost, for some products
- Access to some Kindle books (only you must have an Amazon Kindle)
- Access to some movies and TV shows (this is not bachelor in France though)
- Unlimited music streaming
And, most important for this article and for you lot (and me) as a photographer:
- Unlimited photo storage. This is included in the Amazon Deject Bulldoze service.
Is online backup a viable option?
As a professional person lensman (or serious apprentice) you must have a backup strategy for your photos. Your backup strategy should have several "levels", i.e. include several dissimilar copies of your images.
At least 1 of the copies of your images must be stored in a different location. You should not accept all backups in the function or at abode. What if information technology burns down? Or…?
Currently I have ane re-create of my backups stored in a depository financial institution safety deposit box. I bandy it out with an updated copy every so often (not often enough though).
As online storage is condign more easily available, is information technology a viable option?
There accept been two chief hurdles for online storage:
Cost
Even if prices have gone down it is all the same expensive if y'all have a substantial photo archive. My annal currently includes this:
- More than 140,000 original RAW files
- Over xl,000 "developed" (processed) tiff files
- Around five terabyte (TB) of data
Fifty-fifty with a "cheap" service like Dropbox this would cost something similar more than $700 per year, information technology seems. That tin instead purchase me another brand new file server, every year.
If yet, I get "unlimited" space for a reasonable cost then the price is no longer an issue.
Speed
With this kind of volumes it tin accept some time to upload things over the net. With a traditional ADSL connection it would hardly be feasible. It would just have besides long.
Only if yous have access to a fibre internet connectedness, which is becoming more than and more frequent, speed has improved very much. Exactly how much can sometimes exist difficult to know exactly. This was one of the things that I decided to test with Amazon.
If the upload speed is sufficient online storage can exist viable.
Does "unlimited" really hateful "unlimited"?
But does "unlimited" really hateful "unlimited"? If, for example, the online storage is simply divers every bit a mirror of a binder on your calculator (as e.yard. a Google Bulldoze folder on your computer or Box) then unlimited is non really unlimited, and so it is express past the size of that folder on your local hard disk.
An online storage for photo archiving purposes must exist contained of any unmarried physical drive that you have locally. I have my photos on two file servers attached to our local network. You might also take photo storage that are detached, e.m. drives that are not permanently on the network.
Therefore some of the "unlimited" storage services are non really unlimited.
Just in this respect Amazon Prime actually does offer you unlimited photo storage. You can upload whatever you want to Amazon Deject Drive and it is not a mirror of annihilation that y'all accept stored locally. (This, however, leads to another trouble that I'll come back to below.)
1 indicate to Amazon!
What is a "photo" on Amazon Cloud Drive?
Another important question for a photographer is if you can store all image file types on the Amazon Cloud Drive, or more correctly, if all relevant image file formats are included in the "unlimited" adding? For instance: jpeg, tiff, raw files of different camera formats, Photoshop PSD etc. Or is it limited just to "consumer type" files like jpegs?
The answer is aye, all of these file types are included.
On the Amazon help pages they have the full list of file extensions that qualify as image files.
One bespeak to Amazon!
For other file types, for example video (that is not considered as images!), you have v GB of storage.
Amazon Ts & Cs
In the Amazon Terms and Atmospheric condition it says that the Cloud Drive storage tin can merely be used for personal use and not for business concern. Does this mean that if you are a photographer you cannot utilize it every bit an annal? After all, photography is your business…
This is clearly a very important bespeak. Y'all don't want to be breaking the terms of the agreement.
It has been discussed in several places and some people have also contacted Amazon client back up and asked the question. The reply from Amazon is comforting: Amazon has responded that if you are simply using information technology to annal your photos then information technology is OK. Google it and you will find some discussion threads that deal with this.
1 betoken to Amazon!
My guess is that if you instead use it for delivery of images to customers or other type of "front end" services in your business (sharing pictures with customers, mayhap), and so it might be a violation of the terms. Worth keeping in mind.
Then how does it piece of work, using Amazon Prime number and Cloud Drive for online photograph storage?
I decided to go ahead to examination it. I signed upwards for Amazon Prime with my French Amazon business relationship (I'1000 based in France). Perchance I should take used my Amazon.com account instead so I would have had admission to the wider range of services that they have. On the other manus, that might have been a violation of terms perhaps.
It was very easy to sign up and you even accept a 30 twenty-four hours costless trial menstruation.
And I started uploading.
Desktop and browser admission
You lot tin admission Amazon Cloud Drive either through a browser or with a desktop app that you download from Amazon.
I quickly ended that using the desktop app was useless. Information technology only gives y'all the possiblilty to upload files to the root of the Cloud Drive. For anything else it simply redirects you to a browser window. Not very useful.
Instead I use the browser interface that looks like this:
I decided to go on exactly the same folder structure (bureaucracy) that I take on my file servers then that information technology would be easier to keep rails of the images. This means I created three Amazon Cloud drive folders: 01-01, 01-02, and 01-02 that correspond to the iii file server units where I store images. Nether these top-level folders I have kept exactly the aforementioned organisation every bit on my file servers (in fact, to the extent you upload folder hierarchies, this is done automatically):
Hither y'all tin can see one first annoyance with Amazon Cloud Drive: information technology organises everything past default by "appointment added" in opposite order. Perhaps understandable for personal use where you lot want the most recent things first. Windows, notwithstanding, organises everything alphabetically. Well, yous simply have to click on the heading on Cloud Drive every time. Easy but annoying.
Uploading is very like shooting fish in a barrel:
- You position yourself in the folder where yous desire the files to be placed on Cloud Drive,
- Click on the plus icon on Cloud drive and
- Just drag and drop files from your computer binder to the Deject Drive
After the upload is completed you get a confirmation message giving the number of files uploaded.
One Of import matter:
You tin upload folders to Deject Drive and all files and sub-folders volition exist uploaded with the same bureaucracy. Yet, this folder upload seems not to piece of work with Mozilla Firefox. Just it works fine with Google Chrome. With Chrome you lot tin upload folders and folder hierarchies in one become. Or maybe it is some conflict with a Firefox extension? I much prefer Firefox, information technology's my standard browser, merely it is not a big issue to utilise Chrome for Amazon Cloud Drive.
File upload errors
Every once in a while I had an upload error. One file (or sometimes a handful) did non upload. Cloud Drive gives you an error bulletin and you tin then upload the failed file(s) separately.
This, however, mean some other very important thing: after each upload you must check the result. You must verify that all files were uploaded OK. If your calculator shuts down during or after the upload (nighttime time fill-in with shut-down choice, for case) then you lot volition non know if all files were uploaded or non.
Overall this was very easy.
How much time did information technology take?
It took quite a while to upload all my images but it nevertheless went quite smoothly. I uploaded small amounts of files (grand-5000) in each batch and let it run in the groundwork. Either during the 24-hour interval when working on other things or overnight for bigger batches.
As an example information technology took around 4 hours to upload grand files in a batch of 24GB. I imagine the time will be dissimilar depending on the file size, upload speed and perchance as well on other traffic parameters. My files range from 18MB to well over 50MB.
Later on having washed uploads over a few weeks, not continuously of course, but when I had the time, information technology is now all uploaded. It went smoother than I expected. And I have had no complaints from Amazon, nor any deterioration of service equally far as I can come across.
Issues, weakness and improvements
No syncing
The biggest weakness is that at that place is no way of knowing if a binder on Cloud Drive is properly replicating what is in the same folder on my file server. The only way to practice that is to cheque manually each and every binder.
No file and folder information
On Deject Drive you get only ii pieces of information:
- How many images you accept in total
- How many items in that location is in the folder that y'all are currently in
(You also become the date added for files and folder, likewise as appointment added and size for individual files.)
This means that it is very difficult to verify the contents on Cloud Drive.
For example: Amazon Cloud Drive tells me that I accept 183,076 image files uploaded. If I bank check with Windows > Folder Properties or a tool similar WinDirStat (a very useful tool!) I tin can see that on my file servers I take 183,079 files.
There are three files missing on Amazon Cloud Drive and the only mode of checking which files that is is to go through every single folder manually and check the number of files.
Hopefully Amazon will open an API for Cloud Drive and some clever programmer will develop a syncing or simply a file comparison tool to compare folder. Beyond Compare is ane such tool that is very handy on Windows but it obviously does non piece of work on Amazon Cloud Drive.
No log file for uploads
It would be a not bad comeback if afterward each upload Amazon sent the user a log file (or gave it as an option).
Sort gild not sticky
I would like the sort guild to exist sticky. I always want my files and folder to be sorted alphabetically but Amazon Cloud Bulldoze always does it in contrary chronological order. Each time I open a new folder I have to alter that setting. I wish it was gluey.
Some more statistics and search tools needed
It would be useful to get some more statistics on what is stored on the drive, eg. number of files of different file types. And perchance to be able to brandish folder hierarchies, not simply ane folder at the time.
It would also be useful with some more clever search tools, eg. to be able to search on file extension merely.
What more?
Do you take any more suggestions? Write a comment!
Determination: yes, it IS a feasible option!
After these initial tests I recall Amazon Prime's Cloud Drive is a decent culling for an online backup archive. It is far from perfect only quite good.
Y'all will have to do a lot of things manually, eg recollect to upload new files to Amazon Deject Drive.
And more than chiefly: y'all also take to remember to upload files if you change them in your local archive! If, for example you add metadata to existing files in your archive then you lot will take to upload those inverse files to Amazon Cloud Drive. That will be a tricky and fourth dimension consuming task I fear. Would be made simpler with some kind of syncing or file/folder comparison tool.
Should you go "all in the cloud" now?
So Amazon Prime number unlimited photo storage is swell news for photographers. But I would never ever use information technology every bit the main or the but annal. Yous must take your own local archive in your role/home that should be your primary archive. That should contain all your files and also all your metadata. (This means that yous should non keyword and add descriptions only on an online service, like eg. Photoshelter.) Google "Digital Railroad" if you lot wonder why.
What are the alternatives?
There are a few alternatives to Amazon Deject Drive.
The most interesting ane is Photoshelter's recently announced unlimited storage for their Pro account. The cost tag is much bigger but for a photography business the other services that they offer – having a photography site, online customer-facing archive, brandish, sales features etc, etc – can easily motivate the actress cost.
Or possibly you are, like me, already a Photoshelter customer then the price is effectively zero.
I will be sure to test that in the coming weeks, so come back later and read more than nearly it.
At that place is also Google Drive for work, part of Google Apps. For an organization of at least 5 users and for a price of $10 per month, i.e. $600 per year, in case you lot are not however a client at that level, y'all go "unlimited" storage.
Any other services you would recommend?
Source: https://www.bkwinephotography.com/technology/using-amazon-prime-premium-unlimited-for-photo-backup-and-archiving/
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