14 Foolproof Ways to Keep Your Photos Safe in the Cloud

A few weeks ago, I experienced every photographer's worst nightmare. My external hard drive got disconnected while I was in the middle of editing in Aperture, my data was corrupted, and a library repair failed. Suddenly, the more than 10,000 photos I'd been collecting since I was kid were gone.

I'm not a complete idiot—I had a backup. Unfortunately, it was six months out of date and missing hundreds of newer photos and videos. That's when it hit me: If I'd just spent a few dollars each month on a photo storage service, I could have avoided this disaster.

So I've spent the last couple weeks comparing photo storage service in search of the one that best meets my needs. I've examined everything from Google+ to Flickr, Ipernity to Smugmug, and found that there are solutions for just about everyone. Here's a rundown of the top options, and how they can best serve you.

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500px

Best for:Professionals
Key Features:投资组合工具，销售，多平台
Pricing Tiers:20 Photos per week, Free; Unlimited, $25/year; Portfolio, $75/year; Adobe Bundle, $165/year

500pxis essentiallyFlickrwith an even sexier interface and more pro-friendly options. On top of portfolio and sales features, the service even has a deal with Adobe that bundles a subscription to Adobe Creative Cloud (Photoshop + Lightroom) with an unlimited subscription to 500px.

Unfortunately, 500px doesn't support RAW files, video, or auto-upload. That said, its quality-to-quantity ratio is unmatched, since the site has amassed an unrivaled community of skilled enthusiast photographers. It also has one of the cheapest unlimited storage plans, starting at just $25 per year.

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Adobe Revel

Best for:消费者
Key Features:自动上传，编辑工具，多平台，原始支持，视频支持
Pricing Tiers:2 GB，免费；Unlimited, $6/month

Considering it's an Adobe product that connects to Photoshop and Lightroom, it's perhaps a bit surprising that Revel doesn't include more pro features. It's targeted squarely at consumers, offering apps for every platform, video and RAW support, and even some lightweight editing features.

Revel gives you 2GB of free storage, which you'll burn through quickly. Your only other option is an unlimited plan that costs $6 per month.

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Amazon Cloud Drive

Best for:消费者
Key Features:自动上传，多平台，原始支持，视频支持
Pricing Tiers:无限的照片，每年$ 99;5 GB，免费；20 GB，每年10美元；50 GB，每年25美元；100 GB，每年50美元；200 GB，每年100美元；500 GB，每年250美元；1 TB，$ 500/年

在过去的几年中，Cloud Drive已成为一个令人惊讶的强大选择。虽然它没有提供针对专业人士的任何东西，但does为Amazon Prime订户提供大量基本存储。

您的每年$ 99为您提供云驱动器中无限的照片存储，以及亚马逊即时视频流，每月的Kindle书籍优惠和免费的为期两天的运输。该服务甚至支持一些原始格式和基本视频。一个缺点：视频（和某些原始文件）不会与照片相同的无限伞，这意味着摄影师将不得不为额外的每月存储费用而付出小马。

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Dropbox Carousel

Best for:消费者
Key Features:Automatic Uploading, Mobile Apps, Video Support
Pricing Tiers:5 GB，免费；1 TB, $9/month

Despite its distinct name and branding, Carousel is essentially just a photo viewer for images stored in your Dropbox account. Still, it offers some nice sharing features and can automatically upload photos from all of your devices. With the focus being primarily on social media and hassle-free backup, this is a service clearly aimed at amateurs and smartphone photographers.

With that in mind, the only real downside is Dropbox's limited storage tiers. You either get 5 GB free, or have to pay $9 per month for 1 TB. Competitors like Apple and Google offer far more varied tiers and price points.

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Flickr

Best for:Prosumers?
Key Features:Automatic Uploading, Editing Tools, Mobile Apps
Pricing Tiers:1 TB，免费；免费广告，每年50美元或每月$ 6;2 TB，$ 500/年

Marissa Mayer has made a lot of changes during her brief tenure at Yahoo, but perhaps her greatest accomplishment has been giving Flickr a much-needed facelift. The class-leading social photography service now sports a world-class web presentation andglossy mobile app, but the biggest game-changer is its freeterabyteof storage.

Still, Flickr has its faults. Video support is rudimentary, there's no RAW support at all, and photo upload and organization tools are woefully limited. The new Camera Roll feature chronologically organizes your photos, and there's a new Flickr Uploadr for Mac, but both are still in public beta.

But when you get 1 TB for free, I guess you can't really complain.

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Google+照片

Best for:消费者
Key Features:Automatic Uploading, Editing Tools, Mobile Apps, RAW Support, Video Support
Pricing Tiers:Unlimited Low-Res & 15 min. video, Free; 15 GB, Free; 100 GB, $2/month; 1 TB, $10/month; 10 TB, $100/month; 20 TB, $200/month; 30 TB, $300/month

谷歌+ might be a barren wasteland as a social network, but it offers one of the best photo storage solutions out there—far better than Facebook.

该服务将自动上传来自所有设备的照片，并具有一些强大的编辑功能。万搏体育官网网址最酷的是“自动真棒”功能，它会自动为您的自动上计划照片添加效果和增强功能。我个人最喜欢的是一种闪烁的效果，它添加到了光明的圣诞树的图片中。（不用担心...如果您不喜欢，可以轻松删除效果。）

至于存储，Google提供了很多选项。如果您只想将其用于紧急备份，则无限的免费存储空间可用于2048px分辨率的照片和长度以下15分钟的视频。如果您需要更好的质量备份，则可以免费获得15 GB的通用存储空间。从那里，您可以将四个中间层一直延伸到30 TB。

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iCloud Photo Library

Best for:消费者
Key Features:Automatic Uploading, Editing Tools, Mobile Apps, RAW Support, Video Support
Pricing Tiers:5 GB，免费；20GB, $1/month; 200 GB, $4/month; 500 GB, $10/month; 1 TB, $20/month

苹果可能通过杀死光圈来拒绝其专业用户，但是与笨拙的旧iPhoto相比，iCloud图片库对于普通消费者来说是一个更好的解决方案。该服务会自动上传您的所有新照片，包括非破坏性编辑工具，甚至支持原始文件和视频。但是，有一些显着的缺点。

For one thing, the service is still in beta for iOS devices, and Apple has yet to release an app for Mac—it won't be available until later this spring. Then there's the fact that the service naturally only works for Apple users. And when it comes to cost,谷歌andDropbox都是便宜的解决方案。

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Ipernity

Best for:消费者
Key Features:Mobile Apps, Video Support
Pricing Tiers:200 MB per month, Free; Unlimited, $30/year

The majority ofFlickr用户欢呼玛丽莎·梅耶（Marissa Mayer）对Flickr的大修，但总会有人讨厌变化。在这种情况下，许多仇恨者离开了Flickr并加入了Ipernity。

The service lacks a lot of the bells and whistles of its competitors, providing only mobile apps, a desktop upload tool, and basic video support. But you get unlimited storage for $30 per year—can't argue with that.

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Photobucket

Best for:消费者
Key Features:Automatic Uploading, Editing Tools, Mobile Apps
Pricing Tiers:2 GB，免费；免费广告，每年10美元；20 GB，每年30美元；50 GB，每年50美元；100 GB，每年$ 90;200 GB，每年170美元；500 GB，$ 400/年

啊，Photobucket。您可能已经忘记了古老的照片托管服务 - 诸如Imgur之类的更好的即时共享网站过时了 - 但它仍然存在，实际上提供了一些坚实的存储计划。

Editing tools, automatic uploads, mobile apps, and a desktop upload tool are all here, but there are some serious shortcomings. Photobucket has no RAW upload capability, limited video support, and its storage prices are more expensive than rival services.

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Picturelife

Best for:消费者
Key Features:自动上传，移动应用程序，原始支持，视频支持
Pricing Tiers:8 GB，免费；25 GB，每年50美元；100 GB，每年100美元；无限，每年150美元

Picturelifeis yet another consumer-oriented service. It lacks portfolio, sales, and editing features, but makes up for it with auto-uploads and mobile apps. The service also has a desktop upload tool, and gives you 8 GB to start.

最大的缺点是成本。一个无限计划的费用为每年150美元，这是500px无限计划的成本的六倍。

Picturelifewas recently acquired byStreamNation, but the new owners haven't made any significant changes to the service.

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Shoebox

Best for:消费者
Key Features:Automatic Uploading, Multi-Platform
Pricing Tiers:Unlimited Low-Res, Free; Unlimited, $5/month

Shoebox is another startup similar in principle toPicturelifeandDropbox Carousel。它具有一个针对每个主要平台的应用程序，并且具有自动图上功能。视频支持是在Android上的Beta中，即将到达其他平台，但是没有原始支持或专业功能。万搏体育官网网址

Similar to Google+ Photos, Shoebox has an unlimited free option that stores photos at 1024px, as well as an unlimited full-resolution option at $5 per month.

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自鸣得意

Best for:Professionals
Key Features:Portfolio Features, Sales, Mobile Apps, RAW Support, Video Support
Pricing Tiers:无限，每年40美元；投资组合，每年60美元；销售，每年150美元；业务，每年300美元

自鸣得意is another great option for professionals trying to grow a business around their work. The family-owned and operated service is a little pricey—$60 per year to customize your portfolio and $150 per year to sell photos—but offers excellent customer service and some slick-looking gallery templates.

每年40美元的基本计划非常健壮，在Smugmug.com上提供了健康的定制选项和您自己的子域。每个计划都提供无限制的JPEG上传，每张照片的文件尺寸最高为50MB，视频长达20分钟。Smugmug还为Aperture和Lightroom等程序提供了不错的移动应用程序和多个桌面上传插件。RAW support根据您要上传的数量，每月将花费您每月额外几美分。

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StreamNation

Best for:消费者
Key Features:自动上传，移动应用程序，原始支持，视频支持
Pricing Tiers:20 GB免费;100 GB, 48美元/年;500 GB, 108美元/年;1 TB, $168/year; Unlimited, $228/year

This startup bills itself as a one-stop backup service for all of your digital media. Since photos are a big part of that equation, the service has a desktop uploading tool that works with Aperture, iPhoto, Lightroom, and even iTunes. StreamNation will also connect to all your photo-oriented social networks (like Instagram and Flickr), and cloud storage services like Google Drive and Microsoft OneDrive.

最大的缺点？它的价格高于竞争对手Dropbox,iCloud, and谷歌+。尽管如此，考虑到它可以从中获取多少不同的资源以及可以处理多少种不同类型的文件，这可能值得额外的成本。

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Zenfolio

Best for:Professionals
Key Features:投资组合工具，销售，移动应用程序，视频支持，原始支持
Pricing Tiers:4 GB + 2 GB/年，每年$ 30;无限存储，每年60美元；托管网站，每年140美元；商业功能，每年30万搏体育官网网址0美元

Unless you're a professional photographer, you've probably never heard of Zenfolio. The service is great for pros, as it offers the ability to create a portfolio website and sell photos with very little fuss. RAW and video support, as well as upload plugins for Aperture and Lightroom, are other features that make it very easy for working shooters to integrate Zenfolio into their workflow.

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RELATED:You Should Print Your Digital Photos

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Which did I end up with? Ultimately, I chose two of the consumer-grade solutions—Google+ Photos and iCloud Photo Library. I'm not a professional, so I don't really need the extras offered by the likes of 500px or SmugMug.

I currently take a lot more photos and videos than I have time to edit, which makes Google's "Auto Awesome" feature perfect for me. G+ also does a great job of highlighting my best shots, making it easy to pick which ones to show friends and family. I also ended up adding a 20GB iCloud plan, since I take a lot of photos with my iPhone and prefer its granular editing tools to Google's.

But the beauty of these solutions is that they cater to all sorts of different needs. What will you choose?

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