Photo Library Management Options (June 2021)

 Now that Google has stopped offering unlimited photo and video storage (June 2021), I have had to reassess the options.

What I want a photo management system to do is:

• automatically synchronise online and offline photos
• allow choice of which photos are synchronised
• offer an offline local app to view, search, edit and manage the photo library
• allow meta tagging of photos consistent with EXIF standards (so that images shared outside the system carry this data with them
• perform facial recognition on photos and movies to maket easier
• perform content analysis on photos to make tagging easier
• enable sharing between family member, with friends, and even publically.
• have low pricing

None of the systems on offer has all these features.

Amazon Photos

• DOES automatically synchronise online and offline photos using Amazon Photos App. 
• DOES NOT OFFER an offline local app to view, search, edit and manage the photo library.  There is no desktop app. ie. Amazon offers only a website view of your library.  The mobile apps also use the cloud versions of photos to operate.
• DOES allow choice of which photos are synchronised (because it only stores photos that have you choose to synchronise or upload.  There is also automatic upload (not synchronisation) from mobile devices into the cloud photo library.
• DOES NOT allow meta tagging of photos consistent with EXIF standards (so that images shared outside the system carry this data with them). 
• DOES NOT perform facial recognition on photos and movies to make tagging easier
• DOES NOT perform content analysis on photos to make tagging easier.
• DOES NOT have any search capability !!!!!
• DOES NOT provide sharing options.
• DOES have low pricing but with unusual features: 
• 1Tb for AU$110 per year, BUT
• If you are a Amazon Prime member (it is NOT enough to just be a Amazon Prime Video member), you get unlimited photo storage, but only 5Gb for movies (which is totally inadequate for most members).

Amazon's "honey" is, not unexpectedly, cheap storage (i.e. unlimited photos).  They provide little "value adding" to their storage offer making them a poor choice for photo library management.

Google Photos

• DOES NOT OFFER automatic synchronisation of any online and offline photos.  Some third party apps have attempted this but they all fail.
• DOES NOT OFFER an offline local app to view, search, edit and manage the photo library.  There is no desktop app. ie.e Google offers only a website view of your library.  The mobile apps also use the cloud versions of photos to operate.
• DOES allow choice of which photos are synchronised (because it only stores photos that have you choose to upload i.e. there is no automatic synchronisation from a designated local offline folder.  There is automatic upload (not synchronisation) from mobile devices into the cloud photo library.
• DOES allow very limited EXIF editing (date, description/caption, location).  Does NOT allow user created tags (assuming that google photo analysis is all that the user could want).  DOES perform facial recognition on photos and movies to make face tagging easier. Images shared outside the system DO NOT carry any of this data with them. 
• DOES perform content analysis on photos to make tagging easier
• DOES have very flexible sharing of albums, faces and the whole library with family.
• DOES have low pricing: 2Tb for AU$125 (May2021)

The "honey trap":  Google's "honey" is, not unexpectedly, superb facial recognition and photo content analysis, with limited manual metatag editing and searching. 

Their "trap" is that NONE of the facial recognition, object recognition,  image description etc, data is exportable (either in individual image downloads or most likely through Google TakeOut).  You lose it all if you move away from Google.

Apple Photos

• DOES OFFER automatic synchronisation of online and offline photos. 
• DOES OFFER an offline local app to view, search, edit and manage the photo library.  Apple Photos website view of your library is very limited.  The mobile apps also intelligently synchronise with the cloud versions of photos.  New photos added on any devices (e.g. phone etc) are synchronised and updated on other devices including the offline desktop versions.
• DOES allow choice of which photos are synchronised, BUT it is messy an hard to limit online storage needs by selecting photos that do not need to be uploaded:  unselect the “Copy items to the Photos library” tick box; manually export photos from the library that are no longer required online; delete the original photos from the library; import of the photos as "referenced files" (which can be searched, but are not visible in iCloud)
• DOES allow limited EXIF editing (date, description/caption, location).  Allows user created tags.  and these are embedded into the photo file ONLY when/if photos are exported. Facial and object recognition data are not included in the exported photos.
• DOES perform facial recognition on photos and movies (good, but not as good as Google) to make face tagging easier. Images shared outside the system DO NOT carry any of this data with them. 
• DOES perform content analysis on photos to make tagging easier
• DOES NOT have flexible sharing of faces or the whole library with family.  Smart albums can be created by the desktop app to contain all photos of a person, place or type of image but no smart album can be shared.  When Apple talks of "sharing", it usually means "sending" a copy.  The "Shared Albums" are a great manual method of sharing, with limits of  
• DOES NOT have low pricing: 2Tb for AU$180 (May2021)  BUT this storage can be shared across "family" so that a 2 household family could share the cost and easily fit their collections within the 2Tb limit for many years.  As users can only be a member of one family, this needs to be set up early before seperate families buy too many App purchases under different family groups.

The "honey trap":  The Apple Photos iOS and desktop software is beautifully integrated with good facial recognition and photo content analysis, good metatag editing and searching on the Mac desktop.  (Nothing is provided for the Window User).
Their "trap" the difficulty of designating photos as not "online" thus making the online library "all or nothing" necessitating the jump to the expensive 2Tb subscription;  limited ability to share viewing of complete photo libraries with family; limited ability to share the 2Tb due to needing to be a member of a "family"; the bloat of the local offline library due to retention of all edited versions; the loss of control of original photos requiring manual export for sharing;

Microsoft OneDrive Photos

• DOES OFFER automatic synchronisation of any online and offline photos.  All photos are stored within OneDrive like any other files.
• DOES NOT OFFER an offline local app to view, search, edit and manage the photo library.  There is no desktop app. ie. Microsoft offers only a website view of your library.  But users can then choose to manage their photo libraries with any photo library software (e.g. free and excellent Adobe Bridge).  The mobile apps also use the cloud versions of photos.
• DOES allow choice of which photos are synchronised just by locating them in the OneDrive folder on desktop.  There is automatic upload from mobile devices into the cloud photo library, and these are then automatically downloaded to the local offline OneDrive folder on your computer.
• DOES allow very limited EXIF editing online (ONLY description/caption), but ANY EXIF updates (all tags, location data, date, etc etc) made to the offline local copy will automatically sync to the cloud version.  
• DOES NOT perform facial recognition on photos and movies.
• DOES perform LIMITED ONLINE content analysis on photos to make tagging easier, but the local offline image is not updated with any of these tags.
• DOES have very flexible sharing of albums and the whole library with family, friends or even the public !
• DOES have low pricing: 
• 1Tb for AU$99 (May2021)
• 6Tb for $129 (but each Tb is a separate library intended for each family member)

Microsoft's "honey" is, not unexpectedly, the bundling of Microsoft Office Apps (both online and local computer versions). 

They have no "trap" in that users remain in total control of all files and metadata.  It is very easy to share the complete library with "family" members with view or edit capability.

Their glaring omission is absence of facial recognition, limited object recognition and a rather basic mobile App to find photos.

For me the current winner is Microsoft OneDrive mainly on price, but also on giving users full control of files, tagging, sharing etc. etc.

I am hoping that their mobile app improves, and their online server starts to offer facial recognition.