Managing folders within Organiser using Icloud for Windows

[Terry5FC4]

Windows 10 , Photoshop Elements 2022 , Icloud for Windows 

I have a problem using Elements 2022 to organise images working with Icloud for Windows. If there are images in a folder in my C:\Pictures folder I can rename the folder via Organiser to be represent the images. However the Icloud photos are synced to my C:\Pictures folder and because they are cloud based the iCloud app won't allow renaming/moving of photos into a different folder.

I wanted my workflow to use Organiser to identify the images in the iCloud folder and move them to a folder just for those images.

Therefore I can only see two options

- duplicate the images (there are 20K images) to allow Organiser to sort them into folders

- make Local Albums instead of Folders. 

Does anyone have a workflow for using iCloud for Windows with Elements?

[Greg_S.]

Hi Terry.  Personally, I would not use iCloud for Windows with the Organizer.  There are too many obstacles and Apple can't be relied upon to support legacy uses.

I do download all of my iPhone photos to a non-iCloud folder and use the Adobe Photo Downloader for that purpose.  One of the reasons I do this is to use a non-system drive to store my files.  However, I have been toying with the idea of using a symbolic link to move my iCloud for Windows folder to a different drive, since last time I looked, iCloud can only be placed on the Windows C drive.

The Organizer does not care where you store your photos, but it is important not to manage your files outside of the program.  I would not worry about moving your files or renaming folders to meet your ultimate objective of grouping certain photos for viewing.  The Organizer has plenty of tools and flexibility to meet your objectives.   Certaintly, creating Albums in the Organizer would be one way to go.  But depending on your needs, keyword tags may be more flexible.

[Terry5FC4]

Hi Greg. Thanks for your update. Had a quick read of the Adobe Photo Downloader but this appears a manual method to copy over photos from one folder to another. Might try to find an automatic/scheduled method.

In regards to organising photos within  Organizer I'm trying to group photos into folders as a clean method to see specific images. Otherwise I would need to add tags to search for them as ICloud photos are dumped into one folder. This might be fine once tags have been added but its going to take a while even using face recognition and smart tags. Are there any other tools to help ? Also the method to add photos to new folders is clunky unless with the hiding of sub-directories. Might be a reason to move away from folders.

Thanks for your input.

[Greg_S.]

Terry, I have always used the APD to download all files from my iPhones.  I store the files on my hard drive and use the option to create date-taken sub-folders.  (There are several other options for automatic naming of folders as well as for the creation of Albums.) I also place photos and videos on separate drives, using the filters in the APD.

It is only recently that I have used iCloud for Windows and I will only use it as another backup for my phone photos.

You haven't told us how you would like to group your photos, so it is difficult to give you other suggestions, but perhaps Albums may be the best bet for you.  They are easy to create and organize, and the same photo can be in multiple Albums.

I rarely add keyword tags any more because Smart Tags does a fantastic job of recognizing subjects/objects of images.  And depending on the number of people you wish to name, face recognition can be a very speedy process if you name people in the UnNamed People stacks.

[Terry5FC4]

Greg, 

In regards to how I group my photos my workflow is:

- photos are downloaded from iCloud into C:\Pictures

- Elements retrieves new photos via Watch Folder

- newly added photo is moved to an existing or newly created folder and renamed. Eg 2019 Holidays

- add tags for holidays, person  and year , ensure capture date is correct

- may add to album

- save metadata to files ( playing with face recognition now)

- edit image if required

Other than that I may share or export photo.

[Greg_S. · Accepted solution]

Your workflow seems perfectly reasonable to me.  I'm sure you already know this, but all file/folder management (move/rename/delete) should take place within the Organizer.