How to Upload Pictures Easily…Without Thinking

 by Lori Cunningham

source: Dropbox

I was a panelist for a twitter party for Cricket Wireless last week (#CricketChats) and during the party, we discussed some of our favorite apps that make us more productive, informed, or at least entertained.  I easily listed off some of my favorites, INRIX for traffic, Cozi for shopping lists/calendar, Life360 for keeping track of our family’s whereabouts, OneNote for organizing my many articles, links, and ideas, and Dropbox which allows me to upload pictures easily to my computer.  There are more apps I love, but these are at the top.

It dawned on me that I have not yet shared with you my discovery of how Dropbox, a website I’ve used for years, suddenly became an incredible ally in helping me manage my pictures from my smartphones and tablets.  It’s an absolute incredible resource and a MUST have app.  Essentially, after setting up Dropbox on my computer and all mobile devices, any picture or video I take is automatically uploaded to my online Dropbox account as soon as it hits a connected WiFi network.  It’s that easy!

Now years ago, when Eye-Fi came out, I thought it was incredible.  Eye-Fi makes SD cards you can put in your mobile devices that automatically uploads your pictures to your computer.  What I didn’t like was it’s price tag, ranging anywhere from $80-$150+.  Ouch.  Imagine if you put an Eye-Fi SD card in every mobile device you have, that would be costly.  With Dropbox, there is no cost, unless of course you want increased storage in your online storage on Dropbox.com.

Because of the many pictures we take on our multiple devices, Dropbox is the single most life-saver app I have and I sing its praises daily.  I have downloaded the free Dropbox on our three smartphones, my iPad, my Samsung Note 8.0 tablet, and my Samsung Galaxy Camera.  I also downloaded the Dropbox program on my computer, which looks like a folder in my Windows File Explorer, called Dropbox.  Now I can access my cloud Dropbox files as if they were actually located on my computer, which makes it great to drop and drag folders and pictures back and forth from Dropbox to my computer.

Benefits of Being Able to Upload Pictures Easily

• Pictures instantly appear after they are taken in your Dropbox account (if connected via WiFi)
• If you’re not connected via WiFi, as soon as your device hits your WiFi networks, pictures are uploaded
• You can access your Dropbox pictures anywhere in the world
• If Dropbox is on all your mobile devices, you can see all your pictures in one place
• Dropbox makes a copy of your pictures, ensuring you all your mobile pics are backed up
• With pictures secured in the Dropbox cloud, you can begin erasing pics on your phone, giving you more storage space
• If you’re a blogger, you can take a picture and have it immediately ready to place in the article you’re writing (great time saver!)
• If traveling with someone, you can sign into your Dropbox account on their phone and upload the pics you want from their phone (with their permission of course!)
• Place the Dropbox app on your parents smartphone to ensure their pictures are being backed up
• Place the Dropbox app on your teen’s phone  to watch for anything inappropriate (though it’s advised you alert your teens that all content on their phones will be supervised first)

Here’s what you need to do to get started so you can upload your pictures easily too…

 STEP 1:  Download Dropbox on Your Computer

Go to Dropbox.com, Sign Up, and download the Drobox software onto your computer(s), netbooks, and/or laptop.

The Dropbox screen walks you through the download.

Dropbox offers you 2GB for free.  If you want more space, you can buy some on a monthly basis.  I recommend you opt for the free 2GB.  You’ll have opportunities later to earn more space for free.

After Dropbox is downloaded, you will see a blue box in your computers system tray, right next to your clock, as shown above.  You can click on it for menu options and it also alerts you with messages.  It’s pretty cool to take a picture on your phone and this message pops up seconds later on your computer.  I remember baffling my husband when I took a picture with my phone and it showed up immediately on my PC.  It’s incredibly fast.

You will see the Dropbox icon in your File Manager at the very top.  Clicking on the Dropbox icon will bring up any folders you saved in your Dropbox.  You can also add new folders within File Manager and they will show up on all your various devices and Dropbox.com as well.  You can now very easily copy and move pictures/videos/documents from any folder on your computer to your Dropbox, and vice versa.

I go through Dropbox weekly and move pictures from Dropbox into new folders on my PC.  My favorite pics that I want to share, I keep a copy in Dropbox so it’s easy to show friends and family my favorite pics.

STEP 2:  Download Dropbox on Your Mobile Devices

Download Dropbox for Android,  iPhone, Windows 8, or Blackberry.

The Dropbox app is free and you can bring up your Dropbox pictures on any of your devices with the operating systems listed above.

All folders appear both here on your mobile device and on your computer.    The folders with the two people on it above represent Shared Folders.  You can share folders with individuals or groups of people.  It’s a great way to share large files that are too big to send via email.  Use shared files if you are with friends and take a lot of pictures that you’d like to share with them.  Sending via email is tedious.  Instead, invite them to your shared folder on Dropbox.  They do not have to have Dropbox installed on their PC or mobile device to access it.

Clicking on these folders will show you the pictures contained within them.  There is no need to upload pictures from your mobile device, they will upload automatically as long as you click this option when first opening Dropbox after downloading it on your mobile device.

A Mom’s Perspective

You can’t go wrong with Dropbox.  I know what you’re thinking.  You’re thinking, 2 GB, that’s all I get?  Yes and no.  Yes, you start out with 2 GB, but by going through their tutorial and connecting your social network sites, you can earn more space.  Referring friends earns 500 mb of space for each friend too.  You can even get more space once you connect a new phone.  I connected my Samsung Galaxy SIII and got a huge amount of space.  In fact, I received 48 GB more space through a special promotion Samsung has with Dropbox until 3/26/2015.  I now have ample space.  I found out about the promotion just by downloading Dropbox on my phone and signing in.  That was a nice surprise.

Dropbox is fantastic for photos and videos but it is also a great resource for documents too.  Keep the documents you are using in your Dropbox drive on your computer at home and you can work on them just where you left of at the office.  You can even access them on your mobile device too.  Never will you need to email yourself a file again.

As a free app, Dropbox is a MUST HAVE.  Finally you can unlock all of those photos and videos you have on your phone and get them to your computer to use easily on photo books, greeting cards, photo prints, even blogging.  And best of all, you don’t even have to think about it, your photos/videos upload themselves!  Should your phone break, get lost, or get stolen, you won’t need to worry about losing your precious memories, they all will be stored in the cloud.  Download the free Life 360 app, by the way, to help you find or reclaim your stolen phone.

Are you using Dropbox?  What do you think?