I’m currently in the middle of moving all of my photos, but I have a couple of issues that have come up.

  • The first one has to do with metadata.When I replaced my phone recently, all the photo files were marked as “created” on the same day. They still show in the correct order by datestamp in Google Photos, but everything older than last April is just an undifferentiated mess. Is there a way to get them back in the right order?

  • I have thousands of photos. Is there a way to easily see the total number in both Google and Proton to compare that everything is indeed backed up?

  • There does not seem to be a way to jump to a particular date in Proton, which makes it arduous to find any photos, even if they were in the right order. Is there something I am missing? Is this feature coming?

These issues prevent me from being able to complete the switch. Can anyone help?

  • helenslunch@feddit.nlEnglish
    111·
    4 months ago

    Google maliciously separates your photos and metadata when taking it out, in a non-standard format. You need a tool to reassemble them. I can’t remember the name.

    Proton Photos is EXTREMELY basic, don’t expect any features at all.

    I recommend Immich instead, if you can find a way to get it running.

    • gedaliyah@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
      2·
      4 months ago

      That makes sense. But I’m not quite ready to set up a home server just yet. Proton was meant to be an intermediate step so that I can start shifting away from Google

  • walden@sub.wetshaving.socialEnglish
    6·
    4 months ago

    I’m not sure about proton, but there are some tools for importing Google Takeout images into Immich (an open source Google Photos replacement). The tools stitch back together the pictures and xml files.

    Just going off memory, the tools I’m thinking of typically work directly with Immich, but maybe there’s an option to simply dump the pictures into folders. Worth looking into!

      • walden@sub.wetshaving.socialEnglish
        2·
        4 months ago

        No, unfortunately they’re completely different things. This method is definitely not easy, at least the way I see it in my head. I had a chance to look it up and the tool I’m thinking of is called Immich-Go. It requires Immich, so getting everything set up would be a PITA.

        The steps would be:

        1. Install Immich (likely the most difficult part)
        2. Import your pictures into Immich using Immich-Go
        3. Those pictures will now be in nice folders for you, as dictated in the Immich settings
        4. Upload those pictures (now with exif data re-attached) to Proton.
        • gedaliyah@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
          2·
          4 months ago

          Okay, dumb question… when I install Immich, it asks for a server endpoint URL. How do I get one of those? Do I need to purchase that from a web hosting service or is it something I can set up from any internet connected computer?

  • inspxtr@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2·
    4 months ago

    Never tried it, but I would assume if you do a Google takeout of your Google Photos, the metadata would still be kept, and then you can upload that to Proton. Have you tried that yet?

    • xantoxis@lemmy.worldEnglish
      4·
      4 months ago

      Google takeout (or maybe Photos itself) actually trashes your metadata. BUT you can restore it (for money)!

      https://metadatafixer.com/

      When you get your Takeout zip files, you just drop them in here, don’t even unpack them.