Migrating from huge Photoprism install, Immmich storage method confusion (wrt Backup solution)
I want to move on from photoprism to Immich because I only use my phone anymore for taking and viewing pictures and Immich seems a much better alternative here. However I have read all the docs and still can't 100% understand how the photo storage works.
I have a 500GB folder of photos on a hard drive (which is backed up daily to a cloud backup storage with Duplicati), and organised into folders per event/travel. Photoprism just watches and ingests this folder without touching the structure. But as I understand Immich needs a different storage or at least requires me to 'move' my collection from the local file system through importing them in Immich which will store it in Immich's defined storage. Now my question is, what is this storage, is it just a file structure which I can just point my backup software to?
Please tell me if my questions seem unclear but at the moment I do not understand the Immich architecture enough to formulate them 'better'
7 Replies
Welcome! Immich just uses a normal folder on your hard disk for storage. That is split into a few folders like your main library, thumbnails, encoded videos, etc. For the library, Immich generates paths based on the metadata of the assets. You can find some more info at https://immich.app/docs/administration/storage-template
Also, Immich doesn't scan and auto-import them like photoprism. You have to run the CLI (bulk upload) to get them to show up. There are two ways to do this (1) upload and (2) import. Upload copies the file into immich, while import leaves the file in the original location. Regardless, you cannot manually move the files once they're added to immich.
https://immich.app/docs/features/bulk-upload
https://immich.app/docs/features/read-only-gallery (import)
Bulk Upload (Using the CLI) | Immich
You can use the CLI to upload an existing gallery to the Immich server
Hi, many thanks for your answers!
So if I understand correctly, the first time I will have to import my existing folder with photos with the Immich CLI, after which Immich will have them registered to it's system and saved in a file system folder which I can just access and point my backup software to this new location?
After that I can automatically let my phone pictures sync with the Android app, and upload others like from my reflex camera via the web interface?
Yes indeed
That is very clear now, thanks! I will test this out first on a small copy of my photos
Also kuddos for the reaction speed of anwsering support questions ❤️
I'm also using similar setup with duplicati for local & cloud backup & it's been working fine
The photos i have in Photoprism had incorrect dates so I have changed these within photoprism. Is there a way to import the sidecar files so the dates in immich are correct as there is no way to alter them once in immich