These days everything is online. Whether you’re at work, traveling or make travel your work (like us) you’ve got to be online. And with our whole lives being online it’s only natural that we need an online filing cabinet to take with us (unless you feel like traveling with a backpack full of papers).
Whether it’s documents for work, travel photos and videos, college essays or just personal files, having cloud storage (your online filing cabinet) is the best way to keep track of all your files, as well as sending large files and sharing them with others. In fact, having access to a safe and secure cloud storage system is almost a necessity these days, as we need to store more and more data online.
As online content creators, not only do we have a personal need for online storage (file backs up), but with work we constantly need access to a service that allows us to share our work with clients and partners. Whether it’s sharing photos from a photo shoot or sending a video project for a tourism board, the ability to send large files is a must in our business.
Cloud Storage for Remote Workers
This isn’t just the case for travel bloggers like us. With more and more people working online the need for a secure cloud storage system is more important than ever. You don’t have to be backpacking across the Philippines or taking a road trip in Nevada, you could just be working from your Hong Kong office or at a business meeting in London to need the services of safe and secure online cloud storage.
When you’re traveling, you have to expect the unexpected! Literally anything could happen to you or your work while you’re traveling, so backing up securely is a must! You don’t think it’s possible? Here is a random, yet possible scenario:
Your name is Steve. You’re a photographer on a nature assignment in Estonia. You spend the morning capturing the most stunning photos ever. You eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich at lunch. You pick up your camera to see those epic morning pics and get jelly on your camera. You go to bed that night and don’t back up your photos and send them to your boss (or clean off the jelly)… BAM, a bear eats your camera!
Ok so that sounds dramatic, but I do know of plenty of real life stories from people who haven’t backed up their files, nor sent them to their clients, and lost all their work. And that sucks! Don’t be like Steve!
Best Way to Upload Big Files
As computers become more technical, camera megapixels grow and video resolution sky rockets, the problem with sending large files is amplified by the sheer size of the files. A RAW image from our Sony mirrorless camera is a whopping 42mb and a 2-3 minute video is in the gigabits! And it doesn’t just have to be media files, even PDFs are growing in size depending on how detailed and content rich they are.
When creating a simple business proposal, sending through graphic designs or Photoshop files, we’re talking serious file sizes these days! As the quality of our files grow, so does the size. Instead of talking about online storage in the gigabytes, terabits is now the household quota. Now here lies a huge problem. How do you share and send these massive files? With the measly 25mb Gmail file attachment limit (10mb on Hotmail!!) it’s impossible to send them over email.
Enter Dropbox, our favorite cloud system for storing and sending files. Not only have we been using them for years to backup our travel photos, but they’ve been incredibly useful for sharing and sending large files to clients and partners. In fact just before I wrote this post I uploaded 40+ images to a shared folder for a client.
How to Share Large Files
Sending large files is as simple as uploading the file to your Dropbox account and then creating a shared link for a specific file or whole folder. Then you can take that link and share it with anyone. Shoot it across in an email, drop it in a WhatsApp chat or send it via carrier pigeon! Anyone with the link can access your file and you can choose how much access you want to give to them. And the best thing is they don’t even need a Dropbox account, although they definitely should get one!
Dropbox also allows you to set the boundaries when it comes to sharing your large files, so you can give people access to edit a folder or you can simply let them view and download it. If you’re working on a group project, it’s really easy to share editing access, so other people can upload files. You can also password protect the content to put it on lock down.
Transfer Large Files Online Through Multiple Platforms
Another great feature from Dropbox is the ability to send, receive and access your files across a range of different devices. Got an Android phone, a Windows work computer and a Mac at home? Not a problem (except for the fact that you’re making life really difficult for yourself!) Work between all devices and operating systems to view, edit and share your files. Download the phone or desktop app, or access via a browser. Everything is seamless.
With this much freedom and access to your files, it’s crazy to think that people out there are still like Steve, just waiting for their hard work to be eaten by a bear!
This is a sponsored post for Dropbox. All opinions are my own. Dropbox is not affiliated with nor endorses any other products or services mentioned.
