does iCloud Photo Sharing make a 2nd copy?

[btownguy]

I recently created a shared album for my wife and I to share pics we are each taking from our iPhones on vacation. Rather than "airdrop me those pics" we're just adding to a shared photo album. Works great.

When inspecting the photos, I noticed that the photos I was sharing were stored in HEIF format in my library but in JPG in the shared album. I was under the impression that a shared album was just done by manipulating permissions on the same file in iCloud but it appears that it created a second copy. Is that right? The pic in a shared album isn't the same exact file as the original file?

As a secondary question, how can I make sure that the files I share in a shared album are also shared in HEIC (or HEVC if video)?

 

[ApfelKuchen]

I think the issue for shared albums is that not every end-user is going to have an OS that supports HEIC. My understanding is that the conversion from HEIC to JPG will be done when transferring from the cloud. Apple won't be keeping (or charging for storage of) two copies in the cloud.

 

[btownguy]

I think the issue for shared albums is that not every end-user is going to have an OS that supports HEIC. My understanding is that the conversion from HEIC to JPG will be done when transferring from the cloud. Apple won't be keeping (or charging for storage of) two copies in the cloud.

I'm on my 2017 MacBook Pro running High Sierra. My original image is HEIC 4032x3024. The image that got shared to iCloud Photo Sharing is JPG 2048x1536. NOT GOOD. The person I'm sharing photos with also has a 2017 MacBook Pro with High Sierra and an iPhone 7 with iOS 11.

 

[Partron22]

Perhaps there's a preference hidden away in one of a dozen different places?

 

[BigMcGuire]

I haven't used Apple shared albums since the iPhone 5 but I remember it taking more storage on my phone so it is like a Dropbox folder - one way sync - but definitely a second copy is stored on the phone. (But my info is a bit outdated).

My family/friends/coworkers and I now use Google Shared albums - we all dump our photos in there then I can hit the cloud button to add them all to my Google photo album then download them to my phone so iCloud Photos gets them.