Earlier this year, I frequently recorded large 1080p videos (1 hr long @ 3-4 Gb) with my iPhone connected to iCloud.
After a while I noticed that the iCloud storage space occupied by Photos/Videos was massively increasing at a steady pace – even though I always deleted the videos from my iOS devices/iCloud after exporting them to my computer via Bluetooth.
After deletion, the videos aren't visible on any iOS device nor on icloud.com (including the "Recently deleted" folder, which I have of course emptied). But the storage was still counted as being occupied. I therefore was forced to upgrade from a 50 Gb to a 200 Gb iCloud plan, even though I was doing just fine on the 50 Gb plan. Now I'm stuck at a larger-than-needed storage plan, because I have been unable to get rid of the videos permanently.
I believe I have found the actual problem (described below), which seems to be a deletion bug affecting large video files – but I need advice on how to proceed.
On my iMac, I have set Apple Photos to "Download and Store Originals". I opened the container in ~/user/Pictures/Photos Library.photoslibrary – and lo and behold – in the Masters folder all the large videos can be found, even though the "relational links" to them in iCloud are supposedly deleted.
My thought now is to move the large files out of the photoslibraryfile and see if it's synced to iCloud in such a way that the online storage is calculated correctly. If not, I may have to disconnect my photoslibrary file, delete all Photos/Videos on iCloud, wait for 30 days for them to be completely gone – and then try to sync my iMac Apple Photos to iCloud again after having removed the offending video files.
Does this sound like a good idea? Does anyone have any advice on how to proceed?
FYI: I have been in contact with "senior technical support" from Apple multiple times, and to make a story short: they have tried to be helpful, but very superficially with standard solutions like "try turning iCloud on/off" etc. Getting a formal bug report submitted to them has been hopeless because they demand proof that there is a bug, but ironically there's no way to prove it because they can't access the contents of my account. I think when a software company starts to think its software is infallible – because my screenshots aren't evidence enough – things will invariably go wrong.
After a while I noticed that the iCloud storage space occupied by Photos/Videos was massively increasing at a steady pace – even though I always deleted the videos from my iOS devices/iCloud after exporting them to my computer via Bluetooth.
After deletion, the videos aren't visible on any iOS device nor on icloud.com (including the "Recently deleted" folder, which I have of course emptied). But the storage was still counted as being occupied. I therefore was forced to upgrade from a 50 Gb to a 200 Gb iCloud plan, even though I was doing just fine on the 50 Gb plan. Now I'm stuck at a larger-than-needed storage plan, because I have been unable to get rid of the videos permanently.
I believe I have found the actual problem (described below), which seems to be a deletion bug affecting large video files – but I need advice on how to proceed.
On my iMac, I have set Apple Photos to "Download and Store Originals". I opened the container in ~/user/Pictures/Photos Library.photoslibrary – and lo and behold – in the Masters folder all the large videos can be found, even though the "relational links" to them in iCloud are supposedly deleted.
My thought now is to move the large files out of the photoslibraryfile and see if it's synced to iCloud in such a way that the online storage is calculated correctly. If not, I may have to disconnect my photoslibrary file, delete all Photos/Videos on iCloud, wait for 30 days for them to be completely gone – and then try to sync my iMac Apple Photos to iCloud again after having removed the offending video files.
Does this sound like a good idea? Does anyone have any advice on how to proceed?
FYI: I have been in contact with "senior technical support" from Apple multiple times, and to make a story short: they have tried to be helpful, but very superficially with standard solutions like "try turning iCloud on/off" etc. Getting a formal bug report submitted to them has been hopeless because they demand proof that there is a bug, but ironically there's no way to prove it because they can't access the contents of my account. I think when a software company starts to think its software is infallible – because my screenshots aren't evidence enough – things will invariably go wrong.
