Ease

Cloud Storage can actually be easier to use than, say, a removable drive. You don’t have to worry about which types of computers it will work with, there’s a constant reminder of how much space is available and, strictly speaking, you don’t even need to organise files—you can just use Cloud Storage as a dumping ground and rely on search functions to find files when you need them.

Access

One of the most obvious benefits to Cloud Storage is the ability to access files from anywhere (anywhere with an Internet connection, at least). Put your location stills in Cloud Storage somewhere, and you’ve got access to them at hotels; make sure a copy of your release forms are saved to the Cloud somewhere, and you need never worry that you don’t have them next time you need them.

In addition to the desktop and mobile software that can be used to organ-ise and access files in Cloud Storage, most providers also offer the means to organise and access files through a web portal as well. Not only does this provide a convenient way for users to access their files when the mobile or desktop software is unavailable (such as when using someone else’s computer, for example), but it also allows for additional management and configuration for files. For example, the web interface for Box has comprehensive file and folder sharing options, as well as the ability to add notes, features that are not directly available when browsing the same files on the desktop.

Synchronisation

Many Cloud Storage services include synchronisation of files between devices in some way. Not only does this ensure a particular file exists on each of your devices, but it also means that updating one of them automatically updates the others. Add some records to a FileMaker database on your desktop computer that’s synchronised to a Cloud Storage provider, and the next time you open it on your laptop those records will be there, without needing to use a dedicated server.

Collaboration

As with much of the Cloud, if Cloud Storage is about anything it’s about connecting with others. Most Cloud Storage providers provide a way to share your files with others (most of them offer a way to do so securely as well as conveniently), but some even go as far as allowing you to work collaboratively, letting others make changes to your files, or providing the means to make remarks on them. Some providers also have an Application Programming Interface (API), allowing users to build their own software to interact with their data in some way.

Cost-Effectiveness

When you can buy a terabyte of external storage for less than a hundred dollars, it raises the question of why you’d want to spend (typically) significantly more for a Cloud Storage solution for a prolonged period of time. However, it’s important to remember that in many cases you’re actually paying for all the other benefits Cloud Storage gives you, beyond the simple case of just having somewhere to store some files. Storing files is cheap but maintaining them is expensive.

Security & Reliability

One of the benefits of using a Cloud Storage provider as opposed to relying on just keeping the same files in a folder on your desktop computer is that you get the benefits of the providers’ (hopefully) greater IT expertise and resources. Cloud Storage providers typically have an extremely high level of data redundancy that mitigates the likelihood of any particular file becoming lost (or corrupted), even if they were to simultaneously lose multiple data drives. Many also couple this with data encryption (at the point of transfer and when the files themselves are stored) and other digital and physical measures to prevent your data being accessible by the wrong people.

It might seem counter-intuitive to protect the confidentiality of your data by giving it to someone else, but in doing so, you potentially get an army of IT technicians working round the clock to protect your files, in a way that would be difficult for even a blockbuster-budget production to be able to replicate.

Versioning

Many providers have begun to include versioning features as part of their service. Any changes made to a file (including if the file itself is deleted) are stored as a version of that file, and older versions can be accessed later as needed (although some providers only store such versions for a limited period of time).

Box 4.2 Data Storage and Redundancy

A myriad of things can go wrong with files stored on traditional disk drives, and any of these issues can lead to some corruption of a single file in the least severe instance to the entire contents being lost for good. This has been a problem for anyone using digital storage since before Cloud Storage even existed, and as such there were several ways to minimise the potential damage a disk failure could incur. These came in many different forms, such as having a solid backup system, or spreading data across multiple linked drives, but they all boil down to one thing: redundancy, or having multiple copies of your data.

The concept of redundancy is easy enough to understand when it applies to a backup system—if you lose a disk full of camera reports that you’ve previously copied to a second disk then your data are still safe (assuming, of course, that second disk is fine). The same principle applies to Redundant Array of Independent Disks (RAID), except that instead of two or more complete copies being stored on separate disks, each file is split across multiple disks, along with some extra data that allows the files to be re-created in case of a problem.

If a single disk in a RAID is lost, for example, it’s not a big deal (other than replacing the faulty disk), because there’s enough data stored on all the other disks to re-create the data on the disk that was lost. There are different configurations of RAID that allow for files to be safe even if two (or more) disks are lost simultaneously, each with trade-offs of requiring more storage space, more physical disks, or just more time to recover from failure.

Most Cloud Storage providers are in a position to offer data redundancy across not just multiple disks but multiple facilities. In theory, one of Amazon S3’s data centers could be hit by an atom bomb and its clients’ data would still be intact.

Online Requirement

One of the biggest strengths of Cloud Storage is also one of its biggest drawbacks: its dependence on the Internet. Find yourself without an Internet connection, and you’ll find yourself without access to your files. This is less of an issue for those providers that also offer some sort of synchronisation option, because then at least you still have the local copy of your files when you can’t get to the Internet, but there’s a point where this becomes self-defeating—you don’t necessarily want to have all your video dailies saved to local storage all the time because it’s a waste of disk space most of the time.

Speed

For most real-world uses of Cloud Storage on any production, speed is going to be one of the primary legitimate concerns for most people. You can transfer files only as fast as your Internet connection allows, and if you’re planning to regularly transfer lots of large files (like camera footage) back and forth, you’re going to experience limitations and frustrating delays no matter how fast that connection is.

The concept of making a “copy” in terms of Cloud Storage actually involves what could be considered two time-consuming processes: first the files must be uploaded to the Cloud and then downloaded elsewhere (although at least such uploads normally only ever have to be made once).

Capacity

Cloud Storage, like local storage, tends to be cost-effective in terms of how much data you store up until a specific point. For local storage, it’s pretty common to buy disks to a total of around 10 terabytes (TB) or so before things start getting expensive and you have to think about getting specialised hardware or keeping a stack of disks on a shelf somewhere; for Cloud Storage there tends to be a limit of around a terabyte or so until the cost goes up steeply (many providers simply offer a maximum storage plan with no option get more), although conversely many will also offer a plan that gives you around 5 gigabytes (GB) or so for free.

Although it’s likely Cloud Storage limits will continue to increase over time, this will likely coincide with a corresponding increase in capacity per disk of local storage, which will remain more affordable for higher volumes of data.

In terms of the amount of data a typical production might generate from pre-production to post-production, 5 GB might well be enough to store pertinent spreadsheets and text documents, but once you start including reference images and photos you could find yourself running into that tera-byte limit before the film is done. If you were to start thinking about storing camera footage as well, you’d need something in the order of hundreds of terabytes of storage for a typical feature film (and a very fast Internet connection to get it there).

Trust

In handing data to a third-party, you are placing a degree of trust in them, not only in terms of security and reliability, but also in terms of the privacy and confidentiality of your data. The terms of service of most of the popular Cloud Storage providers, from Google to Dropbox, can be so vague as to defy any guarantee that anyone working within those companies will not implicitly have access to your files as they please. Whilst there’s never any question that “your content remains your content”, there are also significant concessions to allow the companies to look inside your files, with possible reasons for doing so ranging from serving targeted advertisements to preventing piracy.

One possible (if not necessarily practical) way around this is to encrypt the data yourself before sending it to the Cloud. Doing so will ensure no-one else will be able to access any data you send, but in doing so you forfeit some of the benefits of using Cloud Storage in the first place, such as the ability to view or collaborate on documents online.

Box 4.3 Doing More with Files in the Cloud

It’s no coincidence that Cloud Storage services are starting to look more like social media services than the file browsers they originally emulated. For some, such as the photography-oriented Flickr, this is unsurprising, as sharing and giving feedback on each other’s submissions is a key part of the service; but even more traditional file management services like Microsoft OneDrive feature the ability to create photo albums that are abstracted from the file/folder hierarchy and can be shared with others.

Dropbox (dropbox.com)

Undoubtedly one of the most popular Cloud Storage services, Dropbox has been around since 2007 and boasts 300 million users. Not only is it very simple to use, but it’s also extremely reliable for syncing files across a number of different platforms, and has a number of powerful features hidden away, such as fine-grained sharing settings, and integration with a large number of third-party applications.

Box (box.com)

Box is more targeted to businesses than individual users. As such there’s an emphasis on permission control and the ability to collaborate with others within folders. It features a robust search function and generally solid feature set.

Apple iCloud (icloud.com)

Apple’s contribution to Cloud Storage gets better the more Apple products you connect to it. Though both Mac and Windows desktop computers are supported, on the mobile front, only Apple devices are supported. Although the service as a whole handles a number of different types of data elegantly, from notes to video, these work best with Apple’s own desktop software, and in fact its actual file storage system is rather lacklustre.

Google Drive (drive.google.com)

Google’s offering provides much of the same functionality as iCloud, although it features access from a greater variety of devices and platforms, as well as a vastly superior interface for manipulating and sharing files. It also uses a trashcan metaphor, in that files that are deleted are not immediately removed from the storage, but instead go into a special folder from which they can be recovered later or permanently removed.

Amazon Cloud Drive (amazon.com/clouddrive)

Although Amazon’s Cloud Drive service offers excellent value for money in terms of its storage plans, its limited desktop integration means you have to specifically send individual files and folders to the service as opposed to the sync folder option that other services use. In terms of security it’s a bit of a slouch too, protected only via a login and password with no possibility to enable two-factor authentication. There’s also no possibility to share files with others.

Microsoft OneDrive (onedrive.live.com)

Microsoft’s Cloud Storage service has a similar feature set as most of the other services, but specific features depend on which one of the 10 available plans you opt for. Compared to the other services which offer encrypted storage as standard, only the business or enterprise plans offer this feature on OneDrive. Perhaps the biggest selling point for the service is that the Office 365 plans bundle Microsoft’s Office suite of desktop, web, and mobile applications.

Amazon S3 (aws.amazon.com/s3)

Amazon S3 is designed to be used in conjunction with other software. It has a rudimentary web-based interface, but unless you plan on using it for a very small number of files (and very large files at that), you’ll find other options that have a much lower barrier to entry. If you intend to make use of its comprehensive API (or make use of some application that uses it), there’s a lot to like, and it can be cost-effective for a high volume of data. The service is priced for both storage and transfer of data, and the rates depend on the volume of data stored and transferred, meaning it can be difficult to determine exactly how much the service would cost to use. There are three tiers of storage pricing: “standard”, “reduced redundancy” (whereby the integrity of data is not assured in the long-term, but the cost is lower), and “glacier” (the cheapest option, but more suited to long-term archive, as retrieval can be comparatively slow).

Google Cloud Storage (cloud.google.com/storage)

Similar in almost every respect to Amazon S3, but with a more comprehensible pricing structure, Google’s Cloud Storage is more for developers than end-users and features a similar three-tier pricing scheme (and charged separately for transfer and storage of data): “standard”, “durable reduced availability” (the integrity of data is assured, but the retrieval time is reduced), and “nearline” (for data that does not need to be retrieved quickly or often).

Flickr (flickr.com)

Flickr is a bit of a standout compared to other Cloud Services, as it’s for videos and photos only. There’s a huge amount of metadata associated with each file, both from the camera (in the form of location and EXIF data) and from the site itself (in the form of annotation, comments, and usage rights). There’s an abundance of sharing options (including comprehensive permissions and the ability to send files to groups) and a full-featured web-based photo editor. Everything is automatically included in a “photostream” and located on a map where possible.