photo and video Storage :: icloud + manual dual approach possible?

Does anyone know if there is a way to use icloud for a minimum amount of monthly storage but then also be able to easily transfer photo/vid files off an iphone and onto a macbook? I don't want to do this individually because it's a lot of files, and I don't want to upgrade my storage to keep everything on the cloud. If I can't do it manually for some of my photos/vids that seems crazy and so I will just close my current minimum icloud storage plan to get that functionally back, but I'd think it would be silly for apple not to offer this in order to keep all those minimum icloud monthly customers... so I feel like I must be missing something. Any advice?