how do I download photos from my photo stream

iCloud: Photo Stream FAQ

I have the same question. Plus i can't copy and paste the photos i have saved in my pictures onto my external hard drive. Anyone have any suggestions? I want to copy them onto the external hard drive as back up.

Hi sarah,

Not sure what you mean download photostream photos....do you mean upload/sync them to your computer?

If so, unless you have iCloud set up on your computer, there is no way to get PhotoStream photos on it unless you have those same photos in your Camera Roll on your phone, and you sync your phone to the computer.

If you do have iCloud set up, then the photos in PhotoStream automatically get pushed to it from the cloud, and you see them under a section in your iPhoto sidebar called Web in an album calle PhotoStream. They are also automatically copied to your permanent photos in iPhoto and an Event is automatically created for them.

To copy photos to a hard drive, you would just want to drag the photo file from your finder to the hard drive to save your photos. Not knowing what type of computer you have, I cannot provide you with the path.

Hope this info helps!

Cheers,

GB

Thanks for your help. Sorry I wasn't very clear.

Yes I have photostream on my iPhone, iPad and iMac. My iPhone and iPad are all sync'd correctly. My iMac is new and I have just tried to sync the photos but like I said photos from only a month or so has sync'd. Do they only stay on the photostream for a short while and if so could I upload the photo any other way?

The computer I have is an iMac. I have tried dragging and dropping the photos from Photos to my external hard drive but it wouldn't go on the hard drive.

Thanks

Hi sarah,

You need to have iCloud turned on on your Mac, and the same iCloud ID set up as the one on your iPhone and iPad. If you have iCloud on both devices and on your Mac, then iPhoto will automatically create the folders and Events described above.

That is the only way to get all of your current PhotoStream photos (PhotoStream keeps your last 1000 photos before it starts overlaying with new ones) to show and to be permanently on your Mac with no syncing is to set up iCloud on the Mac and sign on with the same iCloud ID.

To move your photos to a hard drive go into Finder>Pictures>iPhoto Library, and drag that folder to the hard drive.

Cheers,

GB

Confused: that iPhoto folder you referred to is already on the hard drive. And the Photo Stream folder won't drag anywhere.

The OP was asking about moving the iPhoto library to an external hard drive. Photostream is automatically saved monthly to your Events folder.

GB

OK, so it is supposed to. What if it doesn't? Mine sometimes saves as an event, sometimes not. I have a day where I took 11 photos. They are all on the WEB photo stream. On iPhoto, ONE photo is saved as an event in the library. Deleting from the web photo stream will sometimes delete them from the iPhoto library. Sometimes it won't. It is so inconsistent, that I don't know whether the photos will be saved or not.

Photo stream only keeps photos for up to 30 days.