Use a cloud AI key
If you have no computer to spare for a worker, a cloud AI provider can read your pictures instead. You choose the provider, you bring your own key, and you pay them directly.
This is off until you set it up. Nothing is sent anywhere before then.
With a cloud provider, the pictures being read leave your library.
Each picture is sent to the provider you chose, under your own account with them and under their terms. Read what they say about keeping and using what you send. If you would rather no picture went to an outside service, run a worker instead.
Which providers
- Claude, from Anthropic
- OpenAI
- MiniMax
- Any service that speaks the OpenAI API, by its address
You need an account with the provider and an API key from it. An API key is not the same thing as a subscription to their chat app. It is made on the provider's developer pages, and it is billed by use.
The steps
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Get an API key from the provider
Sign in to the provider's developer pages, add a way to pay, and make a key. If they let you set a monthly spending limit, set one.
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Open the settings in your library
In your library go to People and settings and find the section for reading pictures.
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Choose the provider and paste your key
For a service that speaks the OpenAI API, also type its address and the name of the model.
The key is sealed before it is stored. It is never shown again, to you or to anyone. The page shows only its last few characters so you can tell which key is in use.
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Pick what it should do
Choose which kinds of reading you want. Pictures already in the library are read in turn, and new ones as they arrive.
What it can and cannot do
| A cloud AI key | A worker of your own | |
|---|---|---|
| Captions, the scene, what is in the picture | Yes | Yes |
| Faces and people | No | Yes |
| Search by meaning, near duplicates | No | Yes |
| Where the pictures go | To the provider you chose | Nowhere. They are read on your machine |
| What it costs | The provider bills you for each picture read | Electricity |
| What you need | An account and a key | A computer, best with an NVIDIA card |
Faces are never sent to a cloud provider. Finding and naming people needs a worker.
What it costs
ImageStoria adds nothing for this. The provider bills your account with them for what they read. Prices differ by provider and by model, and they change, so check the provider's own price list. Reading a whole library for the first time is the large cost. After that it is only the new pictures.
Blue and amber
Whatever a machine said is shown in blue, whether it came from a cloud provider or from a worker. What a person said is shown in amber. Anyone who may tag can correct a caption or remove a label, and a person's correction always wins.
Stopping
Turn it off or remove the key in the same section. Nothing more is sent from that moment. To be sure the key can never be used again, delete it on the provider's pages as well.
What was already written stays in your library until you change it.