Was wondering if someone could help me with step by step instructions on how to point blue iris folder to my Dropbox account. I have searched all over and have not found in laymans terms how to do this. I want to be able to store off premises for my seven business cameras. Help would be appreciated.
How to set up folder to point to Dropbox?
- Thread starter Bigvic2000
- Start date
Simplest way is to go into Blue Iris settings. I think the second tab is where you set the recording location. Put your recordings anywhere in your dropbox folder, and it should work.
Bp2008: Thank you very much for your response, but if you or someone could be a little more specific about setting up the folder it would be very much appreciated.
You will have to install the Dropbox application on your PC if you have not yet https://www.dropbox.com/downloading?src=index. Once you do that and configure Dropbox local storage you can create a folder inside the local Dropbox folder to point BI to. Remember whatever you put in this folder will be using bandwidth to send it to Dropbox and your internet connection may suffer if it is limited. I have a 100Mbps download/10Mbps upload cable account and just hitting the local BI web page on my internal network takes 3 - 4 Mbps with four cameras. JPEG image posting may be the way to go but you will have to set it up per camera (BI Help - Cameras - Image Posting) and again if you use high resolution images and post them too fast the Dropbox upload will probably fall behind.
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If you have trouble finding the path to the dropbox folder, you can open it on your desktop and then look at the address bar to find the folder path.
For example my dropbox folder is C:\Users\Brian\Dropbox
For example my dropbox folder is C:\Users\Brian\Dropbox
I know this is a bit of a necro...but SugarSync works better for this kind of thing as it allows arbitrary folder pairing. So instead of moving BI to the cloud folder, you make the BI folder a cloud folder. You have to be more responsible and watch your usage level, but with great responsibility comes great power 
I to would like to have BI to use dropbox. I have installed dropbox, but when I open the camera properties window in BI, and go to the Record tab, click on the down arrow under Folder and filename (BI ver 3), the only options are New and Stored. I've configured dropbox to put a folder here C:\BlueIris\Dropbox but BI doesn't show Dropbox as an option to save recordings to. How do I configure BI to save it's recordings to dropbox?
fenderman
Staff member
- Mar 9, 2014
- 36,892
- 21,408
Welcome to the forum..you first need to set the new/stored folders path in blue iris options>clips and archiving.
Blue Iris & Dropbox: I have BI 5 setup so that I receive a series of 10 images spaced 2 seconds apart via email upon motion trigger alert of my most critical camera (my home office). I would like to find a way to do something just like this but with Dropbox as a backup in the event that I have theft or damage to my BI setup. I am already backing up all clips to my NAS drives which works great. While I would like to keep the images spaced closely together (every 1-3 seconds) I do not want them recording for the entire time that the video clip is recording if possible. I have setup a separate folder for each of just 4 critical cams on Dropbox and have added them to my Blue Iris options just as I did when setting up my NAS, so I'm all set there. My issue now is that I can't find a way to save a series of images (like I do in the email alert) for this purpose. I need to know if this is even possible and if so a point in the right direction, or a suggestion for a viable alternative if need be. I explored the POST tab in camera settings which looked promising but it saves just one image to Dropbox. I wish that there was an additional choice for "Save to folder" in that dropdown where we can otherwise select Email, FTP, etc.
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looney2ns
IPCT Contributor
looney2ns: Thank you for your comment. You're right, both Google Drive and One drive will work as does Dropbox. The problem for me is that I wish to save a small span of images that are initiated upon a motion activated trigger, just like I am able to do with the email as I explained. I would think that this would be a valuable feature. Since it already exists in the email form (where we can save a desired amount of images with a desired amount of time between them) why not make it available with a "Save to Folder" choice as well? I guess the answer to this for now would be to just use the Email choice but then who wants a dozen images or more per camera per email? It's fine to use that feature for one critical indoor camera but it would be a nightmare with any more, at least for me it would. I suppose I'll have to find another way. Thank again for weighing in. That said, I am always loving my Blue Iris and continue to talk it up among friends, family and colleagues... and rightfully so.
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looney2ns
IPCT Contributor
Can't you setup a new folder named pics in BI, then on the record tab of the camera, select take jpg every 2 seconds only when triggered. And point those snaps to the new folder you created.
Now setup dropbox or whatever to sync from that new folder?
Now setup dropbox or whatever to sync from that new folder?
Yes, that is how I may have to do it and is a good idea, but since most of my triggers are set for 2 minutes this would create 60 stills per event. Maybe I have to rethink my trigger length.
*** It just occurred to me that while I have already cloned all of my cameras for separate feeds to both my NAS drive and system hard drive, I could make another simple clone of my most critical cameras (those that I want still images from) and set them up not to record video but just a small group of stills that are triggered by motion with a very brief trigger length. I might not have thought of this without your tip so thanks for that! I'll let you know how it works
*** It just occurred to me that while I have already cloned all of my cameras for separate feeds to both my NAS drive and system hard drive, I could make another simple clone of my most critical cameras (those that I want still images from) and set them up not to record video but just a small group of stills that are triggered by motion with a very brief trigger length. I might not have thought of this without your tip so thanks for that! I'll let you know how it works
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My idea above actually worked very well! My desire was to have a batch of still images only (no video) and save them to my Dropbox folder so that I would have an off-site backup of sorts in case my BI setup was damaged or stolen. So, I cloned my most critical cameras, turned off their video feed and selected still images only to record once every 3 seconds. See attached image for my very simple setup. It gives me a little more peace of mind to have these as an additional backup.
