Vin on PixelUnion - Free your photos from American tech platforms

New here? Let's get started together

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Maybe you clicked a link a friend sent you. Maybe you read one of our posts about Big Tech and started to wonder where your photos actually live. Either way, welcome. We are glad you are here.

You do not have to decide anything today. This post tells you why we built PixelUnion, what it does, and how to get started if you want to.

Why PixelUnion exists

We are a European company with a heart for a Europe that stands together. Part of that is having digital services of our own, built and run here. Your photos are some of the most personal data you have, and for many people they sit with American companies.

End of summer sale: 50% off your first payment

Sat, 12 Sep 2026 00:00:00 +0000

I scrolled back through my camera roll this week and counted a little over 800 photos from this summer. Two trips, one wedding, and a lot of evenings that were not worth photographing but got photographed anyway.

Every one of them existed in exactly one place: my phone.

That is the part worth sitting with. One dropped phone, one stolen bag, one failed screen repair, and the whole summer goes with it. Nothing dramatic has to happen.

How to export your Google Photos library without losing the metadata

Sat, 05 Sep 2026 00:00:00 +0000

I exported my Google Photos library recently, unzipped the archive, and opened a photo from 2019. The date said the photo was created yesterday. The GPS coordinates were gone. The album it belonged to was nowhere to be seen.

Nothing was actually lost. Google Takeout did give me everything. It just did not put the metadata where I expected it to be.

If you are planning to export your own library, this is the part most guides skip. Here is what I did to keep the dates, locations, and album structure intact.