I created a specific folder to move family photos to that syncs with the server, because i use my phone for work pictures too and I don't want those to end up on my immich timeline. So I manually move photos to that folder, but that's the only manual intervention for me.
I set up the album handling the way I did because my wife spent a lot of time sorting stuff into folders and she wanted the organized folders to carry over to immich.
I do separately sync the DCIM folder to server with syncthing as well, just as a backup, but those don't go to immich.
So for immich destined items it looks like:
Manually move pics to phone "family photos" folder
Syncthing-ext syncs phone folder "family photos" to server folder "syncthing_folders/my_family_pics". (Also syncs phone folder "DCIM" to server folder "syncthing_folders/phone_pics_backup")
Syncthing-int (second syncthing instance on different port, so syncthing-ext and syncthing-int see each other as different devices and can work on the same folders) syncs server folder "syncthing_folders/my_family_pics" to some other designated server folder to work with immich... for example "photo_libraries/my_family_pics"
The script I shared runs on server folder "photo_libraries/"
It's set up this way because I have syncthing-ext syncing with a bunch of external devices and this way i can funnel just the photo folders into one photo library folder to run the script on.
If you have more questions it's cool... I never get to talk about this stuff with anyone who appreciates it 😶🌫️