Review: Google Photos – Skynet Is Here

Ages ago, we used to think of Google as just a web search engine. The ability to pinpoint searches into answers has become an invaluable tool and just like a living organism, Google continues to feed on inputs of users and content around an endless sea of content to become better at finding search results to even abstract questions.

Google recently reworked its photo sharing services and spun it off it’s social networking service Google Plus. The service flexes amazing features like unlimited free storage for regular and raw image photos (up to 16 megapixels) and automatic organization functions that remind you just how smart Google is.

We’ve already seen tag suggestions in Facebook, but Google has gone miles further in compiling and ranking pictures of not just people but all things within your photos. Google provided an answer to a question that you may have never asked: is it possible to search my thousands of photos the same way I search for something on google.com?

For the most part, Google is very accurate in identifying distinct people in your collection. It grouped pictures of me first (apparently have a lot of selfies?), then my wife. The most interesting collections of contact photos capture children growing from newborn to toddler. It truly is mind blowing to realize Google knows a nearly bald baby is the same person years later. It doesn’t matter what angle you frame a shot or how little a person’s face appears. It really does just seem like magic.

baby-1

a baby…

… recognized correctly as the same person, years later

Still in tact is Google’s lovely autoawesome feature. The resurgence of gifs (now a posting option on Facebook) has made this a particularly useful feature. Just remember that even if you don’t find a great shot in a burst of photos taken on your phone, the memory may live on best through an animation, should Google choose to autoawesome that series of stills. While there doesn’t seem to be a manual way to group pictures for animation, it does it well when found.

pro tip: keep your phone away from Brandon

One of the most clever tricks Google Photos does is create collections from mixed sources. The feature actually came as a surprise to me since I hadn’t kept up with all the coverage during the rollout. The idea is Google has your location information from devices using Google services (your phone). Knowing where you were at a certain time allows Google to associate pictures that time meta data. While this is table stakes for phones, Google brilliantly decided to associate photos taken by cameras as well since they also have timestamps. The result is the effortless creation of collections that essentially title your groups of pictures with location information. Most recently for me, it was “Weekend in Solvang and Santa Barbara”.

Google Photos Solvang

Yup, that’s Solvang

Using Google Photos poses the endless debate of the cost of “free”. Hands down, the features of this service raise the bar. While Google Photos isn’t really a social network, it does have carry some undertones of the creepiness that’s associated with the likes of Facebook. It simply knows, and I’m guessing will continue learning, what’s happening in your life from places, people, and things. For some, this means simple, automated organization of a maze of pixels. For others, this is another less than subtle effort by Google going too far.

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