Tag Archives: Photo Gallery

Why do the edits made in Picasa not show in Photo Gallery?

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Ah, the ways “Of Mice and Picasa” [*]. How the computer mouse works, you know pretty well, but Picasa, now that is a different creature altogether.

When you make an edit to an image in Picasa those changes are not incorporated into the image file. Well, some are, but for the most part those changes Picasa just stores away for its own use.

Here is an example. Let’s say you have a precious photo of that fine wheel on your motor carriage. To show really what a hot conveyance your vehicle is you apply the Heat Map effect in Picasa.

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You want to touch it up in Photo Gallery. Low and behold, the Heat Map effect is not there. The photo looks exactly as it did before.

Let’s look in File Explorer. The photo there does not show the edits either. Indeed, the edits only show in Picasa and not in any other program or app.

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See that “picasa.ini” icon in File Explorer? That’s your hint that Picasa does things differently.

But you want to share your Hot Wheel with your friends. What to do?

The solution is easy, but something you have to remember. In Picasa, after you have made any edits, do a “Save As…” and save a copy of the image. That image will have the edits incorporated and they will show properly everywhere.

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[*] With all due apologies to John Steinbeck. No offense was intended.

.:.

© 2016 Ludwig Keck

How do I import just certain photos from my camera to my computer?

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Microsoft Photo Gallery provides a very flexible import tool. For the easiest way to use this tool, first set up your computer to launch it when you connect your camera. Check this post for instructions on setting up your computer: How do I import photos from my camera to my Windows 7 computer? 

To specify just the photos that you wish to import use the options in the import dialog. When the dialog opens the photos on your camera are shown in groups by the time/date the photos were taken. Import-09The groups that you have not yet imported are checked. Note the Select all option above the listings.

Click this several times to select all or to unselect all. You want them all unselected.

If you do not want the imported photos to be placed into multiple folders, adjust the Adjust groups slider all the way to the right. You will see the results in the main area.

Click the View all xx items link on the right of the listing to show thumbnails of all photos.

Now proceed through the thumbnails and select the photos you wish to import. Selecting works just as you expect. Click to select, click again to unselect.Import-14 

Note that the number you have selected is shown. You may have to scroll down and up if there are a lot of photos on your camera.

When you have made your selections click Import to complete the task.

.:.

© 2012 Ludwig Keck

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Where does the “Original size” of a picture in Microsoft Word come from?

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When a picture is inserted in a Microsoft Office Word document it is scaled to fit. The size can be set to other values to suit the document. In the Size dialog window the size of the picture is shown in inches and as a percentage of the “Original size” which is also given as the height and width in inches. So, how does Word come up with the “original size”?

The EXIF data of photo files contains a couple of values name “X resolution” and “Y resolution”. In a Windows Properties box they show up as “Horizontal resolution” and “Vertical resolution” and are given in “dpi”. That last item, the unit of measure, “dpi”, stands for “dots per inch”. There is your big clue. Using “dots” was the way pictures were printed on paper in the old days. Well, if you pick up a newspaper you can still see them nowadays.

These resolution values do not describe anything relating to the picture, they are setting instructions for printers. They can be changed by a number of programs. Changing these values does not affect the picture at all. The number of pixels stays the same, the color depth is not affected. So these values can be changed at will. Several programs, in fact, do that. Cameras set these values, most to 300, some to other values. When Windows Live Photo Gallery makes a JPG copy of a photo it sets the values to 72. Some other editors use 96. I have one that uses 472, another 262. It really does not matter.

For the most part these numbers are meaningless. Microsoft Office Word, however, uses these resolution values as they were originally intended: As printing instructions specifying the dimensions of the printed picture on paper. If you have a photo that is 768 pixels wide and the horizontal resolution value is set to 96, then the picture printed size is 8 inches (8 inch multiplied by 96 dots per inch yields 768 dots – the pixels dimension of the picture).

So Word will set the “100%” size to 8.0 inch – if this does not fit in the margin settings, the picture will be scaled down and the Scale value will be a lower number.Office-31

Normally that is not a problem as most pictures have either 72 or 96 set as the resolution value. If the 768 pixel wide picture had the resolution set to 256 then Word would calculate the width as 768 / 256 = 3 inches. It would most like be set to that value and look somewhat small. It is perfectly acceptable to increase the size setting. If you want the picture to appear 6 inch wide you can set the scale to 200%. Word keeps the original number of pixels of the picture intact until the document is printed or saved with certain save or export options.

.:.

© 2012 Ludwig Keck

How do I move a sub-folder up a level?

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Sometimes you need to re-organize your picture folders and may wish to move a sub-folder up so it is on par with other folders. Here is an illustration:

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On the left the folder “Bob” is inside folder “Ann”. You can tell by the little arrowhead. In fact, until you expand (click on) folder Ann you cannot see folder Bob in the navigation pane.

To move it so it is on par with – at the same level as – folder Ann, proceed as follows: Drag the folder to the name of the folder where you want it. In this illustration we want folder Bob to be inside My Pictures. So it is dragged to the My Pictures folder name. Notice the little note (screen tip) that says “Move to My Pictures”. When it says the correct folder name, drop it (let go the mouse button). You have moved the folder.

You can use this procedure to move any folder to be inside any other folder, even inside sub-folders.

Sometimes the procedure will not succeed, such as when a folder is open in an application. Just close the application and try again.

You can reorganize your folders in the navigation pane of Windows Live Photo Gallery or in the navigation pane of Windows Explorer. (Do not have both open at the same time, see warning above.)

.:.

© 2011 Ludwig Keck