What features are there in the Picasso program? Picasa is a program for viewing and storing photos in the cloud, editing them, searching by faces, creating collages and videos

Picasa(in Russian - Pikasa) is a free software online package(photo editor platform), the use of which tools allows you to easily and quickly edit, process and completely modify digital photos, as well as post them on the Online network. In 2004, the Picasa program was purchased by Google, which continues to develop and expand its capabilities over time (these are: the best browser Google Chrome, Gmail mail, the Google Plus social network, an image editor program and many others online services allowing Google to be one of the leaders in the Internet market).

By using Picasa programs online You can easily create great presentations, collages and slideshows from your arsenal of photos, and also share them via the Google Plus social network or email. When you first launch the application, your images on your computer are automatically sorted and albums are created, the pictures in which are organized by name and date of creation of the files.

How to use Picasa

How to use Picasa— is described in detail and with illustrations in the article below. The main purpose of the Picas program is to edit photographs and paintings using a basic set of functions, effects and filters. The program with a Russian interface can be downloaded online for free at the following link:

After downloading the driver online, installing Picas is no different from installing regular software on Personal Computer. When you launch it for the first time after going through the installation procedure, Photo Editor will by default scan your PC for graphic images. If on your computer a large number of The process may take more than 3 minutes, but after a few minutes of waiting you will receive complete information about your pictures.

Loading images into the program

Uploading an image from a digital camera is quite simple. Picasa itself detects when the camera is connected online to the computer and starts downloading all the photos from it, showing you in advance. The user can select the photos needed to upload and select portrait or landscape display.

Changing Photos

Picasa has a lot of choice tools and filters, using which you will noticeably improve your photographs and be able to create beautiful and unique images. By double-clicking on the photo, the following sections will open in front of you:

This option includes simple changes— straightening the image, cropping, retouching, correcting the common red-eye effect or adding an inscription to any part of the image. If you don't know how to use these functions correctly, you can entrust all the work of changing lighting and adjusting contrast to the Picasa application by clicking on the button - I'll be lucky!

The option presents several controls:

1. Lighting alignment. Often, in a photo with a very bright background, the main details turn out to be darkened or unclear, adjust the brightness - this will help balance the light. You can also try to improve the quality of the photo.
2. Lightening. This function allows you to increase the level of lightening in order to highlight the bright areas in your composition. By pressing the slider to the right or left, you can visually monitor changes in the drawing online.
3. Lighting. Used when you need to darken shadows, to increase depth or contrast.
4.Color temperature. By adding “warm” tones to the image by dragging the slider to the right, you will get a more animated composition and the colors will become brighter.
5. Specify a neutral color. You can also tell Picasa Google which parts of the image should be considered white and gray. This help to the program will give Photo Lab a basis for balancing photographs.

— An article about the main functions of the Picas program and how to use them

To get started, you will need to install it on your computer. On this moment current version Picasa 3.9 programs.
When the installation completes, the user will be offered a number of additional actions, so remember to uncheck those that are not necessary.
Getting started with Picasa 3.9, for convenience, you can collect everything required images into one folder, but the program has a convenient system for searching for the desired image among all those available on the computer, which in addition offers to sort all the photos into albums.
But Pikasa is not only a viewer and organizer graphic files, he is also an editor. Unlike viewing pictures, these functions are not so trivial, so we will look at how to use them.
With Picasa, you can perform various types of image editing. It contains a set of the most necessary tools for this:
Red-eye removal occurs automatically - just select the photo and select “Red-eye” from the actions:

Cropping allows you to remove unnecessary or random objects from a photo. You just need to select the desired area, click “Apply” and the program will trim everything that is not included in this area.

The Retouch feature allows you to remove objects without affecting the composition of your photo. You just need to select the adjustment area and the area into which the program will replace the corrected one.

Picasa has lighting and color correction functions, as well as the ability to apply various effects to the image. There are not many effects; to select them, select the icon on the toolbar that is highlighted in the screenshot below:

It is impossible not to consider such useful functions as creating collages and presentation films. To do this, mark the desired images and select “Create a collage from photos” or “Create a film presentation”, respectively.

In the “Settings” tab, you can select the view, background settings, page format and grid step of the collage.
Creating a movie presentation in Picasa 3.9 is generally similar to creating a presentation in Microsoft Word: the user can also create slides, adjust transitions between them, add effects and audio tracks, etc.

The program keeps a history of all changes; you can roll back any completed action.
Using the "File" menu tab of the program, edited photos can be printed, sent via e-mail or burn to CD or DVD.
We looked at the main functions of the Picasa program and how to use them. Of course, this is not all, but the average user will most likely need them.

To be honest, we love to show our photographs to relatives, friends and acquaintances. But it's one thing to launch a slideshow using some viewer on home computer. But if you want to be able to always carry it with you, then problems will arise. It is inconvenient to store a bunch of photos on a flash drive or CD. In addition, others may not have a normal viewer. That's why best option— arrange the slideshow as a separate executable file or create a mini-movie.
Concerned with this question, I began to look for free programs with which I could complete the task. Of course, you can use commercial software, for example, the same Ahead Nero, but why? It's time to switch to free software. A half-hour search on the Internet yielded disastrous results. Or Picasa, or six little-known but specialized programs. The choice fell on the product from Google. Moreover, there is detailed information in Russian.

First of all, download the viewer program from Google from the page http://picasa.google.ru (the installation file weighs about 10 MB). When you launch it for the first time, the utility will offer to scan your HDD to search for pictures. We agree and wait a few minutes. On the left side of the program window we get a tree of folders (“Library”), on the right — thumbnails of photographs.

Now let's understand a little terminology. You can also run a standard slideshow. Collect all files in one folder. Or select photos in the folder manually by holding Ctrl and selecting them one by one. Then go to the “View > Slide Show” menu (or immediately press “Ctrl+4”). The slideshow will start immediately. Settings are available at the bottom of the screen; just move the mouse arrow to the side. This will pause the slideshow; to continue, press the space bar.
But we need something different. In Picasa, this is called a “Movie” project, which allows you to create a video file with a .wmv extension. You can edit together not only photographs and music for the background, but also video clips. The resulting file can be shown to friends and acquaintances. Or immediately upload to the popular YouTube service. And now in more detail.

So, we selected photos, copying them into one folder for convenience. Open Picasa, find it in the left list the desired folder, select it and select the “Create > Movie” menu.
A new window will appear. On the left is the control menu, on the right are frames from the film of the correct size, and on the bottom right is the storyboard of the film.
If you want the sequence to be sorted by file name or creation date, go back to the “Library” tab, right-click on the folder and select the desired sorting “Sort folder by parameter...”

Movie tab. This section is responsible for the main parameters of the future film. You can select the soundtrack for your slides. Alas, only one in WMA or MP3 format. However, a 3-5 minute composition is enough to view several dozen photographs. You can choose three modes: cut the audio, match the display of the photo with the sound, or link the photos in accordance with the sound. The default is the second item, i.e. The duration of display of pictures depends on the total duration of the composition.
Next, you can select the transition style: a total of 10 filters are available. This is not much - some programs have hundreds of them, but more than enough for an amateur slide film. It's a shame you can only choose one style.
Then, depending on the choice of the two previous modes, the duration of the slide show and the “Overlap” parameter are selected.
Now you can proceed to selecting the movie size. Available resolutions range from 320x240 to a maximum of 1920x1080.
If necessary, check the boxes “Show captions” and “Crop full frame of photo” (to fill the full frame of the film).
At the very bottom there are three more buttons: “Close”, “YouTube” (create a movie and send it there) and “Create a movie”. We don’t touch them for now and go to another tab.

Slide tab. This section is responsible for the text design of individual slides. You can choose a signature for each one. The font, size, style, as well as the color of the background and letters change. You can also choose a template for placing labels. Each slide can be assigned individual captions in the storyboard at the bottom right. Picasa also automatically creates a zero frame with the name of the folder and the date it was created. This inscription can be changed to something else, for example, “Trip to St. Petersburg. November 2008.” You can add text slides to your movie. And delete unnecessary ones.

"Clips" tab. Used to add and remove photos, as well as download them from the library (“Advanced” button).

To change the order of photos, you need to drag them manually. You can see what happened by clicking on the green triangle in the storyboard.

Creating the final film
So, all the settings are done, select “Create movie”. In a few minutes - the creation time depends on the amount of resolution of the movie - it will be created. The movie will automatically be saved to a folder like \C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\My Documents\My Pictures\Picasa\Movies\. If you want to return to the project later, click on the “Close” button. And agree with the proposal to save the draft.

That's all. Remember that the quality of a film primarily depends not on the number of transition filters used between photographs, but on their aesthetic qualities.

(Published in the newspaper "My Friend the Computer", No. 3, February 2009. The author's edition is given here.)

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Comments

error 9 Posted by ansenna , at 2010-06-23 21:36:54 also error 9, damn it (((

iiiiii Posted by iiiiii , at 2010-12-19 12:54:14 how to download

Posted by Desmond, at 2011-01-27 17:18:25 Hmmm this will come in handy

Posted by TATIANA , at 2011-02-12 07:15:02 I COMPOSED EVERYTHING AND MADE THE FILM. I CLICK CREATE FILM, THE DRAFT WINDOW COMES OUT AND CREATE NOW, I CLICK CREATE NOW. I ONLY GET DRAFTS FOR WHY, WHEN I CLICK PLAY SLIDE SHOW THEN I GET BLACK SCREEN AND NOTHING ELSE. WHY IS THIS?

problemi's picasa 3 Posted by vadim , at 2011-05-25 19:14:14 I COMPOSED EVERYTHING AND MADE THE FILM. I CLICK CREATE FILM, THE DRAFT WINDOW COMES OUT AND CREATE NOW, I CLICK CREATE NOW. I ONLY GET DRAFTS FOR WHY, WHEN I CLICK PLAY SLIDE SHOW THEN I GET A BLACK SCREEN AND NOTHING ELSE. WHY IS THIS?

Change movie in Picasa Posted by Pauline , at 2012-01-14 21:54:07 Hello, I created a movie from a photo with music, first, to view it, I set the photos to a low resolution, today I edited this movie and created another one based on it, the photo resolution is 1600*1200. And there are two problems at once - the new film gets stuck when watching and it does not have a “change film” button, please tell me what is the reason?

The author of the article is Alena. I want to introduce you to an amazing photo viewer called Picasa. Picasa is the brainchild of Google and also has great capabilities, which I think will be of interest to many.

I often have to deal with photographs. My indispensable assistant lately is the FastStone Image Viewer, which can not only “snatch” photos from a scanner, edit them, show slide shows, but also does an excellent job of batch image processing.

Well, then somehow I was processing digital photographs and caught my eye free program from Google - Picas. I decided to see what this “beast” was and was pleasantly surprised by the possibilities that open up when working with this free photo editor. Unfortunately, there are also disadvantages (for some, perhaps not significant), but more about them below.

What is Picasa, its features and disadvantages

To the advantages Picasa image viewer the following can be attributed:

1. Photos can be downloaded to your computer directly from a scanner, camera, phone or memory card. A huge number of file types are supported (.jpg, .gif, .nef, .raf, mpg, .avi, .divx, .mp4, .mkv, etc.). The first time you connect any of these devices to your computer, it is configured to auto-upload all files to your Google Drive.
2. You can view images in both normal and full screen mode. You can also view it as a slide show.
3. Picasa can be used as free photo editor(possible retouching, cropping, alignment, color/contrast correction, etc.).
4. It is possible to apply various special effects to photos (sepia, black and white, grain, shine, various shades, posterization, thermal imaging, red-eye removal, etc.)
5. Images can be sent for printing directly from the picasa photo editor.
6. You can send the image to someone by email, or send it for publication on social networks.
7. Create an extraordinary collage from selected photographs.
8. Create a screen saver from any number of images.
9. If you decide to edit an image, it will automatically be saved under a new name rather than ruining your original.

The advantages, of course, more than outweigh the existing disadvantages (in principle, you can find fault with any program, if you really want to):

1. It is not possible to create subfolders (other albums) inside a photo album.
2. It cannot display files with the .tiff extension correctly (only the first page of several will be visible).
3. Well, there is a small problem with changing the size of the picture (you can change it, but not in one action, as you would like).

Installing Picasa on your computer

Go to the official website and click Download Picasa. We agree with all the conditions put forward to us, after which we select the folder (place on our computer) where it will be saved. boot file(it won’t take much, only 65.9 MB). Click the “Install” button.

To complete the installation, uncheck unnecessary checkboxes (I left only the last one - “Run picasa”):

A window will open asking you to create Google account or log in by entering your email address and password.

Once you have logged in (or re-created) your account, you will be prompted set up auto-upload of photos and videos to Google+. To do this, click on the “Configure” button:

Here you can select those sources from which your photos and video files will be automatically downloaded, which after downloading will be visible only to you (if you do not bother to give anyone access to them). After checking or unchecking the boxes you don’t need, click on “Start downloading”:

For some time (depending on the number of photos and video files on your computer), in the lower right corner of your monitor you will see this window, where the pictures will replace one another - this is a search for all the images available on your computer. Please wait for this process to complete.

That's it, installation of the picasa photo editor on your computer is complete.

Picasa Web Albums - Organize and Add Photos

At first sight photo editor from Google It looks like a regular photo viewer, but it actually has some quirks. Let's see which ones:

On the left we can see the “Folders” section (by the way, they will be a complete copy of the folders that are on our computer). remember, that Once you delete a photo from your Picasa folder, it will also disappear from your computer. Be careful with this.

With the “Albums” section, things are much simpler. Albums are the brainchild of the program itself, so we can move and delete images placed there without fear - the source files will always be located in folders on your computer.

Users - search by faces

In the “Users” section you can collect a collection of faces. Picasa can do it very well recognize faces in photos, collecting them from different folders on your computer (it would be nice if this feature extended to Google Images, so that you could more effectively search for people by photo). Here you can also delete and move photos without any consequences.

If you try to slowly enter the name of the person depicted in it under the portrait, you will be offered options for those people who are listed as your friends in various in social networks. Original!

If no offers have been received (well, this person doesn’t have his own account yet), then enter his full name, or just his name (for example, Varvara), and press enter on the keyboard. A window will open where the entered name “Varvara” will appear at the very top. Then, click “New Person” (the name Varvara also appears with an asterisk) and on the right, if desired, enter his e-mail, then click OK.

Now we see that in the corresponding section we have New user- Varvara (this folder will contain all the photos of Varvara, from diapers to old age):

Surprisingly, Picasa detects this with incredible accuracy.

Adding photos to Picasa, importing new ones

First, let's choose which ones we want to see in our photo viewer. To do this, select “Tools - Options - File Types”. We check the boxes next to the types that we want Picasa to show, and then click OK:

Now we need to mark the folders that will be edited. Go to “Tools - Folder Manager”. On the left we select the folder we need, and on the right - the action (how many times the selected folder will be scanned, or it should be completely deleted from the photo editor):

As I said a little earlier, upload images to computer you can directly from a scanner, camera, mobile phone and even from a memory card. They will not only be saved in this program, but will also be automatically added as needed, if you have allowed this in the settings.

Click on Importing new photos :

In the window that opens, select the device (scanner, camera, etc.) from which we want to import something into the program for viewing photos and more. At the bottom, select the folder where all this will be imported, and select import all or selectively.

Picasa - free photo editor

Free photo editor Picasa is rich in a variety of filters and effects that can be applied to a particular photo, thereby changing it beyond recognition. Let's try in practice what it will look like. Double-click on the image you want to improve. The following window opens:

1. Back to the library- go back to select another image.
2. Play -
play a slide show of selected images.
3. A -
viewing one image (as in this case in our screenshot).
4. AB
- view two different images(selected and subsequent ones).
5. A.A.
- viewing the selected image in two versions (original and modified, using any filters). This option seemed to me the most interesting, so I will choose it.
6. Data EXIF- all will be displayed here Additional Information about a photograph that any digital camera can remember. This includes what camera and what lens this image was shot with, what settings (iso, aperture, shutter speed) were made, etc. In this case, we don’t display anything, because this picture was copied from the Internet (there will also be no EXIF ​​information if it was scanned).

Frequently performed operations

Cropping - this operation allows you to cut out the part of the picture we need. We click on the image and, without releasing the left mouse button, select the fragment we need, then release the mouse button and press enter. You can also choose from a selection of sizes (there is a good selection).

Alignment. Here the name speaks for itself. This operation allows you to use the slider that appears to correct the curvature in the photo (for example, straighten the horizon).

Red eyes- eliminates the effect of red eyes in photographs. Holding down the left mouse button, select each eye in turn, release the button - the defect will be eliminated. Unfortunately, it is not possible to correct sun-exposed eyes; this operation only removes redness.

I'll be lucky!- automatic lighting and color correction will occur in one click. Luck fix, so to speak.

Auto contrast correction- automatic correction of brightness and contrast levels.

Auto color correction- automatic color balance correction.

Retouching- allows you to remove various defects in pictures. For example, you can retouch a very old photo, or one that was damaged by something (coffee was dropped on it, for example). Click “Retouch”, select the brush size and begin restoring the image.

Text- everything should be clear with this. We select a place in the photo, click “Text” and enter the information we need.

Leveling lightening. Using this tool will help correct, for example, a person’s silhouette that is too dark in relation to everything else in the frame.

Lighting and color correction

Dodge and Burn- using the slider you can adjust the level of lightening or darkening of the image.

Colorful temperature- using the same slider, you can take your photo in warmer colors, or, conversely, go for cooler ones.

Choosing a Neutral Color- using an eyedropper, we can help Picasa select a neutral gray or white part of the photo in order to then more correctly (in your opinion) restore the color balance.

Effects in picasa photo editor

Although Picasa is a free photo editor, it has more than enough possibilities. I think that it will be in no way inferior to, for example, Pixlr - online editor photo in Photoshop style. Just look at the variety of effects that can be applied to an image. The result will be simply stunning. Let's look:

1. We can increase or decrease the sharpness of the image by using the existing slider to set the value of this setting.
2. Apply sepia, that is, age the photo, make it in some red-brown tones.
3. Make the photo black and white, which, I must admit, is now back in fashion.
4. Using the same slider, make the tones warmer.
5. Add grain. This may seem unnecessary to some (like me, for example), but many believe that it adds some charm to the picture that you just printed out.
6. It is possible to add some color to the image. Select the color you want from the palette, and then use the slider to adjust its saturation. It turns out effectively.
7. Add saturation to the picture.
8. Apply soft focus. That is, select an area in the photo that will remain clear, and blur the rest.
9. Add shine to the whitest areas of the photo. Use the slider to change the intensity and radius of this setting.
10. Apply a black and white filter or focus. Some changes, of course, can be observed with the naked eye, but somehow these settings didn’t particularly appeal to me. Try them, maybe you will check them out.
11. Well, the last effect in this tab is the choice of tone. We choose the shade we like from the palette and admire how our photo is transformed.

The next tab also contains effects:

1. Application of infrared film.
2. Using Lomography (you can add a little blurring and darkening around the edges). This effect imitates a photo taken with a Lomo camera, which was in use back in 1984.
3. Apply a Holda style effect (use the sliders to adjust edge blur, grain and darkening). Simulates a photo taken with a plastic toy camera.
4. HDR effect (you can adjust the radius and intensity of the setting, as well as its darkening).
5. Cinemascope, with the ability to insert wide black stripes at the top and bottom (simulates an old movie).
6. Orton effect (adjustable glow, brightness and darkening). Your photo will look like it was painted with “wet” watercolors.
7. An effect called “60s style” that gives a photo an antique look (you can add rounded corners and a warm glow to the photo).
8. Invert - make a photo look like a negative.
9. Imitation of a thermal imager.
10. An effect that simulates film cross-processing.
11. Posterization is reducing the number of colors in a photo.
12. Duplex - converts an image to two colors. Select the first color and the second, adjust the brightness, contrast and dimming.

Well, the third tab of the picasa photo editor contains several more effects:

1. Enhance - increasing color saturation and increasing contrast.
2. Soften - this effect gives the photo softness and some shine.
3. Vignetting darkens the edges of a photo. You can select the desired color, size, intensity and darkening scale.
4. Pixelation simulates large pixels and low resolution (you can adjust the pixel size, blending mode and darkening).
5. Sports focus - the image is scaled outside the central area. You can shift the center of focus, adjust the intensity of the zoom, change the focal size, mark sharp edges, and apply shading.
6. Pencil drawing effect.
7. The ability to give the image a neon glow effect (you can choose the color).
8. Stylize like comics.
Outline - adding a frame. The frame will consist of two colors - outside and inside (both colors can be selected), it is also possible to adjust the thickness of each frame, and mark the radius of curvature. The "text height" setting enlarges the black area below the image to display some text. It will turn out to be something like a demotivator.
9. Add a shadow cast by the image. It will look as if you put your photo on a sheet of paper (the color of the sheet can be selected in the settings) and a shadow emanates from it (its color can also be designated). You can also select the distance of the image relative to the sheet of paper, angle, shadow size and shading (transparency).
10. Passepartout - darkening the edges of a photo. This is something like overlaying a frame (the frame is also double - its color and thickness are selected both inside and outside).
11. Simulates a Polaroid photo. The tilt of the image and the color of the sheet on which it will supposedly lie are adjusted.

Copying effects

For example, you spent a long time working on some image, and you don’t even remember which filters you used, but the result impressed you so much that you would like to edit other photos in the same way. So Picasa is very capable of doing this, and can apply this set of effects to several photos you select at once! But there is one BUT: copy effects only possible within one folder. That is, the edited photo should be in the same folder as those that you want to edit (apply the same effects) according to the same principle.

What do I need to do?

Select a photo to which we have applied some effects. Then go to “Edit - Copy all effects”.

Then select the images in the same folder to which we want to apply the same effects, and select “Edit - Apply all effects.” Everything is very simple.

Batch editing and renaming photos in Picassa

In order to do batch image editing in the Picasa photo viewer, you need to select the ones you need and go to “Photography - Group Editing”:

Then we select the action we want to perform: rotate clockwise, adjust contrast or color, sharpen the image, add grain, change to sepia or black and white, remove red eye, etc.

If something goes wrong, you can always take a step back - cancel changes made in one click from several photos. To do this, you need to select them, and then select “Photo - Discard all changes.” And also, if you once added a frame to a picture, but now you have made it in black and white, which you are not happy with, then selecting “Undo all changes” will also cancel the previously applied frame.

Here, in the “Group editing” item there is also an action - batch renaming of images(“Batch Edit - Rename”).

Select the pictures for which you want to change the name, click “Rename”. In the window that opens, enter a name, for example “Nature”, check the boxes next to additional data if desired, and click on the tab of the same name:

The selected photos will eventually all have the name “Nature”, and they will also be assigned their own serial number after the name (nature-001.jpg, nature-002.jpg...).

Additional features of the Picasa photo editor

Magnifier and how to add a mark

Pikasa has the opportunity viewing images through a magnifying glass. This is necessary so as not to open each image separately in a new window. To do this, click on the corresponding icon (folder with a magnifying glass), and hold down the left mouse button (your cursor will look like a magnifying glass) and point at any image. After you release the left mouse button, the magnifying glass will disappear.

To keep your favorite photos always at hand, you can easily add them to your favorites - add a note. To do this, select one or more pictures and click on the yellow star. This star will appear in the lower right corner of the selected pictures, and on the left you will have a new folder with your favorite photos - Starred Photos.

To delete a photo from this folder, i.e. To uncheck it, simply select it with a mouse click and click again on the yellow star icon.

Adding text tags to photos

Using tags you can easily Find the photos you need in Picasa Web Albums .

Select the image to which you want to add a tag (place a label) and click on the button Tag(this is a yellow piece of paper at the bottom right):

Then enter short description of our picture (tag) in the appropriate field “in our case - “girl in red” and click on the adjacent plus sign. That’s it, the tag is added. You can enter several tags for one photo at once - enter them one by one, separating them with a space.

You can also select a tag from the existing ones, i.e. select it from the “express tags” field (if you have previously entered frequently occurring tags there for easy navigation). Entering express tags is very easy - click on any question mark, a window will open where you enter those tags that you plan to frequently appear in your photo albums.

You can search for tags added to photos using the search field on the right top corner Picasa windows.

Add a map pin for an album or individual photo

First, let's see how add a pin (mark a location) on the map for the album as a whole. Select the album on the left, and then click on the red mark located in the lower right corner and enter the address or name of the place:

You can do it another way: click on the green mark with a plus sign, and then place it on the map (thereby indicating the location, placing a mark on the map):

You will be asked whether to add a label to a certain number of photos or videos located in this folder - click OK or cancel the action if the label is not set correctly by mistake.

Map marker for one image is added in exactly the same way, only not the entire folder is selected, but one image.

You can add a map pin to one or more photos even easier: grab any image with the left mouse button and drag it onto the map area. Photos whose location is identified on the map will have a red mark in the lower right corner. If you make a mistake with placing a marker (choose the wrong place on the map), then simply drag the red marker to the desired point on the map.

If the label on the photo is no longer needed, then click on this photo (its location appears on the map), and then click on the label that appears on the map itself and click:

Send to Google+

To do this, do we choose an album or individual photographs? and click on the big green “Send to Google+” button? located at the very bottom:

Photos are added to the folder you selected:

Then you will be taken to your Google+ account. There you can:

However you can prohibit publication of the album in other feeds. To do this, go to:

And check the box “Prohibit publication in other feeds”:

You can also prohibit publication in other feeds from the album. To do this, click on “Photo” in the upper left corner:

We select “Photo” there again and get to the page with all our photo albums. Click on the arrow again (as shown in the screenshot above) and select the same “Sharing settings”, check the box to prohibit publication.

Creating a presentation film in Picasa

Select an album on the left, and then click on the button “create a film presentation” :

In the window that opens, select the “Slide” tab, where we enter the name of our film (it will appear at the very beginning when you start watching the film), select a template for it (how exactly the text will appear on our screen), as well as the font, its size, style, text and background color:

You can also overlay text directly on the photo itself - select the one you want among the slides with the picture (click on it with the left mouse button), and then enter the text in the appropriate field, selecting a template for it. It is also possible to add an empty text slide by clicking on the leaf icon (as well as removing any slide by clicking on the cross icon).

When finished, you can view the resulting presentation movie by expanding it to full screen (see screenshot above), and also display the actual size of the movie without any stretching.

On the "Movie" tab it is possible add sound to our presentation. To do this, click on the “Download” button, and then select the appropriate track on your computer. Below we select the transition style, slide duration, overlay, and resolution of our future presentation film created using Picasa.

Then you offer the Picasa program post the film presentation on Youtube(by logging into your channel using your username and password) - click on the appropriate button (see screenshot above).

In the window that opens, give the name of your presentation, enter a description, select a video category, add tags separated by a space ( keywords) and decide whether to make your video public.

The video cannot be longer than 10 minutes and weigh more than 1 GB. Please respect copyright- do not post on Youtube video hosting any music videos, television programs and the like that were not created by you, otherwise you may be blocked.

Then feel free to click on “Add Video”. You will see a window where you can watch the video download. After the download is complete, in the lower right corner of the monitor “Click to view on the Internet” (if you accidentally closed this window, then watch your video on YouTube in your channel):

The video on YouTube will take some time to process (depending on the size). After which you will have the opportunity to dig deeper into its settings:

Opposite “Video” there will be a number that will show the number of videos uploaded to this video hosting site. By selecting our presentation film and clicking on the “Actions” button, we look at what actions can be performed with it:

1. Configure access parameters - make it open, access via link, limited access
2. Delete
3. Apply additional actions - add a date, access to video statistics, category, comments, show the shooting location, insert an age restriction, add tags and descriptions, etc.
4. Well, and see the last completed actions

By clicking on the “Edit” button, we can improve the video, add subtitles, sound, download or delete the video.

Creating a collage in Picasa

In order to create a collage, you need to click on the appropriate button, having first selected a folder with photographs (you can select individual pictures with the mouse) of which this very collage will consist:

On the right, you will have a selection of selected photos scattered on a piece of paper. By clicking on any of these images, you can delete it, set it as a background (the rest of the pictures will show off on it), or rotate and resize it using the target that appears:

On the left there is a wide selection of styles:

1. Stack of photos- randomly scattered pictures (applied by default)> -
2. Mosaic- images will automatically adjust to the page size
3. Mosaic frame- a mosaic with a relief center of the image (i.e. a photo will be installed in the center of the collage, and the rest around it).
4. Net- images will be placed in rows and columns of the same size.
5. Index-print- thumbnail images will be lined up in a row, and the title of the previously selected folder will be displayed above them.
6. Multiple exposure- all images will be superimposed one on top of the other (a very beautiful background is obtained).

Also in the settings you can add borders to photos :

1. Make images without borders (set by default).
2. Make a regular white frame.
3. Make a frame in the form of Polaroid photographs.

As a background you can use a solid tone. To do this, click on the square (see screenshot below) and use the eyedropper to select the desired color in the palette that appears. You can also select a color from the image itself by pointing the eyedropper cursor at any of the images:

You can also use an image as a background. To do this, left-click on one of our pictures (it will be surrounded by a bright frame) and click on “Use selected” (a copy of it will be displayed in a square), and then admire how the background transforms in our future collage:

Each style, no matter what we choose, be it a mosaic, an index print, a stack of photographs, has several more interesting settings. For example, for a mosaic, you can set the grid spacing - the images will not be connected to each other, but will have a kind of frame. And having selected, for example, a stack of photographs, you can add shadows to the images (they will look more natural, not drawn) and add captions (who or what is shown in this photo will be signed):

By the way, captions are taken by default from the name of the photos, so don’t forget to sign them before creating the collage. Also, any collage can be set as a desktop background.

On the “Clips” tab we have all the photos available in the previously selected folder (from which we took the photos to make the collage). If we suddenly want to add images to the collage, then go to this tab, select a few more images you like and press the “plus” sign (to remove, respectively, the “cross”). The selected pictures will be added to the collage in the same form as those existing there (with a shadow, frame, inscriptions, if we previously specified them in the style settings):

All in all, creating a collage in Picasa very addictive, it all depends on your rich imagination. Yes, don't forget to click on the "Create Collage" button when finished.

If you have any urgent matters, but you haven’t finished creating, then click on the “Close” button - it will happen saving a draft to the “Collages” folder (will appear among other albums):

When you need to edit it, double-click your project in the appropriate folder and click “Edit Collage.” Everything is quite simple and convenient.

Sending photos by email

Very convenient in Picasa, sending photos by email. Click on the envelope located at the very bottom of the program:

We will be offered a choice of two ways to send our images ( by mail program by default, or by mail program from Google):

In this case, I was offered to use Opera as the default program, since it is the one I have installed as the main one for receiving and sending all kinds of correspondence. I'm very pleased with her. So, if you select the default program (click on the appropriate button), then a letter will open in it, where you will only have to enter the recipient’s address and click on “Send”.

When you select Google Mail, the following window will open:

In the “To” field, enter the addresses of those to whom you want to send the images by mail - as you enter letters, hints will pop up with the mailing addresses of your friends, which is very convenient. Then you can enter a name in the “Subject” field, then you can view the photos attached to the letter (you can view them using the arrows and delete an extra frame that accidentally ended up in this letter). You can add something of your own to the letter itself, or leave everything as it is, that is, how many files were sent and what these Photos were submitted via Google's Picasa program. If everything is entered correctly, click on “Submit”.

On this note, I think we can end. I hope it will be interesting. Have fun learning free editor Picas photos !

The beginning of autumn is the time to sort through summer photographs, and at the same time organize your family photo archive. For years, millions of users have used the free Picasa program to do this. But this year you may have to reconsider your habits - as of May 1, Picasa will no longer be downloadable. Popular program suffered the same fate as Google Reader previously and has now been discontinued. You can only work with Picasa if you have downloaded it previously, but please note that no further updates will be released for it.

It would seem like nothing, but there are enough programs for organizing photos on the market, both paid and free. But despite the huge selection of applications for working with images, you can find full replacement Picasa is not that easy. Mainly because, for all its simplicity, this program was multifunctional: with its help you could organize photos into albums, select pictures according to various criteria, perform basic editing operations, and quickly upload albums to the cloud.

Let's not forget that Picasa was free solution, which means commercial programs should not be considered as an alternative. We also intentionally do not include in this review programs whose main function is to view images. Our goal is to find solutions that allow you to organize large collections of images and upload photos to the Internet.

⇡ Google Photos is the successor to Picasa

For creating backup copy a photo archive in the cloud is unlikely to be found The best decision than Picasa's successor, Google Photos.

Firstly, all web albums uploaded using Picasa are automatically transferred to the new service from Google. Secondly, as in the case of Picasa, users of the new service receive unlimited storage space for photos whose size does not exceed 16 megapixels. For most people who use their smartphones for photography, this means being able to download their entire photo archive for free, since the number of smartphones with better cameras is not so large (even the iPhone 6s has a 12-megapixel camera, and Samsung Galaxy S6 - 16-megapixel).

To upload photos to the cloud from your computer, you need to use the Google Photo Backup application. Like Picasa, it allows you to automatically download all photos from memory cards, desktop and standard Windows folders for storing pictures. In addition, you can add any number additional folders, in which photographs are stored.

When automatically copying photos to the cloud from memory cards, you can also choose a folder in which to save a local copy of the images. Google Photos Backup can download images at their original resolution or automatically compress them. RAW files are supported, but loading is disabled by default (this can be changed in the settings).

If everything is more or less clear with uploading images online, then many other Picasa functions have not migrated to Google Photos. The online service has rather modest image editing capabilities (and, frankly, the editor interface leaves much to be desired); there are no tags, captions, or comments on photographs that are familiar to Picasa users. So if you've been using Picasa not only as a tool for uploading photos online, but also as a cataloger and editor, it's worth looking for a desktop application with the functionality you need in addition to Google Photos.

⇡ BonAView 1.9.0

• Developer: High Motion Software
• Operating system: Windows
• Distribution: free
• Russian interface: yes

BonAView is not the most famous program for working with photo archives, but it is undeservedly ignored. In terms of functionality, it is close to Picasa, and in some ways it even surpasses the recently closed program.

Viewing images is possible by catalogs, by albums, or in the Timeline mode so beloved by Picasa users, when photos are automatically organized by the program by time they were taken.

You can use ratings to sort images and create custom albums. BonAView is suitable for working with photo collections of any size, as it supports an unlimited number of albums (including any number of subalbums). The number of photos in each album is also not limited.

You can use filters to sort images. They help to display only photos related to a particular album, having a specific name or a given rating.

Viewing photos is possible in two modes: in the form of thumbnails, the size of which can be easily controlled using a special slider, and in 3D view. The second mode allows you to work with a “carousel” of images, rotating and even editing them as you view them.

By the way, about editing. There are many functions for improving photos in BonAView. There are options for adjusting color rendering, level correction and red-eye removal, tools for automatic settings, tools for sharpening and blurring, about a dozen effects (sepia, negative, shadow, etc.), a good set of frames for different cases. It is interesting that, as in “large” photo editors, it is possible to apply editing tools not to the entire image, but to part of it, having previously selected the required fragment.

It's also worth paying attention to an interesting feature for creating visual annotations. Using it, you can add various graphic elements and text to the picture.

Let's also mention the excellent built-in search engine. BonAView can search for photos by specified folders, by user albums, by certain properties (size, resolution or file type, date last change, rating).

To quickly select photos stored in different folders and albums, it is convenient to use the ImageBoard tool (analogous to Photo Tray in Picasa). Once photos are placed in ImageBoard, you can add them to albums and perform other operations as a group. But here are the full-fledged funds for batch processing not in BonAView - for this the same developer offers separate program ImBatch.

Unfortunately, BonAView does not include any means for sharing photos with other people. Perhaps this is due to the fact that latest version program dates back to 2013, when social functions were not as in demand as they are now. However, BonAView can be used in conjunction with Google Photo Backup.

⇡ JetPhoto Studio 4.15

• Developer: Atomix Technologies Limited
• Operating system: Windows/Mac
• Distribution: free for non-commercial use (Pro version available)
• Russian interface: no

JetPhoto Studio combines the capabilities of a cataloger, viewer, graphic editor, and also contains tools for publishing photo albums on the Internet.

To start working with the program, you need to create an album. Photos from the album are then added to the album. different sources(from a memory card, from local folders, from a webcam, etc.). When sorting images in an album, the user can mark them with a star, add keywords and notes (that is, a text description of the photo). It is also possible to edit information in EXIF. All this data can be used when searching for the desired images. And pictures marked with a star can be quickly selected. It is convenient to use a calendar to search for photos. Simply click on the desired date and only photos taken on that day will be shown.

In addition to the usual mode for viewing photos in the form of thumbnails for such applications, JetPhoto Studio offers an interesting feature of displaying images on a map. The program perfectly understands geotags and makes it possible to assign them either manually or based on the downloaded GPS track. There is also integration with Google Earth, Creation KML files and KMZ. If information about where the photo was taken is not automatically available, you can easily add it by simply pointing to the location on the map. This can also be done for a group of photographs by first selecting them.

JetPhoto Studio offers many of the most different ways convenient viewing of images. For example, based on selected photos, you can create wallpaper, flash gallery, screen saver, slide show, web gallery in one of several formats.

But the image editing capabilities are more than modest. There are only a couple of very simple effects, tools for basic image correction and cropping.

Like Picasa, this program allows you not only to work with photos locally, but also to publish them on the Internet. There are two main ways to do this: using the Flickr service and the JetPhoto Server. The second method involves creating your own website with web albums based on the proposed templates. The user needs to purchase hosting, deploy JetPhoto Server on it, and then upload web albums from the program to the site. Agree that for most this is too complicated and expensive (especially since we are looking for an alternative to Picasa, which means free solutions).

But integration with Flickr is very interesting, because on this photo hosting you can store photos with a total volume of up to 1 terabyte. In order to be able to upload your photos to Flickr, you need to authorize JetPhoto Studio to access account. After this, you can upload both entire albums and selected photos. In this case, you can upload originals or compress images to a specified size, manage privacy settings, and add geotags. Keywords and notes added to photos in JetPhoto Studio will also be transferred to Flickr. For the convenience of users, the amount of available free space is shown before each download.

Among the disadvantages of JetPhoto Studio, it is worth noting that the interface is not very responsive. The program often freezes when performing certain operations, and importing photos with default settings generally paralyzes the computer. However, if you switch to import in the background, you can work with other applications. In an age when even many web applications can simultaneously load data and perfectly respond to any user actions, this looks like an archaism. However, JetPhoto Studio is in a sense a relic of the past, because the latest version of the program dates back to 2013.

⇡ WindowsPhotoGallery ("Photo Album") 2012

• Developer: Microsoft
• Operating system: Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 8.1
• Distribution: free
• Russian interface: yes

Perhaps someone will consider the application from Microsoft not the most the best alternative Google product, but Windows Photo Gallery is very similar in functionality to Picasa. The application can be downloaded for free as part of Windows package Essentials Windows components"). In addition to the component we are interested in, the package also includes a blog editor, an email application, OneDrive and a program for working with video files. During installation, you can select only those applications that should be installed.

Immediately after launch, Photo Gallery picks up all the photos stored in the image library (by default, these are the My Pictures and Public Pictures folders). To add other images, you just need to show the program where they are stored by changing the library settings.

If you need to copy photos from a memory card, just connect the drive - the program will immediately offer to import pictures.

In the Photo Gallery window, photos are sorted by the time they were taken. In this case, as in Picasa, there may be photos stored in different folders nearby. Their location on the disks does not matter. If you wish, you can choose one of many other sorting options: by folders, by ratings, by drive types, by people depicted in photographs, by title, by geotags. Appearance the application workspace is flexibly configured: you can enable display additional information about the file, rating, signatures, quickly change the sort order, etc.

A variety of tools are offered for organizing images: ratings, flags, captions, text tags, geotags, information about the people present in the photographs. It is convenient to use the sidebar to add different types of tags. As the user works in the program, a database of tags is compiled, and later one can quickly find photographs tagged with a certain keyword, or those in which the desired people are present. Interestingly, Photo Gallery can help with identifying people: the program itself finds the heroes of photographs and offers to indicate who they are.

All photo information added to the Photo Gallery can later be used in searches. For example, you can search for pictures taken in certain months and tagged with a particular tag. The AND and OR operators are used to define search criteria. The search criteria can also be the type of file (video, photo, Raw file) and whether it was published on the Internet.

Photo Gallery allows you to send photos and video files by mail, as well as upload them to various online services: Flickr, OneDrive, Facebook, YouTube, Vimeo. Images can be compressed to the desired size before downloading. In addition to sending them to the Internet, photos can be used to create panoramas, collages, and videos (in the Movie Maker application).

Photo Gallery also offers some image editing tools. There are several filters with a convenient function preview, tools for color correction and noise removal, exposure adjustment and photo alignment. In addition, directly from the program you can rename files, change resolution, and edit information about the shooting date. Conveniently, all changes made can be canceled by pressing one button.

Unfortunately, Photo Gallery support for Windows 7 will be discontinued soon. This is because Windows 8.1 and Windows 10 have a built-in Photos app for viewing, organizing, and sharing photos online. This application allows you to view photos in different modes: by albums, by folders or by date. Photos is integrated with OneDrive, and all photos a user works with in the app can be uploaded to the cloud. Albums are created automatically based on the best images or manually by the user. However, in terms of functionality, Photos is inferior to Photo Gallery (just as Google Photos is inferior to Picasa - simplification is in vogue these days).

⇡ Zoner Photo Studio Free 18

• Developer: Zoner, Inc.
• Operating system: Windows
• Distribution: free
• Russian interface: yes

We deliberately placed Zoner Photo Studio at the end of the review, leaving this application for dessert. Despite the fact that the program is the younger brother of the professional version of Zoner Photo Studio, it has all the modern important functions for organizing photo archives, as well as free download to your own photo hosting. From paid version Zoner Photo Studio Free is different in that it does not have advanced image editing tools: masks, filters, gradients, selection tools, noise removal, adding frames, perspective correction, working with HDR, as well as tools for screen capture, batch processing , creating video slideshows. However, the list of what the program has is much longer than the list of missing options.

Zoner Photo Studio Free can work both as a simple tool for viewing photos stored on disk or on any media, and as a cataloguer. In order to create a database of photographs, you need to import them into the program from any folder, from a memory card, etc. Photos stored in the database can be displayed in the form of a calendar, by folders or by keywords. There are a lot of viewing modes: from one in which the main part of the window is occupied by one image, to “tiles” (with the ability to flexibly adjust the size of thumbnails). You can also display multiple photos side by side and view geotagged photos on a map.

Image sorting is also great: photos can be sorted by title, rating, date created or last modified. There are also a huge number of advanced criteria that involve all EXIF ​​data. In addition, the program can separately show RAW and JPEG images, giving preference to either the first or the second.

To the right of the viewing area there is information panel, where you can easily edit all the data about the photo. So, it is possible to set a color label, add a rating, title, description, keywords, and change EXIF ​​information.

Zoner Photo Studio Free does not work with third parties cloud services, however, it offers unlimited photo storage space on its own photo hosting site, Zonerama. After creating an account and gallery, a Zonerama item appears in the navigation bar with two folders: “Shared Albums” and “ Hidden albums" It's easy to guess that all photos sent to the first folder become publicly available, and pictures uploaded to the second folder can only be viewed by the owner. To upload photos, simply select them and drag them to the desired album with the mouse.

Although the editing capabilities are limited compared to the professional version of Zoner Photo Studio, the range of editing options is quite impressive for a free program. You can not only change the image resolution and canvas size, but also add text, place one image on top of another, add some effects, perform color correction, improve sharpness, work with shutter speed and white balance.

⇡ Conclusion

In general, as our a little research, majority free programs, which can be considered as worthy alternative Picasa have one common drawback: they are quite old. Therefore, you still need to think about whether it’s worth switching to an unfamiliar solution or staying with the abandoned, but still working Picasa for some time. The only program that stands out from the rest in that it is actively developing and looks modern is Zoner Photo Studio Free. Apparently, it can be recommended as the most better replacement Picasa.