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Live Photo Gallery Vs. Picasa: Digital Photography in Windows 7

Mark Edward Soper — Fri, 15 May 2009 22:00:00 -0500

Windows 7 has the potential to be the most imaging-friendly version of Windows yet developed. Windows 7 makes viewing JPEG and other common file formats easy, displays exposure metadata, and supports more viewing options than Windows XP, while offering better performance than Windows Vista. However, to get the maximum benefit from Windows 7, digital photographers will want to make two additions:

Installing RAW image support for their DSLR
Installing a photo organizer and editor

Wondering how to get RAW support for 64-bit versions of Windows 7? Not sure which free program (Windows Live Photo Gallery or Picasa) is better at fixing common digital photo problems? Looking for the best solution for organizing your rapidly growing digital photo collection? This article helps you find the answers you need.

Adding RAW Image Support for Your Camera

Windows 7's Pictures Explorer shows thumbnail views of JPEG and other supported imaging formats when you select the Medium icon, Large icon (default), or Extra Large icon views. However, RAW files (which are camera-specific) display only icons if you have not already installed the appropriate codecs for your camera. To install RAW file support for your camera:

Open your favorite web browser.
Navigate to http://www.microsoft.com/prophoto/downloads/codecs.aspx
Click the link for your camera.
Verify that the codec works with your camera and Windows release (32-bit or 64-bit)
Download and install the codec.

After installing the appropriate codec, you will be able to see thumbnail views for both JPEG and RAW files in Pictures Explorer:

Flling the Missing 64-bit Version Codec Support Gap

Unfortunately, some digital SLR vendors do not provide 64-bit codecs. However, Ardfry Imaging, LLC offers 32-bit and 64-bit versions of its independently-developed codecs for Canon CR2, Nikon NEF, and Adobe DNG file formats ($29.95 each). 15-day free trials are available. Because I'm currently using the 64-bit version of Windows 7 RC Ultimate, I was unable to use the Canon-provided codec. However, the Ardfry codec worked fine on my 64-bit system.

Using the Built-in Windows Photo Viewer

In Windows 7, Microsoft replaced the Windows Photo Gallery (now superseded by Windows Live Photo Gallery), and replaced it with Windows Photo Viewer. To use Windows Photo Viewer to view your photos in a resizable window, right-click the photo and select Preview.

You can rotate, zoom in, print, burn your photos to CD or DVD, and view your photos in a slide show. From the File menu, you can view Properties, which opens the Details tab to display image metadata, tags, and similar information.

However, Windows Photo Viewer lacks tagging, repair, and filtering tools. To get these, consider adding Windows Live Photo Gallery or Picasa 3.0 to your system. How do these free products compare? First, let's look at the major features of both programs.

Major Features of Windows Live Photo Gallery

Works in individual picture mode or gallery mode
Gallery mode organizes photos (and videos) by folder, date, and tag
Easy "drag to tag" image tagging
Zoom and pan control while viewing individual photos.
Easy, useful auto adjust image repair
Repair tools for white balance, tint, exposure, tilted photos, and red-eye
Cropping to common print sizes, widescreen, or custom page sizes
Image sharpening
Various black-and-white conversion effects, plus sepia and cyan
Multi-level undo/redo
Revert to original image
Integration with Flickr photo sharing
Plug-in support to enable integration with Facebook and other popular photo-sharing sites
Can use Windows Live Skydrive for online photo storage

Major Features of Picasa 3.0

Can scan entire system for photos or only typical locations
Basic photo fixes: crop, straighten, redeye, "I'm Feeling Lucky" auto tuning, auto contrast, auto color, retouch, text overlay, and fill light
Tuning menu: fill light, highlights, shadows, and color temperature, and a neutral color picker.
Effects menu: filters, sharpening, and black-and-white effects
Creates and prints collages
Designs banners
Integrated with Blogger, Picasa Web Albums
Tagging
Batch processing
Can edit and save RAW files as JPEG
HTML Export
Integration with TiVo
Integration with Google Earth for geotagging
Contact sheet printing

As far as features are concerned, Picasa packs plenty more than Windows Live Photo Gallery (WLPG). But, how well do these programs do at repairing problem photos?

Windows Live Photo Gallery Fix (Repair) Menus

Picasa 3.0's Repair Tools

Performing Common Photo Repairs

Although Picasa offers more photo repair tools than WLPG, that doesn't necessarily mean they're better. Compare the results when repairing an underexposed and off-color photo using auto repair tools Auto Adjust (WLPG) and I'm Feeling Lucky (Picasa):

WLPG's Auto Adjust provides a more natural, less harsh repair.

A much tougher repair task is trying to darken an overexposed photo. For this type of repair, I used WLPG's Adjust Exposure menu and Adjust Color menus and Picasa's Tuning menu:

Again, WLPG does a more natural job.

Picasa has two big advantages over WLPG,though:

Picasa can perform batch editing of selected photos.
Picasa can edit RAW files and convert them to JPEG. By contrast, WLPG can only view RAW files.

Here's Picasa's batch edit feature in action:

Saving and Undoing Photo Repairs

WLPG saves changes automatically as soon as you view another photo. Picasa's photo repairs aren't saved until you click the Save to Disk button at the top of each folder listing. Unfortunately, Picasa doesn't display any icons to show which photos have been edited. However, Windows Live Photo Gallery places checkmarks next to each editing tool you have used for the current photo.

Windows Live Photo Gallery offers a multi-level Undo feature at the bottom of its menu structure. Picasa has undo buttons on each of its menus, but doesn't display all of the edits in a single location.

Both programs save previous versions and permit reversions: WLPG uses the shadow copy feature built into Windows 7's system protection (restore points) feature, while Picasa retains the previous version internally.

Tagging Photos

By tagging photos, you make it possible to find photos of a particular person, place, object, or event quickly, no matter what folder they're found in. Both WLPG and Picasa support tagging, but how they do it and what they use tags for is very different.

Windows Live Photo Gallery now supports two types of tags: People tags and Descriptive tags. It is also compatible with tags applied with older versions or with Windows Vista's Windows Photo Gallery. Those tags are placed in the Descriptive tags category, but tags for people can be dragged to the People tags category. To create a tag in WLPG, click the appropriate Add a New Tag button and enter the tag name. To add the tag to matching photos or videos, select the photos or videos and drag them to the tag. It's a system quite similar to what Adobe's been doing with Photoshop Elements' Organizer and other products:

To view photos matching the tag, click the tag. In this example, photos from two different folders are displayed with a single click. By signing into Windows Live, you can also see if this person is sharing photos.

You can add multiple people and/or descriptive tags to a photo using the same technique: create the tag, select the photos or videos, and drag the media to the tag, repeating as needed with different tags

In Picasa, you must select each photo, click View, Tags, and enter the tag or tags for the photo. Picasa Web Albums makes extensive use of tags for organization, but Picasa itself does not use tags for filtering.

Sharing Photos

Windows Live Photo Gallery now integrates with Flickr as well as Windows Live albums. To set up integration with Flickr, you select your photos, click Publish, Publish on Flickr, and follow the prompts to authorize Flickr to work with Windows Live Photo Gallery. Once the integration is done, select Publish on Flickr, and Windows Live Photo Gallery sends the photos to the Flickr account you specify, adds them to a photo set you specify, resizes the photos as you specify, and sets the permissions you prefer:

To add support for other services, open Publish, More Services, and Add a Plug-In. You can choose from plugins for Facebook 2.0, YouTube, SmugMug, Picasa Web Publisher, Drupal Publisher, Pixelpipe, and Ipernity.

Picasa supports Blogger (no surprise there, as both are Google products), but it has no support for other photo sharing services. You must use their clients to share from photo folders, with no help from Picasa.

Which One's For You?

As you can see from this comparison, both programs offer a lot to the digital photographer who's not ready to jump into Photoshop Elements but wants decent tools for working with digital photos. Here's how I see it:

Choose Picasa if you're looking for a "Swiss Army Knife"-like set of photo editing and effects tools, especially if you use both JPEG and RAW file types, or if you want special photo effects without moving up to a full-blown photo editor. However, Picasa's tagging and file management tools are clunky and aren't well implemented. Picasa also offers MacOS and Linux versions if you want to use it cross-platform.

Choose Windows Live Photo Gallery if you're mainly concerned about photo and video organization but want high-quality photo repair tools for JPEG images. While WLPG's doesn't offer the effects and creative tools that Picasa does, it often makes better photo repairs - but sadly, only for JPEG files. WLPG, unlike Picasa, also displays videos and can tag them for easy access.

Can you use both? If you're using only JPEG photos, you certainly can. However, I noticed that when I installed Picasa after installing Windows Live Photo Gallery and codecs, I could no longer view RAW thumbnails in Picture Explorer or other folders.

Where to Find Them

The easiest way to get Windows Live Photo Gallery is to open the Getting Started menu in Windows 7 and click Get Windows Live Essentials. You can select the programs you want to install. To obtain Picasa, visit http://picasa.google.com. If you are also using older versions of Windows, both programs also work with Windows XP and Windows Vista. To download Windows Live components for these versions of Windows, go to http://download.live.com/.

Mark Soper is the author of the forthcoming book The Shot Doctor: The Amateur's Guide to Taking Great Digital Photos.

Love Windows Live Photo Gallery? Hate Windows Desktop Search? XP Users, You Need This Update!

Mark 'Marcus_Soperus' Soper — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 21:53:15 -0600

WDS, Hello? WDS, Goodbye!

Windows Desktop Search was a good idea - but it's been a very unpopular program with Windows XP users in practice, slowing down systems big-time. We chronicled how to get rid of it back in October.

It's Baaaack!

Unfortunately, Windows Live Photo Gallery, one of the components of Windows Live, automatically installs Windows Desktop Search on Windows XP systems. Windows Desktop Search, as it turns out, is used by Windows Live Photo Gallery. Ouch!

Thanks Were Premature...

The good news for WDS haters is that Microsoft announced shortly after Windows Live Photo Gallery went 'live' that you could uninstall WDS after installing an update to Windows Live Photo Gallery. The bad news is that Microsoft has now discovered that uninstalling WDS also breaks Windows Live Photo Gallery.

Send WDS Packing, and Count the Ways Windows Live Photo Gallery Breaks...

According to Knowledge Base article 946486, here's what happens to Windows Live Photo Gallery when you uninstall WDS from your Windows XP system:

On a Windows XP-based computer, uninstalling Windows Desktop Search may remove property handler registrations made by Windows Imaging Component (WIC) that are required to support photo file types in Windows Live Photo Gallery. The file name extensions that are affected include the following:

• .jpg

• .jpeg

• .png

• .tif

• .tiff

• .wdp

• .bmp

• .jfif

• .jpe

You will only see .jpg files in Windows Live Photo Gallery. Other photo files will be removed from the Windows Live Photo Gallery and will no longer be detected. Any metadata changes that could not be written to these files will be lost. These metadata changes include tags, captions, ratings, and the date that the photo taken. This issue may also prevent the Windows Live Photo Gallery from successfully reading metadata from or writing metadata to .jpg photos.

Fortunately, your picture files themselves are undamaged, but tags and other metadata you created go down the tubes.

Now Arriving (After a Short Delay...) the Solution!

Windows Update is now delivering Update for Windows Live Photo Gallery (KB 946486) to Windows XP users who use Windows Live Photo Gallery (Vista users don't use WDS, and don't need to worry about this problem). I received my update this evening. If you have Windows Update configured to automatically update your system, you probably have it now. However, if you have Windows Update configured for manual updating, be sure to check available updates and install this one.

Do The Math...Why Did a "Brand-New" Update Take Five Weeks to Arrive?

You might notice that this update seems to have kicked around in hyperspace for awhile, as the date on the KB article linked to the update (KB946486) is January 22. Why did it take over a month to get this update distributed?

As a review of posts at the microsoft.public.windows.live.photogallery newsgroup reveals, the update was originally released in late January, but didn't install properly. After being retooled, the update now installs and works properly. If you want to send WDS packing, you can do so safely after this update is installed.

The updated version of Windows Live Photo Gallery is Version 2008 (Build 12.0.1329.201).

Windows Vista Tools - How Good Are They?

Mark Soper — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 00:10:47 -0500

Complete PC Backup and Restore - Bigger Backup File, But Speedy Restore Times

Complete PC Backup and Restore (found in Ultimate and Business editions) performs both tasks creditably, according to Tom's Hardware, which tested it against Symantec's Norton Ghost 12.0 and Acronis True Image 11.0 in a comparison of "Bare Metal" disaster-recovery backup and restore solutions. Although Ghost created the smallest backup file size and True Image performed the fastest backup, Complete PC Backup and Restore provided the fastest restore time, beating Ghost by two minutes and True Image by nine minutes (20 GB data set).

Mark's Take: I've found Complete PC Backup and Restore to be useful both for disaster recovery and for moving a Vista install to another hard disk.

Windows Live Photo Gallery Speeds Past Google Picasa

A veteran user of Google Picasa and Windows Live Photo Gallery (the update to Vista's Windows Photo Gallery) likes the speed of Photo Gallery and its improved transfer features, but prefer's Google's support for dual-display screen savers and ability to select multiple images from different file folders.

Mark's Take: I prefer Windows Live Photo Gallery's editing and tagging features, and like its speed as well.

Windows Movie Maker HD Not So PG About Playing Nicely with Others

Windows Movie Maker HD (aka Movie Maker 6) adds support for HD video input, HD video output, and lots more editing features, but is often crippled by problems with various third-party codecs. Unfortunately, these problems often don't show up until you have your movie ready to output to DVD. If you're running Windows Movie Maker, be careful what you have installed, and check the WindowsMovieMakers.net website for help.

Mark's Take: I haven't had any problems with Windows Movie Maker HD or DVD Maker, but I don't have a lot of third-party codecs running on my Vista system. With the strides Microsoft has made in adding third-party codec support for digital camera RAW files, it would be good to see the same care given to the video side.

Microsoft Reaches Out to Flickr and QuickTime Users, Updates Windows Live Photo Gallery and Virtual Earth 3D

Mark 'Marcus Soperus' Soper — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 23:59:14 -0500

Flickr-Friendly Windows Live Photo Gallery

Windows Live Photo Gallery adds lots of great editing and sharing features to Vista's Windows Photo Gallery - and also works with Windows XP. Now, you can use it to publish your photos to Yahoo's popular Flickr photo-sharing website. After you install Windows Live Photo Gallery Beta, Windows Update updates it for you. Once the update's installed, the publish on Flickr option shows up in the Publish menu under More Services...

Other improvements include numerous bug fixes, and, for Windows XP users, the ability to deep-six (uninstall, for those of you in Rio Linda) Windows Desktop Search after the update to Live Photo Gallery is installed.

DirectX 9.0c Update Time Again

Microsoft's latest DirectX 9.0c update is also recommended, as with other recent DX9.0c updates, for Windows Vista users as well as Windows XP and Windows 2000 users. Grab it from the Microsoft download site.

View Your World in 3D - version 2.0

Version 2.0 of Virtual Earth 3D is now available. Virtual Earth 3D adds 3D functionality to Live Search maps - and it's cool! If you haven't tried Virtual Earth 3D yet - or you're looking for a better version, grab it from Microsoft's download site.

MacOS Users: Play Windows Media Files in QuickTime!

MacOS users! Are you tired of switching between QuickTime and Windows Media Player just to play Windows Media files? Microsoft has just rolled out Windows Media Components for QuickTime, from Flip4Mac. Use the free player to play .wma and .wmv files in QuickTime, or update it to add the ability to edit and distribute Windows Media files.