“Keep your snaps at hand wherever you
go by linking the Photo app to your Facebook, SkyDrive and more.”
Everywhere we go these days, we take a
camera with us. Whether it’s a fancy SLR with all the professional bells and
whistles, or a basic 4-megapixel camera built into a smartphone, there’s
usually a snapping device of some description within reach. We’re recording our
lives, one picture at a time, and eventually that constantly expanding cache of
photos becomes difficult to manage.
Enter the Windows 8 Photos app, which takes
the crisp, clean design ethos of the windows 8 interface and applies it to a
cause to which it is well suited. Using the Photos app is very much like
flicking through a real photo album, but can you re-jig a real photo album
automatically if you decide you want to see more pictures at a time? Can you
fill it with photos from Facebook and Flickr? No. so jump on board – you’ll be
pleased with the results.
Step-by-step: Make the most of photos
- Find the app The Photos app tile should be sitting on your Start screen
when you first install Windows 8 – it has a blue background. We’ve dragged
it into its own column here to make it easy to see. Your app might have
had its Live tile activated, particularly if you’ve added images to your
Pictures folder, so look out for a tile with personal images on if you
can’t find it.
The
Photos app tile should be sitting on your Start screen when you first install
Windows 8 – it has a blue background
- Your first run If you haven’t added any pictures yet, Photos probably looks a
bit bare to begin with. There’s a nice picture of a big wheel in the
background, but not much else. Prove to yourself that it’s working by
talking a screenshot – press [Windows] + [Print Screen] together, or hold
the [Windows] button and press the volume rocker if you’re on a tablet.
- Find your photos By default, screenshots are saved to a folder in your Pictures
library. You can open the Windows 8 Desktop view and have a poke around if
you’d like to see it for yourself. You should see that the screenshots
you’ve taken have been added to the Pictures library section of the Photos
app. Copy more pictures to the folder, and they should follow suit.
By
default, screenshots are saved to a folder in your Pictures library
- Connect to a service If you want to use Facebook or Flickr with the Photos app, you
need to hook up the appropriate accounts. It’s easy to do, if you’ve not
already linked your account in another app. Select the link at the bottom
of the screen that points to the section you’re interested in adding, tap
‘Connect’ and log in with your usual details for that site.
- Browse snaps Link the Photos app your Facebook account or add some folders
containing photos to your Pictures library – then tap the appropriate link
to see all the albums you’ve uploaded. If there are lots of albums, pinch
the screen to zoom out, or hunt for the tiny minus sign at the bottom
right corner of the screen. Tap an album to bring up its contents.
- Resize to see The Photos app automatically arranges the photos in your
collection to fit. By default you’ve presented with a line of photos, and
clicking on one presents it in full screen mode. Click again, then click
the arrow at the top-right to go back. Zoom in and a single photo will
fill your screen, with arrows either side to let you browse. Zoom out
again to see as many photos as possible.
- See a slideshow There’s more than one way to see your snaps. Right-click or
swipe up from the bottom of the screen while you’re viewing an album, and
tap the appropriate button to view a slideshow of its pictures. Go back a
screen to the album overview, and the same action leads you to a different
sort order; rather than viewing by folder, you can view your pictures by
date.
There’s
more than one way to see your snaps
