Google Photos Gets New Memories, Cinematic Moments, More
- Paul Thurrott
- May 18, 2021
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At its I/O conference today, Google announced new Google Photos features that will help you better relive favorite memories.
“We capture photos and videos so we can look back and remember,” Google’s Shimrit Ben-Yair says. “But having all your photos—of loved ones, screenshots, selfies—mixed together makes it hard to rediscover important moments. In fact, most of the 4 trillion photos stored in Google Photos are never viewed.”
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To help solve this problem, Google is introducing two new Photos features. They are:
New types of personalized memories. The Memories feature in Google Photos highlights favorite moments from the past. This summer, it’s being enhanced by machine learning to surface new types of memories, including those that match certain patterns, like shapes, colors, and more. And later this year, Google will add even more memory types, celebrations (Diwali, Lunar New Year, Hanukkah, and so on). New Best of Month Memories and Trip highlights are rolling out today, too, Google says.
Cinematic moments. Google Photos uses machine learning to create 3D versions of some photos, but this feature is being enhanced with Cinematic moments will combine two nearly identical photos and fill in the gaps with new frames, creating vivid, moving images.
Locked Folder. This new passcode-protected folder is a place where you can save photos separately, so they won’t show up as you scroll through Google Photos or any other apps on your device. Locked Folder will be available first on Pixel devices, Googles says, and will arrive on more Android devices throughout 2021. (Pixel users will have a unique option to save photos and videos directly to the Locked Folder right from the camera, too.)
In addition to these major upgrades, Google is also making smaller changes to Google Photos, including some memory customization capabilities.