Picasa Web Albums Starts the Year with New Features
Picasa Web Albums, the photo sharing site offered by Mountain View-based search engine giant Google, is starting a new year with a few new features, announced Lisa Conquergood, Photos Team Marketing. The new features Picasa Web Albums is boasting about are, in brief: more metadata, enhanced security and a new way to zoom. That’s putting it in brief; let’s take a closer look at the new features now.
Metadata
You can now view more EXIF metadata that ever before; you have access to more than 200 EXIF tags now, including Metering Mode, White Space and Color Balance.
In case you don’t already know this, EXIF metadata is information stored inside the image file. This information can be accessed the individual photo page by clicking on the “full details page”.
Security
Picasa Web Albums ensures no one snoops on your traffic by providing you with an encrypted, secure HTTPS connection. Unlike Gmail, which uses HTTPS as default since January 2010, HTTPS has not been made the default – you have to make sure you type https in the URL, mainly https://picasaweb.google.com instead of http://picasaweb.google.com.
Lisa Conquergood said “we are working to make https the default”. Hopefully HTTPS will become the norm in the near future, just like it has become the norm for Gmail.
Zoom
Picasa Web Albums, as mentioned above, offers a new way to zoom. What does that mean? It means that by clicking on the magnifying glass you can view an image in its full resolution. After you click the magnifying glass, the image will be brought up in a “lightbox view, from which you can zoom into the image, up to its full resolution. You will need flash to take advantage of this new feature. This works great for panoramas too,” explained Lisa Conquergood.
If you would like to get started with Picasa Web Albums, click here.
If you would like to get started with the HTTPS Picasa Web Albums, click here.
Metadata
You can now view more EXIF metadata that ever before; you have access to more than 200 EXIF tags now, including Metering Mode, White Space and Color Balance.
In case you don’t already know this, EXIF metadata is information stored inside the image file. This information can be accessed the individual photo page by clicking on the “full details page”.
Security
Picasa Web Albums ensures no one snoops on your traffic by providing you with an encrypted, secure HTTPS connection. Unlike Gmail, which uses HTTPS as default since January 2010, HTTPS has not been made the default – you have to make sure you type https in the URL, mainly https://picasaweb.google.com instead of http://picasaweb.google.com.
Lisa Conquergood said “we are working to make https the default”. Hopefully HTTPS will become the norm in the near future, just like it has become the norm for Gmail.
Zoom
Picasa Web Albums, as mentioned above, offers a new way to zoom. What does that mean? It means that by clicking on the magnifying glass you can view an image in its full resolution. After you click the magnifying glass, the image will be brought up in a “lightbox view, from which you can zoom into the image, up to its full resolution. You will need flash to take advantage of this new feature. This works great for panoramas too,” explained Lisa Conquergood.
If you would like to get started with Picasa Web Albums, click here.
If you would like to get started with the HTTPS Picasa Web Albums, click here.
