8.6: Browsing Photos

(Howtogeek.com, n.d.)

The Photos app offers three different interfaces when looking for photos: Collection, Album, and Folders. You can choose any of the three at any time by clicking the relevant tab, above the main interface and below the “Photos” application label.

Collections

“Collections” is a view of your most recent photos and screenshots, displayed in reverse order by date. Within the main viewer of “Collection,” and in the nested album or photo viewers of the other tabs, a series of controls appear on the upper-right portion of the interface. These allow you to select multiple items for a specific action like copying, printing or adding to a specific album, or to start a slideshow, refresh the current file view, or import from a camera or mobile device. Contextual items in the Album view allow you to edit the name of the album or change the cover photo. To navigate backward through the Photos interface, click the left-pointing arrow in very top upper-left of the window, or press the Esc or Backspace keys at any time. (Using Windows 10 Built in Photo Editor, n.d.)

Album

“Albums” is a series of automatically-created photo albums, organized according to the Photo app’s internal logic, though you can add your own and remove or add photos to existing albums. “Folders” is merely a tab for all of the photos on your machine in specific folders—your OneDrive photo folder and your assigned “Pictures” folder in Windows, by default. To add folders to this view, click “Choose where to look” to go to the Photos Settings page, then click “Add a folder” to manually select one in Windows Explorer. (Using Windows 10 Built in Photo Editor, n.d.)

Using the Photo Viewer Interface

When you finally get down to an individual photo, the interface goes completely black and dedicates the maximum length or width of the window. If you’re using mouse navigation, scrolling up or down will advance or retreat in the current collection, album, or folder. Hold down the “Ctrl” button on your keyboard to turn the mouse wheel into zoom or retract controls. (How to Geek, n.d.) On the bottom of the interface, manual arrow controls to go forward or back in the album are on either side of an “add to album” button and a Delete button. You can use the keyboard for both actions: Ctrl+D to add it to a specific album via a pop-up menu, or simply press the Delete button. If you press “Delete” again, the image will be removed both from the album/collection/folder in the Photos app, and the file itself will be deleted in Windows Explorer and sent to the Recycling Bin. (Using Windows 10 Built in Photo Editor, n.d.)

The top controls are labeled, and self-explanatory. The “Share” button will open Windows 10’s share menu, allowing the user to send the file via email, copy it via Windows’ standard copy and paste function, or open and share it directly in any compatible Windows Store app. Zoom opens a manual slider to zoom in and out—remember that you can do this much faster by holding the Ctrl button and using the mouse wheel. “Slideshow” will begin a full-screen slideshow of the current album, collection, or folder.

Draw command

(How to geek, n.d.)The “Draw” command allows you to write on the image, with a selection of pen and eraser tools that appear contextually. It’s mainly intended for pen-enabled devices like the Microsoft Surface. You can double-click on any of the tools in the upper bar to select color and width. Note that the drawings can be erased with the Eraser tool, but after you click “save” (the floppy disk icon) and see the “Letting your Ink Dry,” the original file for this photo is saved over. Don’t click “save” on a photo unless you have it backed up somewhere, or you’re willing to lose the original.

Edit command

“Edit” opens the photo editor, which we’ll cover in the next section. “Rotate” will rotate the image clockwise; if you hit it by accident, just click it again three more times to return the photo to its original orientation.