So, once you're done editing a photo you can move on to the next one without having to exit that screen and double-click on a new picture.Ī row of larger icons line the bottom of the screen, most of which pertain to things you can do with your photos once you've edited them. Picnik, too, allows users to employ a sliding scale when applying special effects, only it offers more.Ī film strip with thumbnails sits at the top of the page, which you can scroll through by pressing the left and right arrows on your keyboard. Those effects without a 1 label, such as graduated tint, have a sliding gradient. One-click effects have a small 1 in the bottom right corner of their thumbnail. Photo enthusiasts are better off with a program like Adobe Photoshop Elements 7, which boasts more manual and advanced editing tools.įinally, the Effects menu includes 12 filters, including Warmify, Sepia, and Film Grain.

The Tuning menu, for more advanced users, lets you use sliding scales to adjust the fill light, highlights, shadows, and color temperature. To add a caption, click the page-like icon in the lower left corner of the photo.

To zoom in, use the sliding scale in the lower right area of the screen. Three one-click options correct color and exposure (the third, our personal favorite, simply reads, 'I'm Feeling Lucky'). The Basic Fixes menu has icons for cropping, straightening, removing red eye, and retouching photos, as well as adding text. The editing pane, located on the left side of the screen, has three tabs: Basic Fixes, Tuning, and Effects. To begin editing, double-click on a photo. In fact, they achieve a balance between the basics and fun special effects. Given Picasa's sleek interface, with scads of sharing-oriented features baked in, the editing tools might seem like an afterthought. A sliding scale in the lower right corner of the screen lets you change the size of the thumbnails. Double-clicking on the folder icon next to the folder name opens the pictures in Windows Explorer. As soon as you start typing, Picasa begins narrowing the results.Īs you scroll through the main pane of photo albums, you'll see color-blocked dividers with a folder icon, showing the name of the folder and, in each instance, a row of icons allowing you to play a full-screen slideshow create a photo collage, movie presentation, or gift CD sync the album with the Web and share the photos with others. Lastly, there's a live search bar for finding photos and albums. As you move the slider further to the right, only more recent photos will be shown, and a message in green will appear below showing you what that time cut-off is.

Accompanying that is a sliding scale allowing you to show only photos taken in a certain time frame. Next to those options is a row of icons for filtering results: users can choose to show starred photos only, movies only, or photos with faces only. Stretching across the top, below the high-level menus, are icons for importing photos, creating an album, toggling the folder view (you can opt not to show subfolders as a tree), and for capturing photos via a webcam. Picasa 3's interface strikes a fine balance between ease of use and giving the user lots of options for sharing and organizing photos.

Picasa 3 photos