WEBVTT - Google Photos Gets Helpful New Features

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<v Speaker 1>Google Photos gets even more helpful features.

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<v Speaker 2>What's going on. I'm Rich Damiro. This is Rich on

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<v Speaker 2>Tech Daily. Well, if you've.

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<v Speaker 1>Listened to me or watched me on TV at all,

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<v Speaker 1>you know that Google Photos is one of my favorite

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<v Speaker 1>apps on my phone. I love talking about this service

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<v Speaker 1>because to me, there's not a better free way to

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<v Speaker 1>back up and organize your pictures.

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<v Speaker 2>You get unlimited storage.

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<v Speaker 1>It works on both iOS and Android, and I always

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<v Speaker 1>tell folks you need your pictures backed up in two places,

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<v Speaker 1>a free app like Google Photos and somewhere else. That way,

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<v Speaker 1>if one of the backups goes out, you still have

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<v Speaker 1>the other one. Recently, I was up at Google Io,

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<v Speaker 1>their big developers conference, and I got to talk to

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<v Speaker 1>David Lieb. He's the product lead at Google Photos, and

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<v Speaker 1>I wanted to know all about the app, which is

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<v Speaker 1>getting some new.

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<v Speaker 2>Features, and if you can believe it, it's been around

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<v Speaker 2>for three years now.

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<v Speaker 3>We launched Google Photos three years ago at Google Io,

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<v Speaker 3>and our approach was that it's gotten really hard to

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<v Speaker 3>deal with all your photos. You take some any photos

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<v Speaker 3>on your phone, on your camera, you've got all those

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<v Speaker 3>old photos from your hard drive. We wanted to build

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<v Speaker 3>one place that you could keep all your photos and

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<v Speaker 3>then make them as useful as possible to you.

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<v Speaker 1>So one reason I love Google Photos is that it

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<v Speaker 1>gives you unlimited storage, so you can free up valuable

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<v Speaker 1>space on your phone.

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<v Speaker 2>And like I said earlier, it works cross.

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<v Speaker 1>Platform iOS, Android, desktop, and anywhere else you might want

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<v Speaker 1>to access your pictures.

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<v Speaker 3>One of the core tenets of Google Photos is one

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<v Speaker 3>place to keep all your photos that is accessible on

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<v Speaker 3>all the devices you have today and into the future.

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<v Speaker 3>So if you go get a new smartphone, you don't

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<v Speaker 3>have to deal with anything. Just sign into your Google

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<v Speaker 3>Photos account, all your photos are there accessible to you.

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<v Speaker 1>One of the new features announced at Google Io is

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<v Speaker 1>called one Tap Actions. Basically, Google Photos is using AI

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<v Speaker 1>artificial intelligence to help you fix things in your photos

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<v Speaker 1>without doing a lot of work.

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<v Speaker 3>One of the things we've noticed is that there's a

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<v Speaker 3>lot of work dealing with your photos, and so we

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<v Speaker 3>noticed that people don't want to do that work. So

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<v Speaker 3>one of the things we watch today is a feature

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<v Speaker 3>that lets you kind of take those actions on your

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<v Speaker 3>photos in a way that's really easy. So, for example,

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<v Speaker 3>if you're swiping through your photos and you happen upon

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<v Speaker 3>a photo that's too dark. Google Photos will understand that

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<v Speaker 3>and put a button right there for you to tap

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<v Speaker 3>once and brighten the image. If you have photos of

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<v Speaker 3>your friends that you've forgotten to share, Google will understand

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<v Speaker 3>that and give you one tap to share those photos

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<v Speaker 3>with those friends.

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<v Speaker 2>I can't wait to use this new feature.

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<v Speaker 1>You can finally take a photo of a document and

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<v Speaker 1>Google Photos will ask if you want to convert it

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<v Speaker 1>into a PDF.

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<v Speaker 2>That's going to come in handy.

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<v Speaker 3>We often take photos of documents that we need to

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<v Speaker 3>sign and then like scan and send back to someone,

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<v Speaker 3>but none of us has a scanner anymore, and so

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<v Speaker 3>we realize that we could apply AI to that problem

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<v Speaker 3>and take something that is really burden some and make.

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<v Speaker 2>It really easy for you.

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<v Speaker 1>Another cool effect rolling out right now is called color pop,

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<v Speaker 1>and it's all thanks to artificial intelligence.

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<v Speaker 3>We have the more creative side of AI for this

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<v Speaker 3>color pop feature, where we take a photo that you

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<v Speaker 3>have of your kid, your friends, and we can recognize

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<v Speaker 3>that the subject is different from the background of a

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<v Speaker 3>photo and then segment them, keep the subject in right color,

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<v Speaker 3>and then turn the background to black and white so

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<v Speaker 3>you get this fun artistic effect.

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<v Speaker 1>Those pictures will be perfect for Instagram, until, of course,

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<v Speaker 1>we're all doing that, and then we'll have to move

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<v Speaker 1>on to something else that's new. Finally, Google Photos is

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<v Speaker 1>working on a way to add color to your old

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<v Speaker 1>black and white pictures.

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<v Speaker 3>The way we think about it is a human can

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<v Speaker 3>look at a black and white photo and guess at

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<v Speaker 3>what colors which parts of the photo are. You look

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<v Speaker 3>at the grass and you understand that would be green.

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<v Speaker 3>You look at the sky, you understand that would be blue.

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<v Speaker 3>What we've done is we've basically showed our AI systems

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<v Speaker 3>a bunch of photos, and they've learned over time what

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<v Speaker 3>things in photos are, what colors. So that's how we

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<v Speaker 3>do it. It's really amazing.

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<v Speaker 1>One final question I had for David, is Google Photos

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<v Speaker 1>working on a way to filter out all the duplicates

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<v Speaker 1>of my collection?

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<v Speaker 2>Now Google Photos.

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<v Speaker 1>Does roughly filter out duplicates if you try to upload

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<v Speaker 1>the same photo twice, but I find that the system

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<v Speaker 1>is pretty easily tricked if something about the file or

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<v Speaker 1>the picture is slightly different, So I do end up

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<v Speaker 1>having a bunch of the same pictures in my collection. Now,

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<v Speaker 1>he wouldn't give me a concrete answer, but he basically said,

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<v Speaker 1>I should not waste my time right now manually searching

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<v Speaker 1>into leading the duplicates in my Google Photos collection, so

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<v Speaker 1>that is a good sign.

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<v Speaker 2>Now, I'm sort of a neat freak.

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<v Speaker 1>So even though these duplicates don't take up any extra

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<v Speaker 1>storage in my account, I would rather have everything perfectly

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<v Speaker 1>organized and arranged, and it sounds like Google is using

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<v Speaker 1>artificial intelligence to get me towards that goal.

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<v Speaker 2>Thanks so much for listening to the show.

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<v Speaker 2>you can.

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<v Speaker 1>Find links to everything I talk about here on the

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<v Speaker 1>These days, I'm doing a lot with Instagram stories having

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<v Speaker 2>Thanks so much for listening. I'm Rich Demiro rich on

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<v Speaker 2>tech dot tv. I'll talk to you real soon.