http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/09/02/picasa-refresh-brings-facial-recognition/

[<<In the anticipated release of Google’s new and improved Picasa, the company will offer facial recognition technology to help you identify friends and family in your pictures without requiring you to tag them by-hand each time you see them.>>]

About time they had an update!

I just downloaded Picasa yesterday :P (for Ubuntu I already had it on Windows)

Although what's the chance of Google releasing the Windows and Linux versions at the same time?

Slim / None.

http://img.labnol.org/di/picasafacialrecognition.png

Wow! This is cooler then some pre-released version of a beta staged, testing vesion of chrome!

Which post had that pic Luka?

here: http://news.cnet.com/8301-13580_3-10026577-39.html

Here's a bigger version from CNet (they credit Google):

http://i.i.com.com/cnwk.1d/i/bto/20080829/face_detection.png?tag=mncol;txt

>> http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10026577-2.html?part=rss&tag=feed&subj=Webware

Phillip : Don't know, TOMHTML send me this image as link... But I think it will be a picture in the Google Help Center for Picasa.

Hebbet was almost right ;-)
I got it on Amit Agarwal's blog, as you can see in the URL ;)

So its up the new version of picasaweb. is it me or did they just take away the "download album" link? this was the best feature on picasa web

Seems to be live now, it's processing my photo's now and afterwards I should be able to tag my faces....

Google seems to have a great day today!!!

Picasa 3 beta download link:

http://dl.google.com/picasa/picasa3-setup.exe

It's live, I've press the button but it seems I've many many photos... 16% complete only :)

I'm on 86% and it's been like an hour

Ouf :) Estimated processing time: 18 minutes

Yeah, it told me 15 minutes a while ago. Anyways, not it says 81% and seems to be stuck there....

it's A-M-A-Z-I-N-G
I just crying now, wooot! wonderful
1000000 times better than Chrome

Awwwww! it's still frozen for me!!! Arghhhhhh!

I'm super-happy about the creative commons, though

http://picasa.google.com/intl/en_us/web/whatsnew.html

http://dl.google.com/picasa/picasa3-setup.exe

hebbet look what posted John one hour before ;)

Hey, it doesn't work anymore! Now I get a "404 NOT_FOUND = Unable to process request." instead of pages with people...

And my "Finding faces..." stops at "84% Complete"........

ok it's back now // how many faces did you have stefan? I had 2600+ "only"

is there a way to see the faces before the processing is done?

I really like the new jpg viewer which you can set up as default for Windows. Its VERY fast to load and has enough features for a viewer..

Does the new version try to prevent right-clicking an image by putting a transparent pixel over it or what happens? Can't easily right-click to copy the image URL.

Also, it didn't find any face in the test photos I've uploaded so far. Those weren't completely front views but I figured it could work:

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1006/867300400_fb8022529f.jpg?v=0
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3164/2505321929_74196ea806.jpg?v=0

They did find a Vint Cerf cartoon image though...

If i click on "show faces only" in the picasa app, i get a lot of pictures, just faces! even a face behind a cocktail glass is recognized..

Ugh, this is ridiculous. I started over and now it is tuck at 68%

It's brilliant. I've found it works very well. Why do you think didn't they include the face tagging in the desktop version though?

finally! it's un-stuck! still not done yet though

UGH. I just left for 3 hours and came back and it's stuck again! now at 81%

I just wish you could sort albums ALPHABETICALLY.
DUH.

stefan, did the finding faces ever finish for you? i started a thread in the help group http://groups.google.com/group/PicasaWebAlbums/browse_thread/thread/2cc40302b27f59ec

<<is there a way to see the faces before the processing is done?>>

Well this is the URL for adding name tags to photos but mien face finder is still stuck and i can't use it yet so i don't think there's any way to see them before the scanning is done, no.

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/people?uname=your.username&isOwner=true

I wish they would bring Picasa to the Mac OS.

Ugh, i have so many issues. The same people aren't really grouped together. There are tons of these "these faces were hard to place" things where it just throws a bunch of random faces together. Then there are a few too many cases of catching things are not at all faces and missing actual faces. Anybody have similar issues?

another thing: mistaking parts of a face as a whole face (an ear or an eye, etc).

yea mine is done...

I wish there was a "friends" feature, not just a "favorites" thing so that friends could help you tag photos and people. Facebook does that and it works well

Oddly, I don't see to be able to access this still (I have a Favourites tab, but no People tab).

If I try to access it by the linked URIs I get:
"404 NOT_FOUND
Unable to process request."

Martin, did you turn on the feature?

Am I the only one who doesn't have this name tagging feature on my Picasa web albums yet? There's no name tagging links anywhere even in settings. I'm in Australia. Has this only been activated for US users?

I just checked the help forum. It's only available for US Picasa accounts. Since when did Google only launch things to US users?

The tags ask for email addresses to match to the faces. I am turning into a Luddite in my old age but this concerns me. It is just creepy.

Charlie, I'm a German user and I have those new features. I'm using the English version though...

Not sure if this has been mentioned: it now allows you set the photos license to Creative Commons if that's what you prefer.

Interesting development by Google!

I would like to tell you that MyHeritage just launched something similar however

> The pics are fully integrated with your family tree
> The concept is more open, as users can import photos (e.g. from picasa) and export the tags back
> We are also available in local languages

MikeG

You do not have to add the email address. Just give it the nickname that you want it to have and hit apply. Or save. Whichever it is. I tagged a few faces for people that I just don't have email addresses for and it worked fine.

Hi Picasa team

i m a big fan of Picasa clinet and Web Album. (give us sub folder option on Picasa Web Album). its Googolplex time better then Flickr.
i use ur new Picasa 3 desktop Client . in 1st shot looks awesome but when i m trying to upload few photos in my 10 + 1 GB Picasa Web Album i found a very extreme major designing

/ feature Drawback , which force me to uninstall Picasa 3 and re-install picasa 2.7.

in detail description about my problem with Picasa 3 :

i hav a very huge collection of pix in Picasa web Album (approx 67,000+ pix in 450 + Folder)
  
in picasa 2.7 when i m going to upload few photos a pop windows open saying which folder i want to upload it and display (drop down many) folder names alfabetically not the date wish .

example : suppose i hav folders name "Dia" , " Imran" , "Deepika", "Ameesha" and . and i want to upload pix on "Dia" so i m type in drop down manu (on picasa 2.7) "d" 1st result apper is "Deepika" then i type "i" so it apper "Dia" But ultra extreme frustetion thing in Picasa 3 is that (it dont show folders name alfabetically in Drop down manu – it shows date wish folder name 1st – What the F) when i type "d" it apper "Deepika" then "i" it apper "Imran" then "a" it apper "Ameesha" no mention of "Dia" . it may be bad but deal breaking if atleast my folders name apper in drop down manu in alfabetically . so after typing "d" i know my desired folder ("Dia") right behind of "Deepika" . HOW COULD I FOUND MY DESIRED FOLDER NAME IN DROP DOWN MANU FROM HUGE NUMBERS OF FOLDERS. if typing "d" shows only one folder name started with "d" not the all folders started with "d". picasa 2.7 was better i m hav problem with it . when i type "d" it display all all folders started with "d" from drop down many . i know picasa 3 is in beta . i hope it will evolve better . am i able to clearly define what problem i hav in Picasa 3. my english is not so good so plz forgive me .

   from Abhisshek (India)

i think they already know that problem , thats why they temporary off the download

Hey, check out the cropping feature. It automatically suggests the subject of the image.

Was this feature there before?

I'd like a normal scroll bar.

Why can't I view all files organized by date/time, regardless of file structure? I'd rather have a tag/label based system than a folder based system.

> Not sure if this has been mentioned: it now allows you
> set the photos license to Creative Commons if that's
> what you prefer.

That's good news. I hope they will add a way to find CC-licensed photos too soon (or is there any way to do that now?).

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3146/2829816789_5b2e9ce6ec_o.png

I hope they will offer an easy to use search option for CC-licensed content in Picasa Web Albums.

Great features, but:

   1. 25 MB memory usage for Picasa Photo Viewer!?
   2. 85 MB memory usage for Picasa (40 MB for Picasa 2.7)!?

After all, I think they need to solve this problem first.

DPic
How do you turn it on? I have no visible options to do so, I've even switched to the English (US) interface and still nothing.

[moved from "Google Picasa's Explore page feature out"]

First face recognition, now 'Explore' feature:

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/09/05/googles-picasa-becomes-more-flickr-like-adds-new-ways-to-explore-interesting-public-photos/

>> Not sure if this has been mentioned: it now allows you
>> set the photos license to Creative Commons if that's
>> what you prefer.
>
>That's good news. I hope they will add a way to find CC-licensed photos
>too soon (or is there any way to do that now?).

Yeah, like i said before this was blogged it's my favorite new feature. I'm sad it didn't get more attention in the buzz about it

I wish they would have support for CC0 but i guess they wouldn't even consider that until it's out of labs.

Colin, that's the feature to license under creative commons, not find images under creative commons

Martin, can we get a screenshot of the picasa homepage that you see when you're logged in?

Dpic, I know that was the feature allowing you to license your photos under different creative commons licenses. I was agreeing with Philipp that since they have the feature where you can change the license that they should also add a feature to search by certain licenses.

Why I don't see just the face in the box, but the complete photo? Yesterday I can see only the face, and to add name tag was simpler then now...