Easily Scan Old Photos With New App From Google
Google has introduced a new app designed to make scanning and uploading old printed photos a quick and easy process.
The PhotoScan app from Google Photos takes advantage of the high-quality cameras found in many smartphones to take multiple shots of the photo to be scanned. PhotoScan is then able to process the multiple shots to eliminate glare and shadows, automatically crop and straighten the image by detecting edges, and use analysis to ensure the orientation is correct.
“We all have those old albums and boxes of photos, but we don’t take the time to digitize them because it’s just too hard to get it right. We don’t want to mail away our original copy, buying a scanner is costly and time consuming, and if you try to take a photo of a photo, you end up with crooked edges and glare,” said Google Photos software engineer Jingyu Cui.
Scanned photos can then be easily uploaded to Google Photos or any other compatible service. The standalone PhotoScan app from Google Photos is available now for Android and iOS.
Google simultaneously revamped the Google Photos app to add new editing features, filters and an improved auto correct function. The company said it is taking advantage of the millions of photos it has processed and analysed to improve the functionality of the new features through machine learning.
All of the 12 new filters, or ‘looks’, take advantage of machine learning when making adjustments, with auto correct also using machine learning when adjusting brightness, contrast, saturation and other settings.
The Google Photos update begins rolling out today.