Odds are that you take a lot of photos with your smartphone camera… but getting them off your phone can be a bit of a pain. Google Photos helps by offering an option to automatically back up your pictures to the web. But if you want to print them and store them in a photo book… well, now Google can do that too.
The company has announced a new feature for Google Photos that helps you select a group of pictures, identify the best ones, and create a paperback or hardcover book that will arrive in the mail.
Prices start at $10.
It’s a bit of a weird service from a company best known for digital rather than analog technology. But it makes sense when you consider that phones and PC screens aren’t always the best way to preserve or share memories.
So here’s how it works: select any group of pictures from your Google Photos account. You can highlight recent pictures, or search for those that match a theme (from your last vacation, perhaps, or those featuring your kids, pets, or both). Then choose to add them to a photo book.
Google Photos uses machine learning to pick the best pictures (and make sure you don’t end up paying to print 50 images that are nearly identical). Then you can choose from softcover or hardcover options.
Images will also be arranged automatically, using Google machine learning to create something the company’s software deems will be aesthetically pleasing.
Google says in the future, Google Photos will automatically suggest groups of photos that could make a good book. But for now you have to be proactive to start the process. It’s still a lot simpler than manually looking through your photo library and then downloading and selecting each individual image.
Photo Books are available starting today when you visit photos.google.com on the web. The feature is coming to the Google Photos apps for Android and iOS next week.
Pretty cool but I really wish they’d offer individual prints. I can’t be the only person in the world with older relatives who still want printed pics.
I love Google Photos but every time I need some prints it’s much more of a run-around than it used to be with Picasa.