Working on Even More Options for the Photos App

Recently on our previous tutorial, we have talked about some tips in working with the Photos app and got familiar with some of the options available in navigating through your photos and tweaking the Photos tile that is pinned on the Start Screen. However there are still a lot of other stuff that you need to learn about the Photos app so you can make the most out of it in managing your photo contents and even editing them using some basic editing tools that are included with the app itself. These things and even more are what we are going to discuss in this tutorial so be sure to get your Windows 8.1 machine ready and follow the steps that I’ll be showing below.

Viewing More Details about Your Photos

While your photos are displayed on the Photos app’s main screen, you will not see any detail of it in the default view but there is one quick button that you can simply click to view some details on each of the pictures that are saved in your computer’s Pictures library and it is found at the top-right portion of the screen. Just open the Photos app first and once you arrive on the main screen, simply click on the button and the pictures on the screen will shrink and the details for each one will appear on the right side of each one of them.

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If you are more comfortable with using some keyboard shortcuts then you can simply use the “CTRL + Alt + 1” keys and press them together simultaneously to execute the same action. The Details View looks like the screenshot below.

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When you switch to the Details View for your photos, you will notice that the button which you clicked will change in appearance. If you want to switch back to the Thumbnails view. All you need to do is click on this button or press the “CTRL + Alt + 1” keys.

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Selecting Multiple Photos on the Screen

When you’re working on too many pictures saved in your computer’s Pictures library, there might be cases that you’ll want to select all of them so you can copy everything to a removable storage device. However, selecting them one-by-one will take too much time so the Photos app offers a button that will let you select everything in a single click or tap. To do this, simply access the main screen of the Photos app and once you are on it, simply right-click on an empty space and when the app bar appears at the bottom, just look for the option that says “Select all” then click it to select all of the photos that are on the screen without having the need of right-clicking on them one-by-one.

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Once all of your pictures gets selected, you can start doing any action that you want to do to them like copying everything to a portable storage device or deleting all of them at once.

Creating a New Folder

You can also reorganize all your pictures by creating different folders where you can store some related images together into separate folders. To create a folder using the Photos app, simply right-click an empty space while you are on the main screen as you did earlier when you selected all the pictures. When the app bar appears at the bottom of the screen, just look for the option that says “New folder” then click on it.

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Importing Photos from Other Devices

You can also copy some photos from other devices such as smartphones, tablets, digital cameras and even USB flashdrives using the process called “Import”. Just connect the device into one of your computer’s USB port and once it gets read by your machine, simply open the main screen of the Photos app and right-click an empty space anywhere on the screen. After doing so, the App bar will appear at the bottom and from here, simply click on the “Import” option.

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After clicking on it, you will be able to see all available devices where you import photos from inside a white box. From here, simply select the device of your choice by clicking on it.

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Right after you click on the device of your choice, the Photos app will scan it and see how many files can be imported to your computer. You will see the number of detected files on the screen while the scan process is in progress. At the bottom right corner, you will find a “Cancel” button which you can simply click or tap if you want to stop the process.

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Once the scanning process completes, you will see all images available to be imported into your Windows 8.1 machine and all of them are selected by default. At the bottom of the screen, you will see that the app bar will now have a different set of options. If you want to deselect everything in one click, simply hit the option that says “Clear selection”.

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To initiate the import process of all selected items on the screen, simply hit the “Import” button. At the extreme-right portion of the screen, you will also see a button that says “Cancel” which you can easily click to stop the process.

Editing a Photo

You can also use the Photos app in doing some minor edits with any picture that is saved in your computer. To do this, just click on the picture from the app’s main screen so you can open it. After doing so, just right-click anywhere on the screen and the App bar will appear at the bottom. From here, look for the option that is labeled “Edit” located at the extreme-right end of the App bar then click on it.

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After doing so, there will be options that will appear on the left edge of the screen which will allow you to adjust certain aspects of the picture such as “Light”, “Color” and “Effects”. There’s also a button for “Basic fixes” and “Auto fix” which you can easily click to do some quick editing to the image you have selected.

Cropping a Photo

After selecting a picture from the Photos app main screen and right-clicking on it, the app bar at the bottom of the screen will also contain an option that says “Crop” which you can use to cut a portion of the picture and save it as a new one. To use this feature, just click on the “Crop” option and a box will appear having edges that can be dragged to make it bigger or smaller. Just drag the edges of the box to the area of the picture which you want to crop and hit the “Apply” button at the bottom once you are done.

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After clicking or tapping the “Apply” button, you will see even more options of what you can do with the cropped image. If you want to save it as a separate photo then you will need to click on the “Save a copy” option but if you just want to apply the changes to the original image then you can click the option that says “Update original”.

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To cancel any changes made, just click on the “Undo” option. From here, you can also access the options for editing the image by clicking on the “Edit” option  located at the extreme-left end of the app bar.

Get Control Over Your Picture the Modern App Way

As you can see, Windows 8.1’s Photos app helps you manage your pictures using some brand new controls and tweaks. Compared to the desktop tools which are still available, using the Photos app in viewing and doing some minor edits to any selected image is a lot easier and now with the awesome features and improvements included in the latest update for Windows 8.1, you will surely love working with modern-style apps more than ever!