Windows 10: Windows 11's Photos app adds support for motion photo, background blur, search

The Photos app in Windows 11 is gaining a handful of new features. The new options include background blur, search and motion photo.

Background Blur in Windows 11 Photos app


As the name suggests, Background Blur adds a bokeh effect in photos to highlight the subject, and blurs out the background. This is similar to Portrait mode that has been popularized by Apple iPhone and Android devices. To use the new feature, open any picture that has a subject (people, animals, vehicles, etc.) in the Photos app. Click on the Edit button to access the built-in image editor, and select the Background Blur option on the toolbar.



The Photos app will display an animation while it processes the photo. It uses the same "flashing / flowing border" animation that the new Text Actions option in the Snipping Tool does.



When Photos finishes analyzing the image, it automatically applies the filter, with a 50% blur intensity.



The edge detection is not perfect, as you can see in the image below. The Tiger's (image via Unsplash) whiskers and paws were blurred out. But it's not too bad for a user-friendly tool.



The Background Blur worked better with people. Let's get back to the other photo, I think the effect looks a lot better in the picture (via Unsplash), the app even managed to detect the backpack and preserved its clarity.



Once the Photos app applies the background blur effect, the image editor gives you some manual controls, including a slider to set the blur intensity. The selection brush tool is a more powerful tool, as it lets you select or deselect areas in the image where the blur effect should be applied in. You can tweak the brush's size and softness per your requirements. For example, I could use it to adjust the brush size and deselect the area around the Tiger's whiskers to make the image look slightly better.



On a side note, Microsoft recently introduced a Background Removal Tool in the Paint app.

Search for Photos by content or location


The Photos app allows you to find photos stored in your OneDrive, based on the content of the picture. Switch to the Personal section in OneDrive, click on the search bar at the top, and type the keyword of what you are looking for. e.g. Car, Beach, Birthday, Vacation.



(Image credit: Microsoft)

OneDrive will display the relevant results by analyzing the content in your photos. According to Microsoft's article, the first search may not work immediately, as OneDrive needs to process the images. Subsequent searches should be faster.

Location search is now supported for all photos stored in your collection, including those on your PC, OneDrive and iCloud.

Motion Photo support


Microsoft's announcement states that it has added support for Motion Photos in the app. This will allow you to view the animated version of Motion Photos that you captured on your Samsung or Google mobile devices. I don't have a supported device, so I couldn't test this feature.



The new features are available in Photos app version 2023.11090.13001.0. It has been released to Windows Insiders in the Canary and Dev Channels. Can't wait to try it? You know what to do, head to https://store.rg-adguard.net/, set the first menu to Product ID, and paste 9WZDNCRFJBH4 in the text box. Switch the channel to Fast in the menu to the right. This will allow you to download the latest version, which has the name Microsoft.Windows.Photos_2023.11090.13011.0_neutral_~_8wekyb3d8bbwe.msixbundle (it is at the bottom of the list). Install the app on the stable version of Windows 11. To revert to the release version, you will need version 2023.11050.16005.0, which can be obtained from the same website (Retail channel).

Remote capture with Phone Link


Microsoft is adding a new feature to the Phone Link app, called Remote Capture. Despite what the name sounds like, it doesn't use your phone's camera to snap a new photo. Instead, it lets your Windows 11 PC to access your Android mobile device's gallery, and edit your recent photos via Snipping tool.



(Image courtesy: Microsoft)

Phone Link will also display notifications when you take a new photo on your phone.

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Photos app hogging resources in background

Ian, this suggestion was posted on my other thread:

We understand that not all of users are using the Photos app on Windows 10, if not very often. If you don't want this app to be running on background when not in use, there is a way you can turn this
off. Kindly follow the steps provided below:

• In Cortana, type Privacy Settings
  and press Enter.
• Look for Background apps.
• Look for Photos in the list.
• Flip the switch to Off.
• Restart your computer.

After you restart your computer, you can check if the Photos app is still running in background. You can use these steps to turn off any running background applications as it is not limited to Photos
app alone. In this way, you can conserve a lot of power and process allowance.

I just followed these instructions, and now have to wait to see if it works. I'm hoping it solves your problem, too!

 

Windows 10 Photo App unable to sync photos

Hi,

I realize that you face difficulty with photos app. I will certainly help you.

To assist you better, let us know whether you are using same Microsoft account to login to the Windows photo app on both laptop and Desktop.

If not I suggest you to use same Microsoft account to log-in both laptop and desktop.

Then sign out of the photos app and restart the system. Then login again into Windows photo app and check.

If the issue persists, I suggest you to remove and re-add the source location within the windows photo app. Please follow below steps to change the source location.

• 
  Type photos in search bar and press enter.
  
• 
  Then click on settings (gear icon) in photos app and under
  sources section add the path where photos are saved.
  

Please get back to us if you still face any difficulty with photos app.

Thank you.

 

How to get rid of raw file support in windows photo viewer?




I have downloaded this, and it did not work; photo viewer is not in the list of programs in Open With or Default App. I used option 2 step 3, followed by step 5 to 9.