Google Image Search's Loading Animation

Google Image Search shows an animation below the search result's thumbnail while the original image is downloaded. As you probably noticed, Google first shows the thumbnail, which is already loaded as part of the search results page, then it replaces the thumbnail with the full-size image when you click a result.

Update: This is not a new feature. Thanks, +Sushubh Mittal.

The animation is especially useful for large images, since you may have to wait a few seconds until the images are downloaded. Here's an example and here's the animation:

moreless

Google Image Search Tests Snippets

One of the features that was removed in the current Google Image Search interface is snippets. Now Google only shows the title of the page, the domain and the size of the image in pixels. Snippets used to reveal more information about the photo or the page that includes the image, just like the snippets that are used for all the other search results.

Google considers bringing back snippets. Here's a screenshot from a Google experiment:

In this case, the snippet is quite useful, but very long: "the company's energy supply. This makes the Googleplex one of the USA's largest corporate solar installations. Unfortunately, I wasn't allowed to take photos on the roof, so here's one Google made earlier."

Google's regular interface doesn't show snippets:

moreless

Yahoo Image Search's Fullscreen Slideshow

One of the features I've always wanted to see in Google Image Search is slideshows. Google lets you quickly go to the next image result using the right arrow shortcut, but a slideshow button would make things even easier. Picasa Web search used to have this feature. I know that webmasters will say that this wastes their bandwidth, so let's get past this.

It turns out that Yahoo already has this feature. Yahoo's search results are powered by Microsoft Bing, but Yahoo has its own UI and it does a pretty good job. Yahoo uses the same infinite scrolling interface (Google borrowed it from Bing), but things look different once you click a search result. Images occupy the entire page and you can click the small "play" button at the bottom of the page to start a slideshow or just use the "p" keyboard shortcut. There are some cool zoom effects for big images and, if you use a browser that supports the HTML5 fullscreen API (Chrome/Firefox for desktop and Android, Safari for desktop), you can click the "view fullscreen" button at the top of the page and only see the images. You may want to restrict the results to large images.

Yahoo has a similar interface for the mobile search engine and it looks more like the old Google Image Search for mobile. The new Google interface has some benefits if you don't want to see all the results sequentially, but the old UI placed more emphasis on the images. The nice thing is that Yahoo has the slideshow button in the mobile interface, as well.

moreless

New Google Image Search for Mobile

Google's image search engine has a new interface for smartphones and tablets. The new UI looks just like the desktop UI, but you can use swipes to navigate between the image results.

Here are some screenshots from my Nexus 7. When you tap an image result, a black box with a bigger version of the image will open. You can also find some additional information about the image.

Swipe left to see the next image result, swipe right to go to the previous result. Gestures work just like the left/right keyboard shortcuts in the desktop interface. Tap an image to open the page that includes it.

A similar interface is available for smartphones. Here's a screenshot from an iPhone running iOS7:

Google will probably say that it changed the interface to make it more consistent and provide an unified interface for both desktop and mobile devices. There are some other advantages: you can scroll down to see more results, you can scroll up and quickly change the query or switch to web search.

I find the old interface more intuitive and better suited for mobile devices. It made it more obvious that you can use gestures by showing the previous and the next image result, search results didn't move around and you could find more information about the images. The new smartphone interface only displays the domain name and it no longer shows the title of the page and the image size (the tablet interface still shows them). Here's a screenshot of the old UI:

moreless

Google's Reverse Image Search, Now in Chrome

Google's reverse image search feature is about to become more popular, now that you can easily use it in Chrome 30+. You no longer have to install an extension, just right-click an image and click "search Google for this image".

"Search by image allows you to do a reverse image search and discover all sorts of content that's related to a specific image. For example, search using a picture of your favorite band and see search results that might include similar images, webpages about the band, and even sites that include the same picture," explains Google.

It's interesting to notice that Google uploads the image, instead of using the URL. Maybe Google wanted to make sure that you'll always get some results: not all the URLs are publicly accessible (for example: Gmail's image attachments).

Reverse image search also works for modified versions of an image, so you can use it to find more information about an image, other sites that include the image, the original source of an image. You can also use TinEye, a similar reverse image search engine.

moreless

Google Mobile Image Search Regression

Google has a great mobile interface for image search. It was launched in 2010 and improved multiple times since then. You can use swipes to go to the next image result or to the previous one. It looks like Google changed the image search UI for smartphones and tablets and now sends you to a landing page that shows the image and loads the corresponding page in the background. Intuitive gestures are gone and now you have to use the back button.

This seems to be limited to iPhones and iPads running iOS 7, so it's probably a bug. A lot of people complain about this in the Google Search Forum.

There are many reasons why the new interface is strange: loading the associated page uses more bandwidth and that's not a good idea for mobile devices, it's more difficult to check multiple search results, thumbnails are smaller and even the desktop interface shows a bigger image instead of sending users to a new page.

moreless

Google Image Search Collections

Google works on a new image search feature that lets you create collections, add image search results to your collections and annotate them. The source code includes multiple references to "collections", "notes", "folios", "clips", "groups" and the feature could integrate with Google Profiles.

For some reason, this looks like a standalone feature and notes aren't added to Google Keep.

Bing Image Search used to have a scratchpad, where users could save their images.

Google also had Notebook, a product that worked well for saving image search results. "Google Notebook is a simple way for users to save and organize their thoughts when conducting research online. This personal browser tool permits users to clip text, images, and links from the pages they're browsing, save them to an online notebook that is accessible from any computer, and share them with others," explained Google back in 2006.

{ Thanks, Florian K. }

moreless

Google's Search by Image and Special Effects

Google Image Search has a feature that lets you find images on the web by uploading the files or pasting their URLs. It's a clever feature, but it's a lot more clever than you imagined.

It's obvious that Google finds an image if exactly the same file is embedded by a web page or there's a link to that file. Google also finds images if you resize them, crop them or apply various photo effects.

Here's an image from a Wikipedia page, after resizing it and applying the pixelate effect from Picasa. Can Google find it?

Google can't find other sizes of the image, but if you look at the "Pages that include matching images" section, you'll find the image.

What if you convert the photo to black and white? Will Google's reverse image search engine be able to find it?

You'll get the same pages that include matching images:

Let's try something more difficult - apply multiple Picasa effects: soft focus, tint, filtered black-and-white and posterize. There's no way to recognize this image, right?

Wrong.

I used IrfanView to remove EXIF data and compress the image above a lot more. Here's what I got:

I edited the image in Paint and added some random shapes:

Here's the original photo:

To call this impressive is an understatement. It's a resilient algorithm that goes beyond matching pixels, colors, shapes - it understands the structure of the image, its essence.

{ The image from this post ("a red flower in the Philippines") has been licensed as Creative Commons Attribution by bingbing. Thanks, Brian Anderson. }

moreless

Navigation Arrows in Google Image Search

Google Image Search shows two arrows when you click a search results. The two buttons let you go to the previous or the next result. Until now, you could only use keyboard shortcuts (left/right arrow keys) to navigate between results.

I'm sure that website owners won't like this feature because it's much easier to go to the next image result, but users will like it. Maybe Google will also add a slideshow mode in full-screen, so that you don't have to click the "next" button over and over again.

moreless

New UI for Related Searches in Google Image Search

A few weeks ago, I posted about a new Google Image Search experiment for related searches. Now it's no longer an experiment.

Google shows some thumbnails next to the related searches, so you can preview the results and see if those queries are relevant. Until now, you had to mouse over the results to see the thumbnails.

Click one of the related searches and you can see bigger versions of the same thumbnails. There's an extra click to actually see all the results.

moreless

Google+ Photo Search With Image Recognition

Last year, Google Drive added an advanced image search feature powered by Goggles that recognizes objects and uses OCR technology to extract text. The same feature is now available in Google+: search for [sunflower], click "More", restrict the results to "Photos" and select "Most recent". You'll find sunflower images from Google+ posts that don't even include "sunflower", not even in the image filename.

This also works for the images you've uploaded to Picasa Web Albums/Google+ Photos or the images uploaded by your circles.

{ via Android Police }

moreless

Google's Atari Breakout Easter Egg

Is this the first Google Image Search Easter Egg? Search for [atari breakout] and you can play Atari's Breakout game. It's an arcade game introduced in April 1976. The game has an interesting story that involves Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak and it influenced Steve Wozniak's design for the Apple II computer.

"In the game, a layer of bricks lines the top third of the screen. A ball travels across the screen, bouncing off the top and side walls of the screen. When a brick is hit, the ball bounces away and the brick is destroyed. The player loses a turn when the ball touches the bottom of the screen. To prevent this from happening, the player has a movable paddle to bounce the ball upward, keeping it in play."

Google uses image search results for [atari breakout] instead of bricks, so the game is self-referential.

{ via TechCrunch, thanks Florian K. }

moreless

The Old Google Image Search in Chrome

There's a weird regression in Google Image Search if you use Chrome 27+ and enable "Extended Instant API" in chrome://flags. Extended Instant is a feature I've mentioned a few months ago and it's still a work in progress. It integrates Chrome with Google Search, replaces the new tab page with a special version of the Google homepage and removes the navigation bar and the search box from Google's search pages.

Back to Google Image Search. For some reason, when Extended Instant is enabled, Google Image Search switches to the old interface: thumbnails are smaller and you can mouse over to see more details about the images. When you click an image result, Google sends you to a new page that loads the original image file.

moreless

Google Image Search Shows the Images From a Page

There are many extensions and applications that let you see all the images from a web page. Another way to do that is to use Google Image Search. Search for [site:URL], where URL is the address of the page. This doesn't work for domain names, subdomains and subdirectories because Google shows the images for all the URLs that start with the name you've entered.

Example: [site:http://www.google.com/insidesearch/features/search/knowledge.html].

It's not a new feature, it's just another way to use the site: operator.

moreless

Google Tests New Interface for Related Image Searches

Google Image Search tests a new interface for related searches. Instead of displaying a list of thumbnails when you mouse over the related searches, this experimental interface shows a small collage of images above the queries.

Click one of the related searches and Google shows an additional box. It looks like the black box that's displayed when you click an image search result:

Here's the standard interface:

In other related news, search by subject no longer works. Hopefully, it's just a bug:

{ Thanks, Abdul. }

moreless

Google Image Search to Add Filters For Animations and Transparent Images

Google tests a new version of the advanced image search page that lets you restrict the results to transparent images and animated images. The most popular image file formats that support transparency are GIF and PNG, while most animated images are GIF files.

Animated GIFs made a comeback and they're popular again. "Just as the LP has enjoyed a second spin among retro-minded music fans, animated GIFs — the choppy, crude snippets of video loops that hearken back to dial-up modems — are enjoying an unlikely vogue as the digital accessory of the moment," says the New York Times.

Update: the feature is now available. Check the animated GIFs for [Gmail] and the transparent PNGs for [Nexus 7].

moreless

Gray Background in Google Image Search

Google Image Search uses a gray background for almost the entire page. The same background color from the header of most Google services is now used for the list of image search results. It's a light shade of gray and it looks a little better than the white background.

moreless

"Try These Too" in Google Image Search

Google Image Search has a new feature that shows a list of 7 related images when you select a result. The section is called "try these too" and is a clever way to integrate the similar images feature. Click one of the related images and it will replace the original result. The first image from the list is always the original search result, so you can always go back to that image.

If you want to find a more comprehensive list of similar images, click "more sizes", then click the "More sizes" dropdown and select "Visually similar".

moreless

Google's Mobile Image Search Adds Infinite Scrolling

I'm not sure if this is an experiment or a feature that's currently rolled out. Google Image Search for mobile has a new interface that replaces pagination with infinite scrolling, just like the desktop interface. You can see a lot more images without having to swipe and it's much easier to find great search results. Another difference is that thumbnails no longer have the same size.

Google also added an option to "scroll to top", but this is more useful if you use Android. iOS has a built-in feature that scrolls to the top of the page (or the current view) when you tap the status bar.

When you select an image result, you'll probably see a new interface that focuses on the image and makes it more obvious that you can swipe right/left to check to other results. The browser's address bar is no longer displayed and the image is slightly smaller.

Unfortunately, just like the new desktop image search, the redesigned mobile interface replaces snippets with page titles and removes file sizes (in bytes, not pixels). The most important missing feature is the link to the full-size image. The image is actually loaded in the background and replaces Google's thumbnail, so you can still long press the image and use browser features that let you save the image or open it in a new tab.

Here's the old interface:

And here's a side-by-side comparison (old vs new):

moreless