The Google Chrome Oogle extension improves this essential part of the image search experience in multiple ways. When you click on an image in the search results you are still taken to the page the image was found on. Instead of having to scroll down until you locate it by yourself, this is now handled by the extension automatically.

It will automatically scroll to the location of the image on the page so that you can see it right away. To top it all off, it furthermore highlights the image with a border so that you can recognize it even if other images are displayed next to it on the page.

Identification works very well most of the time. The developer has stated however that there are pages where it does not work yet.

Chrome users can change the highlighting color from black to another color in the extension’s options.

Just enter another color into the “highlight image in page with a shadow in” form. You should see the new color immediately being applied to the border of the form.

The options furthermore allows you to switch between the new and old style of image results, and to enable Google’s lightbox which overlays the image you have been searching for on the page it has been posted on.

Oogle is a basic extension that can speed up the a user’s workflow considerably when searching for images on Google’s image search engine.

The ability to highlight and scroll to the image sets it apart from other solutions. Chrome users can download and install Oogle from the official Chrome Web Store.

But Photo Finder could also aid users who are looking for specific photo types, for instance wide-angle or fisheye photos, or photos taken in a specific month or lightness.

Photo Finder processes Exif data that many digital cameras write automatically as meta data when photos are taken. The extension uses the vast archive of Google Images.

It adds an icon to Chrome’s address bar. A left-click on the icon displays a search form and menus to customize the photo search. It is not necessary to use the menus at all, which means that the extension can also be used as a quick way to search for photos on Google Images.

A digital camera manufacturer or model can be entered in the leftmost menu. You can for instance search for all photos taken with Canon cameras, or for photos that have been taken with Nikon’s D7000 digital camera. Once you start typing suggestions are made automatically by the extension.

The second and third menu are used to make changes to the camera’s zoom level and lightness. The fourth and final menu can be used to select a specific month for the photos. Want to find Statue of Liberty, Central Park or Golden Gate Bridge photos in Winter? Just select one of the Winter months and you are good to go.

The loading of the results page is not delayed by the selections. The selection may however have an impact on the quality of the results. Let me give you an example. If you select a camera that is not really that popular, you may up with unrelated or no photo results at all.

Photo Finder is nevertheless a handy extension for Chrome users. The extension can be downloaded and installed directly from the extension’s Chrome Web Store page.

Today I’m going to look at different uses of Google’s Search by Images. What can you use the new technology for?

Google Search by Images is a reverse image search engine built on top of the standard Google Images search options. Users can drag and drop images to the search form, upload images from their computer with a file browser or paste an image web address into the search form to search for that image. You find the service here.

One of the easiest ways to use the reverse image search engine is to have two browser windows open. Keep the Google Search by Images page open in one, and use the other to drag and drop interesting images and photos to it. This works even in different browsers, like Firefox and Chrome.

Lets start with 10 uses for Google Search by Images.

1. Find People

This works best with portraits. You can use it to find a long lost friend, similar photos of a celebrity that you hold dear or information about a person of public interest. Just use the photo that you have and upload it to the search engine. All findings will be displayed on the search results page. Please note that the results depend largely on the availability of additional photos and information on the Internet. If your long lost friend is anti-Internet, your search will likely turn up empty. Works best for people of public interest.

2. Find Dead People

The Internet offers lots of information about people of the past. From the Cesar’s of old Rome over generals of the Napoleonic Wars to scientists and artists. If a picture is available, it is likely that you can find out more about them. It does not have to be a photo of the person, it can also be a photo of a painting or bust for instance.

3. Get Information About Art

Ever wanted to know what Van Gogh’s Starry Night is all about? Then upload a photo of the painting to Google’s Image search to find out. Even better, you can upload photos of art that you do not know the artist or name of. That beautiful picture in the newspaper or magazine? Take a photo, upload it to your computer to find out all about it. Works well for paintings and photography, but other art forms as well.

4. Find a Location

So you have that picture of the most romantic sunset in history, but do not know where it was taken. Upload it to Google Search for Images to get the location where the photo was taken. Found an interesting landmark, hotel, hangout or even the interior of a house? Try to get their location by uploading the photos.

5. Sightseeing

Take photos while you walk the streets of your holiday destination. Maybe you are in Berlin and want to know more about the Dome or the Reichstag, or you are in London and want to find out more about the Tower of London. You can use the new search to find out more about a building or sight that you do not know anything about, not even a name. Where ever you are, take a photo, upload it to the search engine to get information about the sight. Especially handy if you have a mobile phone with a decent camera, and a solid Internet connection.

6. Identify Plants

You can use the reverse image search to identify plants. Your neighbors have that beautiful plant in their garden that you do not know anything about? Take a photo, upload it to find out all about it. Maybe you like trekking or hunting. If you encounter plants you could take a photo to analyze them right away or at a later time.

7. Identify Animals

Just as with plants, it is possible to identify animals as well. This may be a bit more difficulty considering the fact that animals are most of the time on the move and not standing still so that you can take a photo of them. From the smallest of animals to the largest, if you are lucky enough to be able to take a photo, you will be able to find out more about them using the image search engine.

8. Identify Technology

Identify cameras, laptops, car parts, weapons or household items by taking a picture and uploading it to Google Search by Images afterwards. Maybe you see a cool laptop at the other table in the coffee shop and want to know more about the manufacturer and model.

9. Search for vehicles

Find out more about planes, automobiles, trains or ships. This works even with miniatures, as long as the photo is detailed enough.

10. Find out Who’s Using Your Photos

You can use the search engine to find out if other webmasters or websites have copied your photos or images. Just upload them to the search engine to get a list of sites that have posted identical images or visually similar images.

Closing Words

Have you played around with Google’s Search by Image yet? What’s your impression of the service?

The preview thumbnails on the new Google Images results page take longer to load, simply because that page displays a multiple of the images displayed on the old Google Images search page.

The userscript Google Image Basic changes the behavior by redirecting users to an old layout page. Redirection does mean that the new image search page is loaded and then redirected to the basic image search page while it is still loading.

Some users may still experience lags and high cpu loads because of this, but those should go away once the old basic search interface starts showing up.

Here are two screenshots that show the new Google Image search results page and the results page after installing the Google Image Basic userscript.

Standard Google Image Search

Google Image Basic

Notice the scrollbar on the standard Google Image search page? That page has lots of space to display thumbnail previews, and all of those thumbnails need to be loaded.

The redirects are automatic, and you do not need to do anything after script installation. I have tested the userscript under Firefox and Google Chrome, and it worked flawlessly under both web browsers. Firefox users need to install Greasemonkey or a comparable add-on like Scriptish first before they can install userscripts. Google Chrome users on the other hand can install the script right away.

The script is active right after installation. If you are on Google Images search currently you need to reload that page before the new interface becomes available.

The core benefit of the userscript is that it reduces the page loading time of Google Image Search and the load it causes while the page and its elements are loaded. Google Image Basic is available at the userscript website.

The userscript Image Search Preview changes that for users of the Firefox web browser. The userscript does not seem to work in Google Chrome after installation. Image Search Preview by default will display the original image on hover on the same page.

Users who only want to view the images can do so more easily just by hovering over them in the image search results. The script is currently working on a number of sites, including the popular image search engines Google Images, Bing Images, Yahoo Images as well as Flickr.

Larger image previews is just one of the features that the userscript brings to the table. It can for instance be configured to display direct links to the original images on the thumbnail pages. This makes it possible to download images directly from a search results page or image listing page without visiting the site or page the image is hosted on.

Firefox users need to change the preferences of the userscript for that and a few other features available. To open the preferences users need to click in the search box on a supported website and press the keyboard combination Ctrl-Y or Ctrl-P.

A configuration menu is opened with options to enable direct links. Other options available are to set a maximum height or width for the image previews, a background color for images with transparency and a delay before the image is shown (to avoid accidental previews if the mouse moves over an image preview area).

Firefox users need to install the Greasemonkey add-on before they can install the userscript.

The program uses tabs for the supported services with the presented options differing largely depending on the choice made here. Google Images can be searched by entering a search string, the desired number of results, the size of the images (either custom or pre-configured), the image offset and if adult content should be included in the results.

Media Spider will display a save file window which needs to be used to pick the location for the images that are downloaded during the operation.

The image search on Deviant Art uses slightly different parameters. It is here for instance possible to select a specific site category (for instance wallpapers), the sorting method and a username and password.

The 4Chan image downloader finally works by selecting one of the available categories of the popular bulletin board. Media Spider will start downloading images from that 4Chan board automatically once the selection has been made. It is not clear if all images of a board are downloaded or if the program sets a limit as there is no option to set the number of images to download from 4Chan. It looks as if all are downloaded though.

The program remembers the directory the last images were saved to which saves some time during a session. The images are all saved in the root directory of the folder selected. That can be a problem if lots of images are downloaded.

Media Spider is a handy program for users who want to download lots of images from at least one of the supported websites. The program is portable and Open Source. It can be downloaded from its Sourceforge project website. (via ToThePC)

But there are also extensions that are created by Google and Slideshow is one of them. Slideshow is an excellent extension for viewing image and photo slide shows on the Internet. The extension is currently compatible with the following four popular photo hosting websites: Flickr, Google Picasa, Facebook and Google Images.

The slide show extension will automatically recognize additional photos on pages on the supported websites and display those photos in a thumbnail bar at the bottom of the screen. A click on any of the thumbnails will load the photo in the slideshow view. This recognition process takes a while depending on the number of photos found on the website.

The photo slide show extension will also display a slideshow icon in the Google Chrome address bar that indicates that a slideshow can be opened that displays the photos hosted on that page.

The user viewing the slideshow can load new photos with the mouse by clicking on them in the thumbnail bar at the bottom of the screen. It is furthermore possible to use the left and right cursor keys on the computer keyboard to navigate in the slide show instead.

A click on the x icon next to the image name will close the slideshow and return the user to the page the slideshow was launched on. Slideshow is an interesting extension for the Google Chrome web browser, especially for users who regularly visit at least one of the supported websites. The photo slide show extension is comfortable to work with. Only the lack of supported photo hosting websites and the delay until the slideshow controls are displayed are something that Google should be working on.

Slideshow for Google Chrome is compatible with version 4 of the web browser. The extension can be downloaded from the Google Chrome website.

Update: The Chrome Photo Slide Show extension is no longer available on the official web site. A alternative is the Slideshow for Facebook, Flickr, Google Images extension which is also available at the web store.

Google Image Swirl starts of like any other Google Image search. The user enters a search phrase in the search form on the page. The script will then display possible matches for that entered search phrase. So far so identical to the standard Google Image search engine.

Differences begin to appear after the selection of one of the results.

Google Image Swirl will display the image and related images in the same interface instead of loading the website that is containing the image. Related images are placed around the selected image with lines showing their relation. Even better is the fact that second tier relations are shown as well on the page. A click on the central image will load that image in the website that is was published on.

It is however also possible to click on one of the related images to navigate further into that path. This can be a very interesting way of exploring images about a specific subject. Google Image Swirl is an experimental service that is open to all users over at Google Labs.

Update: Google Image Swirl has been discontinued. It is no longer available.

The Google Images Downloader solves that problem by providing the means to download multiple images from Google Images directly. The portable software program is available for the Windows operating system. The user can either copy and paste a Google Image search url into the application or grab the url from the active page in the program directly.

It is then possible to grab the image links from Google Images. The program will grab results from the first five pages by default; A figure that can be changed in the interface directly. Other filters include the allowed image formats and to block html files. All images will then be downloaded to the directory that the user specified in the interface. It takes only a few seconds – depending on the Internet connection of course – to download dozens of images from Google Images.

Multi Image Downloader can be downloaded from Freeware Files. The program is compatible with Windows XP and Windows Vista (and likely Windows 7 as well).

This new type of comfortably accessing search options has now been brought to Google Images as well. Users who conduct a search in the Google Image search engine will now be able to click on the same Options link to access and change several important search parameters.

The options allow a search engine user to specify a certain size for the images that are displayed in the search results, change the type of image (face, photo, clip art or line drawing) or specify a dominant color. All of these options are also available in the advanced image search parameters. The benefit for the search engine user is that these options are now directly accessible.

The collection centers around five areas called People (Kennedy, Picasso), Places (Times Square, New York), Events (Vietnam War, Winter Olympics), Sports (baseball, football) or Culture (Railroad, Cowboys). It is possible to enter any search term which is usually good enough to find many images related to the keyword.

A click on an image will display a larger thumbnail and additional information about it including the location or date taken. The very same page contains links to related images and an option to purchase it as a framed photograph. A click on the image will load it in full size in a new window.

Image resolutions range from 800×1280 to 1280×1280. Could be a nice idea for a present or as a background wallpaper for the PC.

Google Image Search can also be used to search the Life Photo Archive exclusively by appending the source:life parameter to the search.

The 150 images will be displayed in a zoomable and movable area. The mouse wheel can be used to zoom in and out of the area to inspect images closely. Pressing the left mouse button in the area makes it possible to move around which is handy if some images are not displayed because of the zoom level.

It is also possible to use the zoom slider on the right sidebar to zoom in and out of the main area. The second step is the refining phase. The user drags and drops images that fit best to the right sidebar. A double-click is the alternative method of selecting those images. To give an example. A user searching for the game Diablo might enter Diablo in the search form. The resulting pictures will show images of Diablo 1, Diablo 2 and Diablo 3. It is then possible to only select Diablo 3 images from the first batch to tell the search that these are the images to find and display from then on.

Pixolu will then search for and display images that are closely related to the selected images of step 2. The url, resolution and source of selected images will be shown. The only way to view images in full resolution is to load them by clicking on the source url in the sidebar.

Entering Kill Bill for instance displays lots of pictures of actors that played in that movie. The search engine is pretty good at finding pictures of celebrities but I had less luck finding pictures of ordinary people. I checked some random Facebook profile pages and tried to find the pictures with the search engine but ran out of luck.

That’s a little bit surprising because FaceSaerch is using Google Images and their &imgtype=face parameter to find matching faces. The interface is pretty slick and has some nice effects when flipping through the hits.

It’s possible to turn safesearch off in the options which are located in the about page of the website. Deeply hidden I would say. Facesaerch provides several comfortable tools like adding widgets to another website or using RSS Feeds for searches.

An alternative would be Piclens but that would require an installation. FaceSaerch works just like it is.

You enter a search term, define the size of the images that will be displayed and the amount of images and hit enter. All images appear in the size that you selected. The site offers a bookmarklet for this type of search.

Google Image Ripper: Full Size Image Search

Google Image search is fantastic and highly useful to say the least, but the chaotic thumbnail presentation is less than satisfactory in terms of image size. You have to search through a sea of thumbnails and then click the appropriate one to get the full image size. Not that this is terribly difficult to do, but there is another option. Google presents an interesting new script with Google Image Ripper which quickly displays full size images. You enter a search term in the search field and then select the size of the images you would like to see and escape the land of tiny thumbnails. The images will all appear in the selected size. A website called “Dear Computer” uses the massive Google Images index and displays images only.

http://dearcomputer.nl/gir/ This link will lead you to Google Image Ripper.

Enter the search term, choose the desired size and type and click the “Rip Google!” button and off you go to the images. The example below is a search for clipart for an interesting symbol that a music artist uses as his logo. The usual Google image search proved to be frustrating in finding the isolated image, but Google Image Ripper yielded exactly what was being searched for.

Once the search was initiated at xxlarge size, it was a matter of scrolling down to find the image from a friendly interface. You can save the image with a right-click straight from the screen. This is the image that was needed. It came up in a 6×5” image size, but has been reduced in size for this article, as it would take up entirely too much space. This image is the property of Juno Reactor, to give due credit. After submitting a search, the interface provides many images, if fact more than you would get with the typical Google image search.

This is the appearance of the interface, yielding exactly what was specified in the search. As with Google Image search, there is still a good bit of scrolling to do in order to pinpoint the right image, but they are much easier to see.

You can take the search any direction you like. In addition to the optional sizes selection, you have an “icon” option. To get usable icons, choose “any” in the “type” box. The other Type options will generally yield much larger images than would be suitable for an icon. Links are included with every image so that you can go directly to the site for the image if you wish to learn more from an interesting discovery.

The “type” options available are: any, news, face, clipart, lineart and photo. The sizes range from icon to “huge” so you can get any size of the image being searched.
There is little else to this useful web app, but it is worth bookmarking if you find that you regularly use image searches. Google presently provides the best free image search app and this just takes it a step further. Give it a try even if you are not going to use it often.