is a blog about design, technology and culture written by Khoi Vinh, and has been more or less continuously published since December 2000 in New York City. Khoi is currently Principal Designer at Adobe. Previously, Khoi was co-founder and CEO of Mixel (acquired in 2013), Design Director of The New York Times Online, and co-founder of the design studio Behavior, LLC. He is the author of “How They Got There: Interviews with Digital Designers About Their Careers”and “Ordering Disorder: Grid Principles for Web Design,” and was named one of Fast Company’s “fifty most influential designers in America.” Khoi lives in Crown Heights, Brooklyn with his wife and three children.
Without apology, I admit a prejudice against any Windows-based software that blatantly mimics innovations that originated on the Mac OS; a prime example is Candy Labs’ App Rocket, a startlingly faithful and shameless reproduction of Objective Development’s superb LaunchBar that was developed for — you might even say “ported to” — Windows XP recently.
Unfairly or not, I regard those indiscretions with scorn, and not a little indignation, which was my attitude when stumbling across Picasa, a program that bears a remarkable similarity to Apple’s iPhoto software for management of digital photos. I might have dismissed it altogether, but the attractive design of their Web site hinted at some level of cleverness at work, and so I decided to download and install the software on my Windows box for a trial run.
On Second Thought
Below: It’s a Picasa! A debt to iPhoto is readily apparent in Picasa’s user interface.
So I’m swallowing my pride here to say that my initial prejudice was completely unfounded, and that even though Picasa owes a tremendous debt to iPhoto and even to Mac OS X itself, its developers have not borrowed lazily; they’ve actually used their brains and injected a nontrivial amount of original thinking and elbow grease into improving upon the principles that made iPhoto so successful: top-shelf ease of use, attention to detail and willingness to invest the engineering resources and effort into creating not just a pleasant user experience, but a fun one.
If nothing else, this should be a wake up call to the iPhoto team at Apple, which already is in the hole for its delay in updating iPhoto’s dog-slow management engine. Working with my library of two thousand some iPhoto images is excruciating; its glacial pace even makes me reluctant to launch iPhoto at all.
Having not loaded more than about 150 images into Picasa, I can’t say for sure whether it would be dramatically faster when handling ten times that number of photos, but the program also has more going for it. Its photo album management is, in some ways, superior to that of iPhoto in that it serves to reflect the file structure users already have in place before installing Picasa. This approach also yields the truly excellent Timeline view, which takes those logically grouped collections of images and displays them chronologically in an animated, highly-responsive and highly original interface.
I’m not describing the Timeline feature particularly well, in part because it’s such a unique presentation, but it’s well-worth experiencing for yourself. My reaction to using this for the first time was one of pure delight, which is something I almost never experience with Windows software, and which is as clear an indication as any that Picasa has managed to capture at least a little bit of that Apple magic.
I agree – Picasa UI is nice. I’ve been beta testing new software called Slide http://www.slide.com – which offers a different model of sharing. Simpler. I like it as much as iPhoto, but its only on Windows so far.
mik
So,
What are you using instead of iPhoto? I wish there was Picasa for Mac…
iPhoto 5.0.1 is SO slow and heavy, I never use it and being a Mac Newbe, i don’t know what else to use.
I have to say that Picasa completely outclasses iphoto, which is borderline ueless by comparison. It’s the main reason I’d use a windows machine now! I’m very sad that there’s no Macintosh port in the works.
I’ve added 2500 or more photos to my library in Picasa every month for the last 5 months and the thing is not slowing down.
Picasa users – be SURE to get a mouse with a wheel on it. You’ll be glad you did.
One more thing – google literally owns picasa. I don’t imagine google has much of an interest in a single desktop picture browser. I’m thinking that there will be a publishing mechanism, hopefully soon – imagine something that allows me to publish selected galleries from my picasa library to the world, with a click. Apple? Google?
Jonathan
The editing model is much nicer in Picasa, especially for RAW images, but really any image. In Picasa the image is never touched. So when you make changes to a picture, the parameters of the change are remembered in a database without touching the negative at all. Color temperature, sharpness, etc., and even cropping parameters are separate from the file.
This is why you can make changes to an image and then switch to another image instantly. I have a dual 2.5Ghz G5 and iPhoto is unbearably slow. I was just on vacation with my PC laptop that’s configured to run at 800 Mhz (it’s 1.2 Ghz processor) and it was so much faster and enjoyable to use than iPhoto that I am very depressed about my year long invvestment with iPhoto on the mac. I have 9k photos, and picasa handles them all without any trouble at all. iPhoto struggles to say the very least.
But back to the main point: if I want to edit my RAW image (or JPEG for that matter), iPhoto is slower to apply changes in the Adjust window, AND, when you switch to the next photo you get a 4 or 5 second delay as it SAVES your changes to disk. In iPhoto this means backing up your RAW image, and generating a JPEG image with the parameters you’ve selected. And the worst part is, if you go back to that image to edit it again, you’re now operating on the JPEG file, not the RAW file, and the only way to go back to the RAW file is to undo all your previous changes and start over.
iPhoto just doesn’t cut it anymore. I hope they fix it because iLife is still a great suite of apps.
sam
I ‘switched’ to mac 3 months ago (20″ iMac), as i have moved to australia for a year. I wanted a computer i could enjoy and transport OK.
I had not imagined i would miss picasa so much – i thought iphoto would be comparable. I am hugely disappointed with iphoto despite trying to get to like it.
I think picasa2 has set the bar very high for photo organising applications.
I think rather than take the imac back to the UK at the end of the year i will sell it on and go back to windows. Unless picasa appears for mac or iphoto improves 200%.
There must be many thousands of people who, like me, would gladly pay for a mac version of picasa.
Patrick
I just discovered Picasa2 on my Dad’s home machine and was amazed at how fast it is. Thought I’d return to my Mac and find something comparable. Just used iPhoto for the first time and it’s just not as user-friendly and fast as Picasa. Very unusual for Apple to be scooped by a PC-based image program, but it appears to have happened here. Hope there will soon be Picasa for Macs, or a corresponding upgrade to iPhoto or other similar Mac-compatible photo management system.
I know I would pay for a Mac version of Picasa. I almost forked over a couple of benjamins for another professional photo management software, but it didn’t live up to my expectations. Picasa is the only application that I truly miss from my 10+ years of PC experience.
LSpears
I’m thinking that there will be a publishing mechanism, hopefully soon – imagine something that allows me to publish selected galleries from my picasa library to the world, with a click. Apple? Google?
In iPhoto Share > Export and click the Web Page tab. Better yet, if you have a .Mac account, Share > .Mac Slides
“The editing model is much nicer in Picasa, especially for RAW images, but really any image. In Picasa the image is never touched. So when you make changes to a picture, the parameters of the change are remembered in a database without touching the negative at all. Color temperature, sharpness, etc., and even cropping parameters are separate from the file.” —Jonathan
This is exactly the way Aperture handles images, so I’m sure it will be built into iPhoto 6 as well.
And as far as publishing, I wouldn’t want Google to have access to every single photo in my collection, just waiting for the time Google decides to change policy and index them all into their search engine. I don’t have any pictures I’m ashamed of, except for quality. I have a truckload of scanned old photos awaiting restoration.
Plus, of course, it’s the principle.
I’m sorry. I just don’t trust Google’s motto: “Don’t be evil”. They’re a corporation, and the bigger it gets, the more evil potential exists at some level or another.
CK
Our experiences using iPhoto are 180 out. I find it to be a clumsy interface with very little horsepower. Worse, it can and will degrade your files; handling of raw images is an at-your-risk proposition.
I’ve not met a pro or prosumer who could afford to trust their work to it, not to mention their workflow. . .
Without apology, I admit a prejudice against any Windows-based software that blatantly mimics innovations that originated on the Mac OS; a prime example is Candy Labs’ 
I’m playing with it at this very moment and I have to say I’m quite impressed. Nice interface, smooth and a lot of options. $30 isn’t bad at all.
Timeline Views were around on Sony Computers over three years ago, it comes with evey Sony computer… And yes, even back then they were animated..
I agree – Picasa UI is nice. I’ve been beta testing new software called Slide http://www.slide.com – which offers a different model of sharing. Simpler. I like it as much as iPhoto, but its only on Windows so far.
So,
What are you using instead of iPhoto? I wish there was Picasa for Mac…
iPhoto 5.0.1 is SO slow and heavy, I never use it and being a Mac Newbe, i don’t know what else to use.
Thanks!
I have to say that Picasa completely outclasses iphoto, which is borderline ueless by comparison. It’s the main reason I’d use a windows machine now! I’m very sad that there’s no Macintosh port in the works.
I’ve added 2500 or more photos to my library in Picasa every month for the last 5 months and the thing is not slowing down.
Picasa users – be SURE to get a mouse with a wheel on it. You’ll be glad you did.
One more thing – google literally owns picasa. I don’t imagine google has much of an interest in a single desktop picture browser. I’m thinking that there will be a publishing mechanism, hopefully soon – imagine something that allows me to publish selected galleries from my picasa library to the world, with a click. Apple? Google?
The editing model is much nicer in Picasa, especially for RAW images, but really any image. In Picasa the image is never touched. So when you make changes to a picture, the parameters of the change are remembered in a database without touching the negative at all. Color temperature, sharpness, etc., and even cropping parameters are separate from the file.
This is why you can make changes to an image and then switch to another image instantly. I have a dual 2.5Ghz G5 and iPhoto is unbearably slow. I was just on vacation with my PC laptop that’s configured to run at 800 Mhz (it’s 1.2 Ghz processor) and it was so much faster and enjoyable to use than iPhoto that I am very depressed about my year long invvestment with iPhoto on the mac. I have 9k photos, and picasa handles them all without any trouble at all. iPhoto struggles to say the very least.
But back to the main point: if I want to edit my RAW image (or JPEG for that matter), iPhoto is slower to apply changes in the Adjust window, AND, when you switch to the next photo you get a 4 or 5 second delay as it SAVES your changes to disk. In iPhoto this means backing up your RAW image, and generating a JPEG image with the parameters you’ve selected. And the worst part is, if you go back to that image to edit it again, you’re now operating on the JPEG file, not the RAW file, and the only way to go back to the RAW file is to undo all your previous changes and start over.
iPhoto just doesn’t cut it anymore. I hope they fix it because iLife is still a great suite of apps.
I ‘switched’ to mac 3 months ago (20″ iMac), as i have moved to australia for a year. I wanted a computer i could enjoy and transport OK.
I had not imagined i would miss picasa so much – i thought iphoto would be comparable. I am hugely disappointed with iphoto despite trying to get to like it.
I think picasa2 has set the bar very high for photo organising applications.
I think rather than take the imac back to the UK at the end of the year i will sell it on and go back to windows. Unless picasa appears for mac or iphoto improves 200%.
There must be many thousands of people who, like me, would gladly pay for a mac version of picasa.
I just discovered Picasa2 on my Dad’s home machine and was amazed at how fast it is. Thought I’d return to my Mac and find something comparable. Just used iPhoto for the first time and it’s just not as user-friendly and fast as Picasa. Very unusual for Apple to be scooped by a PC-based image program, but it appears to have happened here. Hope there will soon be Picasa for Macs, or a corresponding upgrade to iPhoto or other similar Mac-compatible photo management system.
I know I would pay for a Mac version of Picasa. I almost forked over a couple of benjamins for another professional photo management software, but it didn’t live up to my expectations. Picasa is the only application that I truly miss from my 10+ years of PC experience.
I’m thinking that there will be a publishing mechanism, hopefully soon – imagine something that allows me to publish selected galleries from my picasa library to the world, with a click. Apple? Google?
In iPhoto Share > Export and click the Web Page tab. Better yet, if you have a .Mac account, Share > .Mac Slides
“The editing model is much nicer in Picasa, especially for RAW images, but really any image. In Picasa the image is never touched. So when you make changes to a picture, the parameters of the change are remembered in a database without touching the negative at all. Color temperature, sharpness, etc., and even cropping parameters are separate from the file.” —Jonathan
This is exactly the way Aperture handles images, so I’m sure it will be built into iPhoto 6 as well.
And as far as publishing, I wouldn’t want Google to have access to every single photo in my collection, just waiting for the time Google decides to change policy and index them all into their search engine. I don’t have any pictures I’m ashamed of, except for quality. I have a truckload of scanned old photos awaiting restoration.
Plus, of course, it’s the principle.
I’m sorry. I just don’t trust Google’s motto: “Don’t be evil”. They’re a corporation, and the bigger it gets, the more evil potential exists at some level or another.
Our experiences using iPhoto are 180 out. I find it to be a clumsy interface with very little horsepower. Worse, it can and will degrade your files; handling of raw images is an at-your-risk proposition.
I’ve not met a pro or prosumer who could afford to trust their work to it, not to mention their workflow. . .