MyDigitalLife

Photos

Overview

This page describes everything related to photos; taking photos, making a selection, editing and showing them.

I’m only a simple photographer, so there’s not so much information about taking photos, only some technical tips.

I want to organize my photos in the way I want, not in the structure prescribed by some tool. The photos are available on different devices.

For selecting (deleting) photos it’s sometimes useful to show them on a map, this is possible in the MyWorld application.

For editing I use standard tools: PhotoShop and IrfanView.

For creating a photo show, I merge photos from my different devices. A photo show can be created via the MyWorld application.

Showing the photos can be done by running IrfanView on my PC, which has an HDMI connection to the tv.

Taking photos

Nowadays I take most photos with my smartphone, but on holidays I also use a digital camera.

Smartphone

My smartphone is a Samsung Galaxy s10e, which has a good picture quality.

  • + I ‘always’ have it with me, as it fits in my pocket
  • + Has a wide angle lens
  • + Stores the GPS location automatically
  • – Has no optical zoom
  • ~ Be careful with settings. It easily makes the pictures look unnaturally colorful.
Camera

My camera is a Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ40.

  • + Has a good optical zoom
  • + Good, natural colors
  • – Using GPS is cumbersome.
    It has to be switched on when you want to use it. Otherwise you have to switch it to flight mode in a plane, and it drains the battery. When it’s on, it takes a long time to get a location.

Storing photos

I store all photos in a directory structure which is synchronized via the NAS.
The directory structure is as follows:

  • General Images
    These are actually not photos.
    • AnimGIFs
      Animated GIFs.
    • Bitmaps remote control
      Bitmaps for my RC5000 remote control.
    • Materials and images
      Images of materials.
  • Day trips
    Single day (cycle) trips, each in a separate folder.
    Folder names have the following format:
    <flex-date>  <trip-name>
    <flex-data> is the year (4 digits), optionally followed by ‘-‘ and the month (2 digits), optionally followed by ‘-‘ and the day of the month (2 digits).
    <trip-name> is any text describing the trip.
    With this naming format the folders are sorted by date.
  • Miscellanious
    Photos not falling in any of the other categories.
  • Family (general)
    Photos with family members and taken around the house.
    There are subfolders for family events, with names with the following format:
    <flex-date> <event-name>
    Also there are subfolders for ‘parts’ of the family, like ‘my parents’.
  • Locations
    Photos of specific locations, which are not related to a vacation or day trip.
    Each location is in a separate folder, with the following format:
    <flex-date> <location-name>.
  • Work
    Trips and events related to my work.
  • Themes
    Photos related a specific theme like graduation, a concert, a festival, etc..
    Each theme is in a separate folder, with the following format:
    <flex-data> <theme-name>
  • Vacations
    By far the biggest folder, with a subfolder per vacation.
    Folder names have the following format:
    <flex-date>  <vacation-title>

Delete the pictures that aren’t good or that just are ‘too much’.

Editing photos (in the broadest sense)

Operations on Google Top Shot photos

You can do this on your phone, but also on your PC with MoPho Photoviewer.
Besides the normal picture, Top Shot photos contain a small movie. With MoPho Photoviewer you can save this movie, or export a frame from this movie.
To actually use the application, you have to pay. In my case this was € 2,09.

Edit the pictures to make them look better.

Showing photos

Displaying 360o photos

To display 360o photos (taken with my Pixel 7 phone) I use Panorado 5.0.

Show the pictures on tv

Typically we only show a selection or just some highlight and we want to show them in the right order (mostly chronological).