Most frames are relatively low resolution, most being in the 640×480 or 800×600 range. The solution to this is to convert the images. Even modern frames have a typical capacity of 1 GB and while that can be increased through expansion cards, it’s really only prolonging the inevitable. Many older frames have storage capacities below 256 MB, which just doesn’t cut it. With cameras boasting higher and higher megapixel counts, their file sizes are increasing exponentially. The first problem is the limited storage capacity of the frame itself. I have run across two major stumbling blocks doing this.

It’s a great way to get photos to them, but managing the content can be a bit of a nightmare. Being in technology, I of course have given digital frames to my parents, grandparents and in-laws. However, I have always found that digital frames were much more difficult. This makes sharing photos online really easy to do. In the case of Facebook,the dialog looks something like below: Remember that Windows Live and Facebook are tightly integrated,so that people you tag with Photo Gallery will automatically be reflected on Facebook. Once configured, for each selection, you’ll get a dialog box prompting you for the album and other metadata, and in the case of Facebook, for people. Once the pictures are tagged, you simply select the ones that you want to send (I also like to tag them with a destination/album name like “Flickr – 2009 General” so that I know what I’ve saved) and then click the relevant destination in the Share section on the tab. I store my photos in Windows Live and Facebook (for sharing with others) and in Flickr for both sharing and full size image storage. One of the things that I really like about the product is its integration with external applications and galleries. However, once processing is complete, Live Photo Gallery takes over for tagging and organizing. It has some light editing capabilities, but I work frequently with RAW images, and I use Adobe Photoshop with Bridge for my picture processing tasks. It’s been out for several months now, and my opinion on it hasn’t changed – it’s an excellent photo organizing tool.

I’ve written before about Windows Live Photo Gallery and its promise when it was in Beta. This post may be a little late for the holiday season, but there’s always another one coming up.

Windows live photo gallery errors