GOOGLE PHOTOS ... I'm kind of digging this app.

For the record, I still love Google Picasa with its easy interface for basic photo tweaking and I'll continue to use it, even if Google doesn't update it anymore.

This new Google Photos app has really won me over also.

It automatically uploads my newest photos and videos, from my phone or my computer, (unless I say no), and then... it "messes" with them.

Photos cruises my pictures and then woos me with "creations".

Some of these "creations" are not worth saving, but often, the software has done a pretty nice job of creating a collage, artistically tweaking a photo, or making a short animation or photo story based on some related photos.

(Okay ... when Photos makes a story of your trip using your pictures and includes a map of your travels ... that's a wee bit creepy...)

Here's a small sample of "creations" made by the Photos app and then submitted to me for approval.

Today, it sent the collage below based on the date.

The photos are all from PureFlorida posts I made in 2009 using Google's product Blogger.

It's a pretty little collage for a bit of software to have created.

It made me realize how much my timber bamboo have expanded. The bamboo "sticks" in the photo have expanded to a healthy, young grove.

It also does this ...

This anole is an example of the "animations" that Photos comes up with based on related sequential photos.
I get a lot of these submitted for my approval, since the Canon shoots 7 frames per second and I'm usually shooting on full auto trying to get that one good shot.

And then there's the "stylized photos" where Photos takes a shot and softens it, enhances it, ages it, or in this case, turns it into a  ... a water colory sketch?
I like it.

And not just because these are the steps where my Emma will marry her Kyle in December.

Google Photos ... it's free and it keeps on giving.

I'm a fan.