Chapter 17. Importing and Storing Your Digital Photos

In This Chapter

  • Connecting to your digital camera

  • Using media cards

  • How to import photos directly into My Pictures

  • Storing your photos where Media Center can find them

Digital cameras are getting smaller, better, and cheaper practically every day. They aren't just replacing our film cameras (the day is fast approaching when some youngster will ask you, "Film? What's that?"), but digital cameras have become so compact and affordable that they are cropping up in everything from mobile phones to PDAs.

As we trade in our old film canisters and cartridges for reusable memory devices, the whole process of picture-taking begins to change. Shooting scores of photos to get the one perfect shot used to be a trade secret of the professional photographer, but no more. If you own a digital camera, there's no incremental cost associated with taking three dozen rather than just one. You may run out of room on your removable memory card temporarily, until you delete the photos you don't want to keep, but you won't start running up your bill until you begin making hard copies.

Therein lies the Shakespearean "rub" in digital photography: printing. Although consumer-grade color printers and related software continue to improve, they have not reached the point where the process can match the ease and convenience of dropping your film off at the one- hour photo shop or corner drugstore. In fact, many of us have shelled out hundreds ”even thousands ”of dollars in digital photo equipment and supplies , only to find that we have essentially become our own one-hour photo technician. In fact, count yourself lucky if you can actually produce a set of quality prints from your digital camera in only an hour. Most of us find ourselves spending much longer, and still end up frustrated with both the process and the results.

Surely there must be a better way? There is. Why print photos at all when you can easily share them with family and friends electronically ? Email and Web pages provide effective ways for showing off your photos over long distances, but for displaying them in your own home, nothing beats the television screen. Here's where the whole idea of Windows XP Media Center Edition's My Pictures feature set really starts to shine .

My Pictures lets you display your photos individually or as a virtual slide show. You can sort your pictures in various ways, and browse through them using the remote control, or your mouse and keyboard. Your digital photos never had it so good, and the one-hour photo guy will have to find somebody else's pictures to leaf through in his spare time.



Absolute Beginner's Guide to Microsoft Windows XP Media Center
Absolute Beginners Guide to Windows XP Media Center
ISBN: 0789730030
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2002
Pages: 159
Authors: Steve Kovsky

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