Skip to main content

More than selfies: Google’s apps bring the world of art to your phone

The art of color: Paul Smith experiences Art Palette #GoogleArts

Google’s “art selfie” app, which helps you find a classic portrait that you most resemble, took social media by storm a few weeks back. Even celebrities got in on the fun. But Google’s commitment to bringing the world of art to a wider audience goes beyond just selfies, as shown by some new apps from its Arts & Culture Experiments division.

Recommended Videos

First up is Art Palette, which is all about color. It’s a search engine that finds and categorizes artworks based on the colors you choose. You can either upload a picture, or just play around with the different color combinations at the top of the screen. The algorithm uses machine learning to sift through thousands of images that match the color palette you uploaded.

It’s a great way to see how different colors look together and will likely give you some inspiration for adding some art to your own house or apartment.

Next is Life Tags, a collection of more than 40 million images from the iconic magazine. Life was like the Pinterest of the 20th century, a glossy full-sized magazine that ran from 1936 to 1972. The images captured in the pages of Life are a fascinating digital encyclopedia, and Google’s neural network uses a specialized photo search to categorize and tag the photos for browsing.

Each image has multiple labels associated with it, depending on what the Google annotation algorithm “sees” in the picture, and those associations can be viewed as dotted lines on the picture. This one’s a real rabbit hole — be prepared to spend several hours exploring a fascinating photographic history of the 20th century as you jump from astronauts to roller derbies to suspension bridges, and everything in between.

Both of these new apps can be found in the Arts & Culture Experiments section of Google’s site. Making art more accessible is the aim of the project, Amit Sood told the Telegraph. The Google Art project began with 17 museums and now includes 1,600.

“In the West we are so used to having these masterpieces and this cultural heritage on our doorstep,” he said. “But not every country will be able to build hundreds of physical structures and acquire hundreds of millions of artworks. It’s just not practical.”

“Museums have a role to make their spaces different,” he added. “I think this is not a problem, this is an opportunity, because you are changing the definition of the word ‘museum’ from it being a building.”

Mark Austin
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Mark’s first encounter with high-tech was a TRS-80. He spent 20 years working for Nintendo and Xbox as a writer and…
Google is launching a powerful new AI app for your Android phone
Google Gemini app on Android.

Remember Bard, Google’s answer to ChatGPT? Well, it is now officially called Gemini. Also, all those fancy AI features that previously went by the name Duet AI have been folded under the Gemini branding. In case you haven’t been following up all the AI development flood, the name is derived from the multi-modal large language model of the same name.

To go with the renaming efforts, Google has launched a standalone Gemini app on Android. Moreover, the Gemini experience is also being made available to iPhone users within the Google app on iOS. But wait, there’s more.

Read more
The Pixel 7 is Google’s iPhone, and it’s my favorite Android phone so far
Google Pixel 7 rainbow gradient home screen on a blue placemat

I’ve been a long-time user of Apple’s iPhone — since 2008, to be exact. I got my first iPhone as a birthday present, and it was the original one that started it all. Every year since, I’ve upgraded to the latest and greatest that Apple has to offer (most recently, the iPhone 14 Pro), and I don’t regret my decision one bit.

However, since I started at Digital Trends, I’ve been expanding my horizons by giving Android devices a try. There are a ton of different manufacturers, and each one has its own version of Android. But so far, my favorite has been Google’s own Pixel 7. To me, it’s just like Google’s version of an iPhone, and it’s quite lovely.
Android is to Google what iOS is to Apple

Read more
The Pixel Watch puts the best of Google’s software on your wrist for $350
Google Assistant on the Google Pixel Watch.

Google has finally launched its first smartwatch, the aptly named Pixel Watch. It stays true to the famed Pixel formula of mixing half-decent hardware with a ton of Google-integrated services to offer a seamless software experience.

For the Pixel Watch, Google is charging $350 a pop. But if you’re eyeing the version with cellular connectivity (4G) support, prepare to pay a cool $400. For comparison, the Apple Watch Series 8 starts at $400, while the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5’s LTE variant costs only $330 right now.
What's on the table?
The Pixel Watch’s design is fresh, thanks to the dramatically curved glass alongside the periphery, meeting the metallic shell halfway through. It will be available in three case choices – matte black, polished silver, and champagne gold – all made out of stainless steel.

Read more