Picasa Face Detection: Can't we get this on the Desktop?

Update: Upon further investigation it seems that the face detection is only a part of the Web interface and is *not* synchronized back to your files on your computer! That's a bummer - hopefully something that can be improved upon in a later version. For the time being, I'll leave this post as-is... it's something we can hope to see down the road! -RD, 9/2


While the news has been mostly buzzing about Google's new Chrome browser, they've also released a new feature to their Picasa product: Face Detection.

The general idea is that the software learns your friends and family after you've tagged a few of them. As you import more and more photographs (or scan your existing library), Google Picasa will tag each with the appropriate handle

...that is, as long as it guesses correctly.

I want this feature in my Lightroom workflow!
What I'd like to try is to let Picasa take a pass at some of my images and attempt to tag out my various faces with names. However, the last thing I want to do is compromise the integrity of my existing keywords and metadata that Lightroom, et. al. have so tirelessly built up.

If I get some spare time, I'd like to test out some different workflow integration options: Do we only run Picasa on newly-imported photos (as we must with the GeoSetter software)? Can it be run at any time in the workflow? Will all of the tags marry up together or will we see some ugly conflicts? Any way to make it more-or-less automatic?

If I could turn Picasa loose on my files & be confident that it's not going to hose me then I'd be more apt to use it. Even better is if I don't need to handhold it - simply script it as a plugin or something to that effect. Clearly you'll have to interact with the Picasa software a bit to correct the recognition, but as it learns your subjects it should become less and less needy.

Just some thoughts on how to make use of a really neat feature until an equivalent finds its way into Lightroom in some way, shape, or form. If you beat me to it, please post about your experience in the comments section! ...Perhaps Jeffrey Friedl will find a way.


BTW - I've recommended Picasa to several people as the best software to use to manage their digital photographs. It isn't quite Lightroom of course, but it has some suprisingly powerful features and is great at what it does. Check it out.