A desktop computer needs a way to display images that you have saved to your hard drive. These days, your computer also needs a way to interact with the webcam that probably sits right above the screen. GNOME has long shipped apps that performed both of these tasks, but with the release of version 45, two new apps take their places.
In traditional GNOME fashion, neither the Loupe image viewer nor GNOME Camera is particularly complicated, but both are slightly different from what came before. Here’s the rundown.
GNOME 45’s New Image Viewer
The newer image viewer is known as Loupe. The name refers to a type of lens or magnifying glass that you may see a jewelry, dentist, or (yes) photographer use to see things up close. It replaces Eye of GNOME, which served as the default way to open images since GNOME’s early days.
Eye of GNOME was not heavy on features and never intended to compete withLinux’s full-blown photo gallery apps. Loupe continues in that tradition.
You can view images in Loupe either by clicking them within the Files app or by dragging and dropping them into the Loupe window. You can switch between images saved to the same folder by clicking the forward and back arrows in the bottom left. You can also zoom in on images or view them fullscreen.
As for editing images, you’ll need to look elsewhere. Loupe allows you to rotate a picture, but even the ability to crop is not present. You may want to consider installing gThumb fromFlathubinstead if you want a GNOME app with more editing chops.
Lastly, you can copy images or delete them. You can also set them as a desktop wallpaper. At launch, that’s all for the features.
Like Eye of GNOME before it, if you seek to look for Loupe in your app drawer, you will likely see it listed as “Image Viewer.”
A Single App for Webcams and Smartphone Cameras
Next is GNOME Camera. This app is immediately intuitive if you’ve ever taken a picture with a smartphone and likely easy to grasp even if you haven’t. There’s a shutter button in the center that you tap to take a photo. In the bottom left, you find the option to set a countdown timer in increments of three, five, or 10 seconds.
As far as app preferences are concerned, you can toggle the shutter sound on or off, and you can use a grid to help you compose a shot.
GNOME Camera can record video as well. The controls and options are the same. But when you switch to video mode, the shutter button goes from white to red.
GNOME Camera’s controls handle the basic tasks of a webcam. They also tackle the fundamental needs of a smartphone camera. So if youdaily drive a Linux phone like the Librem 5, this camera app is one to watch. It’s fully adaptive in the way that most GNOME apps aspire to be.
GNOME may have chosen new defaults, but the previous go-to image viewer and camera app haven’t gone away. If you prefer Eye of GNOME, though the functionality is largely the same, you can find it using GNOME Software or any command-line-based package manager of choice.
The same is true for Cheese, which is an alternative you may have greater reason to seek out. That’s because Cheese comes with various filters to play around with or use to artistic effect. There’s also a burst mode for taking photos in rapid succession. you may download Cheese fromFlathub.
GNOME 45 Continues the Trend of New Default Apps
One of GNOME’s core values is to keep things simple, and each release refines different aspects of the experience. Part of that means swapping out older, slightly more complicated apps for paired-down, easier-to-maintain alternatives.
GNOME 42 saw the text editor and terminal replaced. With the addition of Loupe and GNOME Camera, that marks four new core apps in under two years.
