Sunday, August 16, 2015

Turn Your TV Into a Giant Digital Picture Frame



I recently discovered that I could turn my TV into a giant digital picture frame using Google Chromecast. If you have a photographer in the family, this would make a great birthday or Christmas gift. Google Chromecast is currently $34.99 on Amazon.

Here are the basic steps:
1. Plug Chromecast into your HDTV.
2. Connect Chromecast to your wifi.
3. Using your computer, phone, or tablet, send YouTube videos and movies to your TV.
4. When you stop Chromecasting, you will get default pictures. Chromecast calls this wallpaper.
5. Create a photo album on your PC that contains the pictures you want to send to Chromecast.
6. It's best to crop the photos to 16X9 so that they match the aspect ratio of the TV.
7. Upload the photo album to Google Photos. I use Picasa from my PC, but you can use an app on your phone or tablet too.
8. Go into the Chromecast app on your phone or tablet and specify the name of the album you just uploaded. More complete details for this step are here.  
9. Enjoy!