Google Image Swirl from Google Labs launched

Google Image Swirl released on Google Labs today, the latest search adventure by the search giant. Google Image Swirl is a modification of Google Image Search, which is running for the last eight years.

What exactly is Google Image Swirl?

Take an example: You want to search for Mahatma Gandhi on Google Image Swirl. Start typing, and the text attempts to auto-complete. When you click on search in Google Image Swirl, you get sets of pictures, like in a stack. Each stack is a different set of pictures related to Mahatma Gandhi. The first set of Google Image swirl search results could be of Mahatma Gandhi himself, the second set could be of Mahatma Gandhi University, the third of Mahatma Gandhi Road and so on. So, by grouping this way, Google Image Swirl helps you home in the most relevant results, grouped together.

Clicked on any of the “stack”, and it springs forth with a set of related search results ‘radiating’ around it. (See pictures). If you click on the central image, it opens the searched image in a new window. If you click on one of the ‘satellite’ images, it throws up another Swirl, showing more related images.

Google Image Swirl interactive interface

If you “hover” over the images with the mouse cursor, you can see the dimensions of the picture. A link to the website where the image is hosted also appears. Users can refine search to locate images more relevant for them by moving to the sub-clusters.

Being a Google Labs project, the future of Google Image Swirl cannot be predicted for sure. Some Google Labs projects die a slow death, while some others make it to the full product suit of Google. Google Image Swirl did not appeal us very much; but perhaps as I use it more, we might like it better. We reserve my judgment for now.

Google said in its official blog that the features of Google Image Swirl draws from similar features in Picasa’s Face recognition algorithms and the “Similar Images” feature of Google Image Search. “Each thumbnail on the initial results page represents an algorithmically-determined representative group of images with similar appearance and meaning. These aren’t just the most relevant images — they are the most relevant groups of images,” Google said.

Google Image Swirl is currently available for about 200,000 queries, said Google. In the future, Google Image Swirl will have more search query keywords added to its database, Google added.

In some ways, the Google Image Swirl resembles the Google Wonder Wheel which is already running for a while in Google Labs. The launch of Google Image Swirl comes on the same day of reports that Microsoft’s new search engine Bing has gained nearly 10% of the market share.