Series

A series is a run of photos taken close together that show the same scene: a burst, or several attempts at the same shot. Picturesque finds series automatically, so you can compare their photos and keep the best.

How series are found

Photos are taken in capture order. A photo joins the current series when both are true:

  • it was taken at most 30 seconds after the previous photo, and

  • it looks like one of the series’ last three photos: their perceptual hashes differ by at most 16 bits (Visual similarity), or, once the CLIP model has analyzed them, their image embeddings are at least 0.87 similar (Image embeddings). Embeddings recognize zoomed-in and reframed retakes that hashes miss (spikes/series/results.md).

Otherwise it starts a new series. A single odd frame (someone walking through the shot) stays in the series when the next photo looks like the series again. A series has at least two photos; photos without a capture date are never in a series.

Until a photo has been analyzed, it is grouped by time alone. Series are updated in the background as analysis progresses and after each import (Background analysis).

Adjusting the thresholds

In Settings → Series, set the longest pause between shots and the similarity limit (series). Series are regrouped as soon as you save.

The best photo

Each series has a best photo, ranked from the technical scores (Quality scores) and, once the AI models have run, the aesthetic score and faces (Local AI):

score = (wₛ · sharpness + wₑ · exposure + wₙ · low noise + wₐ · aesthetic)
        / (wₛ + wₑ + wₙ + wₐ)
score × 0.5 when someone important has closed eyes

  • Sharpness is relative to the sharpest photo of the series: 1 for the sharpest, 0.25 less for each halving of detail. In a burst every frame may be “sharp”; the crispest one still wins. With faces, the face’s sharpness relative to the sharpest face of the series counts as much as the whole photo’s, so the frame where the face is in focus wins.

  • The aesthetic term counts only for photos the CLIP model has analyzed (Aesthetic score).

  • Closed eyes of the largest face, or of any face at least half its size, halve the score: a sharp blink loses to a slightly softer frame with open eyes (Faces and closed eyes).

  • The weights default to 0.6 (sharpness), 0.3 (exposure), 0.1 (noise) and 0.4 (aesthetic) and can be changed in Settings → Series (ranking). Only their ratios matter; an aesthetic weight of 0 ranks by technical scores alone.

  • Rejected photos rank last, and photos not analyzed yet just before them.

  • Ties go to the earlier photo, so the ranking never changes by itself.

Whether this matches your own choices can be measured on a shoot of yours with spikes/ranking/README.md.

You can choose the best photo yourself. Your choice wins over the ranking and is kept when photos are re-analyzed; if a series contains several photos you chose (after joining series), the latest choice wins. Withdrawing a choice returns the series to the ranking. The best photo is recomputed when scores arrive, when you reject a photo and when the weights change.

Combined score

Every photo also gets a combined score (0–1) for comparing photos across the library: the technical overall score, scaled by the face’s sharpness when there are faces, averaged with the aesthetic score when there is one, and halved for closed eyes. The loupe shows it as Score, and Best quality first sorts by it.

Correcting series

When the automatic grouping is wrong, mark a photo:

  • Split: the photo starts a new series.

  • Join: the photo belongs to the series of the photo before it, even if it was taken later or looks different.

Corrections are saved per photo and applied every time series are recomputed, so they survive re-analysis, new imports and threshold changes. Removing a correction returns that photo to automatic grouping.

In the Library, select a photo and press S to split before it or J to join it to the photo taken before it; pressing the same key again removes the correction (Keyboard Shortcuts).

Series in the grid

In the Library timeline:

  • The photos of a series sit inside a frame. When a series continues on the next row, the frame’s edge there is dashed and open.

  • The best photo has a green border and a ★ badge. Rejected photos stay dimmed.

  • Press C to compare the photos of the selected photo’s series side by side, best first (Compare).

  • Press B to make the selected photo (or the photo in the loupe) the best of its series; press it again on that photo to withdraw the choice (Keyboard Shortcuts).

  • Stack series (above the timeline) shows each series as its best photo, with a ⧉ n button giving the series’ size. Click it to show all photos of that series; click − on its best photo to stack it again. Stacking works with filters: a stacked series shows its best-placed photo among those matching the filters. Whether series are stacked is kept for the session.

The grid updates by itself whenever series or their best photos change: during analysis (at least every five seconds while photos are being analyzed), after imports, culling and corrections.