Google Adds Swirl to Image Search

Google has introduced an image search feature called Swirl into its experimental “Google Labs”.

Swirl builds on Google’s “similar images” feature and adds the Wonder Wheel query refinement interface. The result is that Swirl allows you to visually explore clusters of related images.

Google says:

Image Swirl expands on technologies developed for Similar Images and Picasa Face Recognition to discern how images should be grouped together and build hierarchies out of these groups. 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.

At the moment Google Image Swirl is still in the experimental phase so it “only” supports around 200,000 of the most popular image search queries.

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