Perhaps this highlights the main problem - no one currently buys a forty-inch screen just to look at photos. That seems pretty obvious, but if your main viewing device is your TV, then as soon as your daughter comes in to watch an episode of 'The Next Step,' or indeed 'Game of Thrones,' no more on-screen photos. Secondly, you can't watch TV and view images at the same time.

Unfortunately, both the software (poorly designed and awkward to use) and hardware (cheap, plasticky, and, crucially, not networked) got in the way. They involve a synergistic dance between hardware and software so that it does what it's meant to do (display photos) without getting in the way. I followed that viewer up with a seven-inch Kodak frame and while it was bigger, it made you realize that digital albums were more than just pixels. Yes, the resolution was also low at only 1 MP, and the color reproduction only really a ballpark figure. That might have been quite a good idea for an iPod where you wanted the general gist of an album cover, but for viewing a person, they were poor, and for a group of people… well, just try recognizing an individual face from fifty-odd pixels. Actually, to be brutally honest, they were rubbish! I remember my first photo frame with a screen the size of an address label. Why is this?įirstly, the hardware wasn't up to scratch, with the displays not particularly good. But the curation of virtual photo albums for display in the living room? That appears to be sadly absent.

Of course, large forty-inch digital displays are now mainstream, and you'll find them in many homes. Photos and information were the items of choice, so it's a short step to a curated slideshow of your own images (although curiously, we never see Marty shoot stills, only video). Of course, the reality of Lyon Estates in 2015 was a little different, but the direction of travel of digital displays was clear. It's Back to the Future 2 and Marty McFly - the future Marty McFly - walks into his lounge where large display screens show an idyllic rural scene.

How to buy a digital photo frame