Complex file operations are not really supported by the default file browser in Windows. Windows Explorer does not come with the means for instance to copy or move a specific file type or files with a specific name pattern effectively.
One example would be to copy all photos from a folder and all of its subfolders into another directory. Most Windows users will probably access each folder individually to copy the photos from there into the target folder.
It is not that big of a problem if all photos reside in the same folder, but once subfolders are involved, it is quite time consuming to do so.
There is however a way to make those file operations more effectively. And that is done by using the Windows Explorer search. The search is powerful enough to speed up some file operations.
Note that this has been tested under Windows 7. Search in other versions of Windows may not offer the same functionality.
This can be largely attributed to the fact that the search will only find files and folders that match the search term if they reside in the folder the search was started or a subfolder of it.
To find all photos with the jpg extension one would simply search for jpg in the search form after the root folder has been selected.
Windows will then list all files that match the keyword jpg. This can mean that some files are added to the search results that are not jpg images, for example a file called photojpg.exe would also be included in the list. But that is not a problem as that search results can be sorted by file type or name easily.
All or only selected files that have been found this way can be copied or moved easily to another location. The easiest way to do so is to hit Ctrl-A to select them all, but that works only if there are not any collateral files displayed here that you may not want to move.
If that is the case you can either Ctrl-click on any file you want to move, or use the sorting option to sort by file extension, date or other characteristics before you select and move the files you want to copy or move.