Transfer of Photos

I have an iPhone 7 and am trying to transfer all of my photos onto my laptop which has Windows 10. At the moment it is proving impossible. I have made sure that I have the most up to date version of iTunes, I am using a genuine Apple data transfer wire, I have watched all sorts of videos on YouTube and followed everything anyone has to say but, still, I cannot get my photos to transfer! Sometimes a few will transfer across but then I get an error message saying that my laptop is not recognising my iPhone. It is so frustrating as I desperately need to free up space on my phone. Can anyone out there help me please.