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By early 2006, digital units had taken a 92 percent share of the camera market, and it seems very likely that with an a couple more years the only people still buying film cameras will be high-end professional photographers. And why not? I'm a photography buff from way back, and I love my film cameras, but I very rarely use them anymore. I've had the same roll of film in my Olympus OM 1 for two years. With a digital, you can shoot the way to your heart's content and never have to pay a penny for film or photo processing, plus you get instant gratification, and have the digital equivalent of a full darkroom setup in your computer and photo-quality color printer, allowing you a full range of photo cropping, retouching, enhancement, manipulation, and enlargement tools at your fingertips in the comfort of your computer workstation without having to breath chemical fumes, mess about with liquids, or work in the dark.
Digital models now match film cameras for quality in practical terms, at least for enlargement sizes the most users care about. With digital cameras you get instant results and can shoot as many photos as you have a digital media to store them, which is great, until it comes to organizing and displaying all those shots. Yikes!
That's where one of the cornerstone applications in Apple's iLife suite comes in. Every new Mac and copy of OS X that has shipped since January, 2002 has come bundled with an application called iPhoto, which Steve Jobs unveiled at Macworld Expo San Francisco that year. Hard to imagine that it was only a little more than four years ago.
iPhoto has no pretensions of challenging the digital image editing software colossus Adobe Photoshop, or even the "lite" Photoshop Elements 4 consumer-oriented program, but it is ideal for its intended user base - consumers who want a tool to help them manage their digital photo collections with a minimum of hassle and learning curve climbing.
That's not to say that iPhoto is not a powerful program - it is. There are a wide range of tools and shortcuts for editing and enhancing your digital photos Including some powerful new ones in iPhoto 6, plus database and photo-presentation features to help you keep your digital photos organized and display them to their best effect.
iPhoto 6, the fifth and latest iteration (there was no iPhoto 3) of Apple's photo management, editing, and display software is substantially improved over its predecessors, a significant upgrade of the program, particularly in the speed department, with faster start-up, quitting, and scrolling - all areas were previous versions were, well, a bit sluggish. It can now handle 250,000 photos (better have a really big hard drive!), and they no longer have to be imported into iPhoto's own library.
Book, calendar, postcard, and greeting card ordering support has been enhanced and expanded, and you can now edit photos iPhoto 6 in a full screen, edge-to-edge mode with floating palettes for editing tools. There is new "publish and subscribe" support, new floating palettes for special effects like sepia-toning, enhanced slide show features, ROW file import for more camera models, and a user interface that mercifully dispenses with brushed metal.
That's great, but unfortunately, as with most computer software (and hardware) these days, iPhoto 6 comes with a very sparse documentation, is essentially consisting of the mediocre and frustrating on-screen "Help" feature. I think back fondly to the eight bound manuals that came with Microsoft Word 5.1, or perhaps more topically to the excellent manuals Apple used to ship with MacPaint, HyperCard, and MacWrite, etc. However, that's what O'Reilly's "Missing Manuals" series is all about, and even as a reasonably seasoned Mac-veteran, I simply can't imagine how Mac-using folks get along without these books.
The subject of this review, iPhoto 6: The Missing Manual is IMHO, one of the finest books in the series, although my personal interest in digital photography may color my perspective somewhat. Nominally "the book that should have been in the box," iPhoto 6: TMM is a lot more than a surrogate users-manual for iPhoto 6, although it is certainly that. Authors David Pogue (who originally conceived the "Missing Manuals" series) and O'Reilly's in-house digital photography guru Derrick Story will need no introduction to many readers, but here are brief bios:
New York Times computer columnist, former columnist for Macworld magazine, and author/co-author of more than 38 computer books, including 17 in the "Missing Manuals" series and six "For Dummies", editions (including Opera For Dummies and Classical Music For Dummies -- David Pogue is also a former Broadway conductor, magician, and professional pianist).
Derrick Story is former managing editor of the O'Reilly network and creator of the MacDevCenter for O'Reilly and Associates, as well as being manager of his own commercial photography business, Story Photography, a frequent contributor to Macworld magazine, and speaker at Macworld Expo. Story is also the author of the Digital Photography Pocket Guide.
"Don't let the rumors fool you, say the authors, "iPhoto may be simple, but it isn't simplistic. It offers a wide range of tools, shortcuts, and database-like features; a complete arsenal of photo-presentation features; and sophisticated multimedia and Internet hooks. Unfortunately, many of the best techniques aren't covered in the only "manual" you get with iPhoto - its slow, sparse, electronic help screens." Ergo, the need for this book.
Compared with the last edition of the book I reviewed, iPhoto 5: TMM, the iPhoto 6 version has grown in size by only about 7 pages, but is about 20% thicker in dimension. As with the previous edition, all the screen shots, photos, aside bars, and page margins are in full color, which dresses up any book, but is particularly desirable an appropriate in a book about photography. The downside is that the photo reproduction quality on the new thicker (and cheaper?) paper stock is not as good as before, being completely matte with no gloss effect. Happily, the price has held at a relatively modest $29.99.
iPhoto 6: The Missing Manual is structured in four major sections, plus a three appendices and of course an index.
Part One, "Digital Cameras," is a concise but thorough tutorial in basic digital photography techniques that walks neophytes through a general overview; buying a digital camera; what resolution to shoot for (so to speak); memory capacity and storage card formats; battery types (look for units that can accept conventional AA cells); lens quality and features (e.g.: zoom), the dreaded shutter lag; movie mode; price of course; composition; sports and action photography; portraiture; theater, underwater, travel, outdoor, wedding, still life, like light, and nature photography; using flash; and even -- yes -- cameraphone photography.
Part Two: "iPhoto Basics," gets down to the main business of this book: The iPhoto 6 application and use of its four central functions:
Import
Organize
Edit
Book creation
If you're still using iPhoto 1 or 2, note that since the release of iPhoto 4 two years ago the program is no longer a free download, but is only available as a component of Apple's $50 iLife suite, with the OS X operating system, or in the software bundle that ships with new Macs. iPhoto versions 4 through 6 also use a different file format from their predecessors, so iPhoto files from earlier versions, if any, will have to undergo a (automated) conversion process.
iPhoto Basics is organized into three chapters: Chapter 4, "Camera Meets Mac" walks you is through the basics of how to get iPhoto 6 if it didn't come already installed on your Mac (January, 2006, and later), system requirements and installation/setup details. The chapter also covers getting your photos into iPhoto 6, a discussion on file formats, how to store and organize your photos in iPhoto, and basic slide shows. Chapter 5 "The Digital Shoebox" picks up the thread and deals with photo organization in much greater detail, working with your photos, organizing albums, using the calendar, searching for photos, then much more.
Chapter 6, "Editing Your Shots" tells you how to enhance and improve your photos using iPhoto 6's editing tools and features. with cropping, digital retouching, eliminating red-eye, black-and-white and sepia-toning, and so forth. The authors note that with iPhoto 6's "Adjust" set tools and RAW file support, there is now a lot less reason to invest in a dedicated image getting program like Photoshop, although they cite some reasons why you still might want to. "I think many amateur photographers are going to start experimenting with RAW files now that iPhoto 6 supports these formats," says Story. "We've covered RAW editing in this book, and using our guide and iPhoto 6 is a great way your feet wet with RAW."
Part Three: "Meet Your Public" is about sharing your finished photographs in various ways, such as in electronic slide shows, in hard copy prints, on the Internet via email or Web pages; on CDs or DVDs, or in a gift book, calendar, postcards, or custom greeting cards.
There are six chapters in this section. Chapter 7, "The iPhoto Slide Show" walks you through the various nuances of its titular subject, the fans and outs of creating and showing slide shows using I photo, including the "Ken Burns effect" feature that has been borrowed from Apple's companion iMovie application, as well as a tutorial on burning to slide shows to DVD.
Chapter 8, "Making Prints" is a tutorial on printing photos from iPhoto and saving them as media files. Chapter 9, "iWeb, Photocasting, & Network Sharing" explains how to email photos, publish photos on the Web, make .Mac slide shows using Apple's online service, and photo sharing across networks and across accounts.
"Books, Calendars & Cards" is the topic of Chapter 10, which details using iPhoto's "Book" function, which lets you design and order over the Internet a linen-covered, 9 in. x 11 in. hardbound book in a classy slipcover containing 10 pages of your photos. Given the hefty cost of these books, it's something you will want to do right the first time, and this chapter could in itself be worth the cost of iPhoto 6: TMM. New to iPhoto 6 is support for custom calendar, postcard, and greeting card ordering as well.
Chapter 11, "iPhoto Goes To The Movies," is all about adding background and incidental music to your slide shows and converting them into stand-alone QuickTime movies that can play just as happily on PC boxes as they do on Macs.
Chapter 12, DVD Slideshows, is for users with DVD-burning optical drives and Apple's iDVD DVD-creation software (like iPhoto, part of Apple's iLife software suite). The chapter covers the basics of how to import your photos from iPhoto to live DVD, and then customize, preview, and burn them to disk.
Part Four: "iPhoto Stunts" contains two chapters. Chapter 13, "Screen Savers, AppleScript, and Automator" shows you how to create a custom screensaver using your photos; one-click Desktop backdrops; exporting and converting photos; use plug-ins and add-ons; employing AppleScript tricks; and Automator tricks.
Chapter 14, "iPhoto File Management" is a summary chapter on managing and storing large archives of photographs as iPhoto CDs; iPhoto backups; Managing iPhoto libraries; and moving beyond iPhoto into professional digital asset management software.
There is also a Part Five containing three appendices, on "Troubleshooting;" "iPhoto 6, Menu By Menu"; and "Where To Go From Here" which contains a collection of resource suggestions for further reference and or study. There is also a nine page Index.
The book is designed and formated in the "Missing Manual" motif which will be familiar to anyone who has used any of these books in this increasingly prolific series. Screenshot illustration is profuse, and there are many, many sidebars amplifying points in the main text where appropriate. As noted above, presumably to keep costs down and in deference to the ephemeral reality of computer software books, the paper stock is definitely not coffee table book quality, and nowhere near photo-reproduction glossy. However, the book design is very attractive with rich-looking ivory-color page margins, blue chapter titles, page labels, and sidebar boxes, as well as highly readable, easy on the eyes on both counts, although not quite as arrestingly pretty as the previous edition There is no bundled CD - a 90s computer book convention that seems to be fading away, but every piece of shareware discussed in the text is available on the http://www.missingmanuals.com Website. Click the "Missing CD" icon.
As usual, and David Pogue's prose is a witty and mischievously humorous, while Derrick Story's depth of technical expertise shines through in the details.
Just as if you are serious about getting the best out of OSX you need Pogue's "Mac OS X: The Missing Manual" - if you're serious about getting the best out of iPhoto 6 you really need this book. At 395 pages of solid and useful information, it's something of a bargain. You won't be disappointed.
iPhoto 6: The Missing Manual
By David Pogue, Derrick Story
First Edition March 2006
Pages: 408
Price: $29.99 USD, $41.99 CAD, Ă‚ÂŁ20.99 GBP
For more information, visit:
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/iphotomm/
Charles W. Moore
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