November 21st was a sampler day for MacLearn. Norman and Dorothy Hallett, Robbie Gee, Joan Larcom, Marcy Katz, Richard Sato, Lorie Goodman and Terrence Young had fun with all kinds of great apps for making things with images.
Terrence first shot a clip of each person in front of ING Direct’s green wall using the video feature of his regular Canon camera. The clips were brought into iMovie using the green screen effect and voila! folks were transported to Branson, the grandchildren’s house, Chicago or Europe.
Next was Photo Booth. Lorie took a video ride on a moving roller coaster and others tried the 4-up, sepia tone and miscellaneous effects. The computer’s built-in camera captured a still or a video clip which could be sent to iPhoto with one click.
iPhoto cards and calendars came next. One or more photos were selected in iPhoto. Then the Keepsake Card, Album or Calendar button was clicked. That opened a list of templates to choose from. The photos were then dragged into the image placeholders. Background colors, text fonts and layouts were changed in an instant. Some templates had text placeholders for a short letter.
However, printing was an issue since Apple intends you to buy prints through them. Right-clicking on the project anywhere in the white space between the text and image placeholder boxes allowed the project to be saved as a PDF. Cards print beautifully on greeting card blanks you can buy from Ben Franklin and other craft stores. Commercial printing services will probably give you the best price and quality if you need more than a few items. Marcy shared a 5 x 7 photobook she made of her grandchildren made by one of these services. The session handout has links to several such services – many have specials for the holidays.
But wait, there was more. Although the Internet connection stalled on us and we were unable to do Picnik for online photo editing, it was discussed. Picnik is free and goes beyond iPhoto’s editing abilities. It includes many text effects, clip art, photo frames and allows you to save in multiple formats and sizes. It’s very easy to use and Picnik video tutorials are available. Another free online site, Smilebox, is a Mac friendly e-card service for creating drag and drop cards that can include video clips as well as still images. Even kids can do it.
iWork Pages was next and folks dragged and dropped text and images into placeholders in one of the many templates. Free clip art easily embellishes the holiday newsletter. The Packaging Pictures handout is available at driop.io/hmaus_maclearn and includes links to two free holiday clip art sites. You can use the instant alpha tool in Pages for removing the white background on these images.
Mahalo to Norman for his egg nog creation – Terrence said we could use his picture, oh wait, he said don’t tell anyone who it is! Don’t tell him I told you. There were so many choices for creating fun, beautiful, lasting gifts. If you missed it, don’t worry. The apps are easy to use, the Apple video tutorials are excellent and the session handout can be downloaded and printed. Give it a try!
P.S. Just came across a MacWorld “Holiday newsletters with iWeb 09″ post. Here’s one more idea! http://www.macworld.com/article/143860/2009/11/newsiweb.html?lsrc=nl_mwweek_h_cbstories
Posted under MacLearn
This post was written by jomats on November 30, 2009
