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

You can just come to listen or if you want to actually do stuff:

• Don’t wear green, it will turn into a puka in a green screen image.
• Bring images of a landscape or anything that would make a good background and other personal photos on a CD or thumbdrive, things that would be great on a card or calendar.
• If you have a laptop with iPhoto ’09, bring it.  Have some text to paste into a Christmas newsletter on your computer if you wish.  If you don’t have iWork ’09 download and install a free trial version of iWork ’09 before Saturday.  It works on Tiger, Leopard and Snow Leopard.

Location:  ING Direct Cafe 1958 Kalakaua Avenue 2nd floor conference room.  For directions and parking please go to http://www.hmaus.org/meetings-workshops/maclearn/

Registration:  To register (for a headcount for handouts) please complete the MacLearn form at http://www.hmaus.org/meetings-workshops/maclearn/maclearn- registration/ and add “Package that Picture” in the message box.  Ignore the payment screen that may popup.    Free. Sorry, no hosted coffee this time, but feel free to purchase a beverage at the coffee bar before coming up.

Hope to see you!

iMovie and iDVD 09 Hands-on Workshop September 5, 2009

Joe Zaret, Apple Solutions Consultant from Best Buy Iwilei presented iMovie and iDVD.  He began with a bonus Snow Leopard sneak preview.  Then he demonstrated how you can select movie clips, add transitions, create titles and rolling credits and add music with drag and drop ease.  You can send your movie to iDVD to create a one click DVD or use one of many templates to easily add a menu, music and graphics.

iPhoto 09 Hands-on Workshop September 12, 2009

Gregg Kamei, one of our skilled and patient HMAUS members presented iPhoto. Participants created albums, edited photos with a palette full of tools, created slideshows, and added titles and keywords to images.  If you store your photos in iPhoto you can easily grab them from any other iApp.

iWork 09 Presentation September 26, 2009

Colin Murphy, Apple Solutions Consultant from Best Buy, Aiea presented iWork, Apple’s productivity suite of Pages, Numbers and Keynote.  The interface is consistent across all three products, making it easy to know where to look for things.  Controls for customizing text, objects and animations are tucked neatly into 10 Inspector palettes.  Seven of the 10 Inspectors are the same in all three programs.    You learn one, and the others are easy to navigate and use. Colin gave away a copy of iWork ’09 to lucky Dorothy Hallet and Everett Young won a copy of Snow Leopard which he already had. He donated it to the upcoming Mactoberfest on October 24, 2009!

Pages 09 Hands-on Workshop October 3, 2009

Colin Murphy presented a second great workshop, this time a hands-on Pages session.  Participants used one of Pages’ 44 templates to type or drag images into.  They learned to easily put a border or picture frame around an image, make columns, and create charts and tables.  Pages can open, save to and email files in Microsoft Office Word format.

Mahalo to Joe, Gregg and Colin for taking the time to prepare and present these excellent session! Thanks also to those of you who took the time to join us, and to our photographer Norm Hallett.

Here are Dwayne and Ellen Dorschu, Susan Saka, Junie Hayashi,  Lisa Oi, Cliff Young and Barbara Lusch at Gregg’s iPhoto workshop.  Kimo Sutton, Everett Young and Mike Brein are involved in Colin’s Pages workshop.

Handouts for these products can be downloaded from http://drop.io/hmaus_maclearn.  We recommend you print from the PDF file rather than directly from this website. These handouts link to Apple’s iLife and iWork video tutorials.

Watch the hmaus.org site for more HMAUS events!

Corny yes, but interesting!  Join us on September 26th for our next MacLearn session. Colin Murphy, Apple Solutions Consultant from Best Buy Pearl City is going to demonstrate iWork – a Mac only suite of three programs rivals Microsoft Office for $54 – $79!

Pages is a full featured word processing program with templates, image editing features that go way way beyond lighten, darken and sharpen, and tables that add columns and rows and as you resize.  It integrates seamlessly with Numbers, the spreadsheet program with drag and drop tables, charts, graphics and text.  Completing the trio is Keynote, which has amazing transitions and a clean, professional look you will want representing you, your family or your organization.

Curious? Come join us from 10 am – 12 pm on September 26^th at ING Direct Café at 1958 Kalakaua Avenue.  Please park in the Niu St. employee lot if you can, otherwise behind the Café is fine.   If it’s your first time please check the driving/parking directions.   Free.  We will provide ice water and coffee so come a little early and talk story and get a good seat.

volunteervolunteer

ING Direct Cafe is at 1958 Kalakaua Avenue.  Parking is available but please follow the directions at this link.

Did you know that Apple has a wordprocessing, spreadsheet and presentation suite called iWork?  Did you know it’s a fraction of the cost of Microsoft Office and can open Office files? Colin Murphy, long time Apple Solutions Consultant from Best Buy Pearl City will show you what these three products can do at our September 26th MacLearn from 10 am -12 pm.

Pages is a wordprocessor and a desktop publisher with templates for newsletters, flyers and cards.  Numbers has many auto features that make creating a spreadsheet easy and good looking.

The Magic Move transition feature in Keynote ’09 moves objects seamlessly from one slide to the next.   I’ve heard people say “Keynote?  It’s like Powerpoint…..but better!”  All iWork products have a similar interface making them easy to learn, and they integrate with iPhoto, iTunes and iMovie.  Are there things Office can do that iWork cannot? Yes.  Will they make a difference to you?  Possibly not.

Come to ING Direct Cafe at 1958 Kalakaua Avenue for this free presentation.  Come early so you can get parking and pour yourself a cup of coffee or ice tea.

Parking is available but a little tricky so PLEASE check these driving and parking instructions first.  Please use the employee lot on Niu St. unless there are lots of spaces behind the Cafe off Pau St.  Mahalo.

Btw, if you’re thinking of buying iWork ’09, now’s a good time – it’s $49 at Amazon.com with free shipping.  The only place matching that price is the UH Bookstore.   It’s also available at Best Buy for $79 with shopping points that convert to discounts.  It requires System 10.4 or higher.

Download the PDF (8.9MB)