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Aperture 101: Importing Photos
The first step in any digital photography workflow is getting the frames into your editing program — well, I guess the true first step is the capture itself, but you get my drift. Aperture is my editing program of choice for two reasons: Through the Mac App Store it’s only $79.99, as opposed to Adobe Lightroom ($299), and my familiarity with iPhoto lessened the learning curve a little. Here’s how to manage your photo importing using Aperture.

Step 1: The Preferences Panel

After opening Aperture’s Preferences window and choosing the Import tab, you can adjust a few rudimentary options. The biggest decision you will have to make is whether Aperture will open when a camera is connected. If you do not use an iOS device in addition to your digital camera this can be an easy choice: set it to open Aperture. Your decision can get a little complicated if you do use an iOS device. OS X detects iOS devices as cameras, so every time you sync your device, Aperture will also load. This can get annoying, so I load Aperture manually when I plug in my camera (or SD card).

The Default Import Location allows you to choose between a New Project or another selected location in Aperture. I’ll get into this a little deeper in later, but in my case I’ve accepted the defaults here.

Autosplit into Projects lets you adjust the time frame on how Aperture auto-creates projects (One project per day, One project per week, Two-hour, or eight hour gaps). This is going to depend on your shooting style. If a day-long shoot for you constitutes true event or project, like a wedding shoot, you’ll be well served with One Project per Day. On the other hand, if you shoot a lot of little things all week but wouldn’t call it an event, you can set it to “One project per week.” I fall into that category, so that’s the setting I choose.

Step 2: Importing Photos

Once Aperture has loaded, click the Import button at the top of the screen. This will bring up the Import window. By default, all images on the camera are checked for import. If you don’t want that, simply click Uncheck All and you can select what ones you do in fact want to import.

By default, Aperture wants to import the photos into a new, Untitled project. By clicking in the field next to Project Name you can change the name of the newly-created project. Also, if you click an existing project in the left pane the photos will be imported there.

Again, what projects you import to will depend greatly on your shooting style. If I’m shooting a true event, like a concert or show, where I’ll have an empty SD card at the start of the shoot, I’ll create a project based on that shoot (the band name and date of the event). However, most of my shoots tend to be onesey-twosey shoots, or nothing that coherently falls together in a project of any stretch. For those, I have a generic dumping ground project called Imports where I put the shots while I sort through them.

There’s no hard and fast rule on assigning projects, and your method will change over time. The good news is, assigning photos to a project isn’t a one-time affair. If you’re not happy with where a photo is assigned, you can just drag it to a new project.

Step 3: Cleaning Up and Taking Out the Trash

Arguably the most important part of the import is accepting that not all your photos are fantastic shots. It’s important during the import to give your capture a critical eye and unless there’s a good reason to keep it, trash it. Don’t litter your library with substandard shots if you can help it. That said, sometimes the only shot of a memorable event is a poor shot, in which case a bad photo is sometimes better than none, but try and take a critical eye to your art.

Another good habit to get into when you import photos is to geotag them as well as assign keyword. If your camera doesn’t have a GPS, and you have an iPhone, you can use your iPhone to geotag the photo. Just take one photo on site with your iPhone and in Aperture, go to Places, and then choose “Import GPS from iPhone Photos” from the GPS button.

Keywording is one of my OCD habits. I like to assign photos some common tags (Boston, Outdoors, Night,) so I can easily find them later.

That’s my basic guide to importing photos with Aperture. If you shoot RAW, or if you want to get more complicated, your process may become much more involved. If you feel like I’ve missed any major tips for new users, please include them in the comments.

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AdMob Survey Shows What the iPad is Good For
A new survey (PDF) conducted by Google-owned mobile ad company AdMob breaks down how people are using their tablets, which in most cases so far, means the iPad. The survey’s nearly 1,500 respondents revealed some interesting trends regarding tablet usage.

Gaming (84 percent), search (78 percent) and email (74 percent) led the way in terms of how users are spending their time with their tablets, and surprisingly, entertainment consumption (music and video) and reading e-books ranked among the least common activities, with only 51 percent and 46 percent respectively. Shopping online occupied the lowest percentage among specifically polled options, with only 42 percent of respondents confirming they used their tablets to buy from the internet.

While tablet users may not all be using their devices for reading e-books, they still spend more time on average with their iPads than they do reading paper books. And the survey found that nearly half (43 percent) of those surveyed now spend more time with their tablet than they do with their desktop or notebook computer, and 77 percent spend less time on their notebooks or desktops than they did before getting a tablet. That’s impressive for a device that was mostly marginal and almost non-existent in the consumer space before last year, but only 28 percent said it’s their primary computer, which lines up with a survey performed in November of last year that found the same. Even so, that number seems quite large when you consider that the iPad is still essentially a tethered device in many ways.

Even more impressive is that over a third (34 percent) of respondents indicated that they use their tablets more than they use their televisions. That’s a good indicator that the many recent attempts to bring cable and live TV programming (like the Time Warner Cable, Cablevisionand ESPN apps) to the iPad is a smart move for media companies struggling to keep audiences intact amid considerable upheaval in the way people consume media.

One final takeaway is that, as Mark Zuckerberg once claimed, the iPad does not appear to be a true mobile device in the minds of most users. Eighty-two percent of respondents said they primarily use their tablet at home, while only 11 percent said they use them most often “on the go.” The remaining 7 percent said they use the iPad mostly at work. Maybe that’s because, as my colleague Kevin Tofel is often quick to note, the iPad’s 9.7-inch form factor is not easily pocketable, and it remains a much more popular tablet than the 7-inch Samsung Galaxy Tab.

Unlike survey respondents, web browsing, social media and news consumption take up the majority of my time with the iPad, though I do agree that I use traditional computers less and primarily only use the iPad at home. Do these answers line up with your own iPad (or other tablet) experience?

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10 Things You Never Knew You Could Do On Your iPad
What is usually the first thing everyone that gets a new iPad wants to know? Which apps to get. But there are still some cool things that you can do with your iPad, even without buying a single app. I’m not talking about well-known features like Multitasking, Folders, Airplay, Airprint, or even the new HD Mirroring capability of the iPad 2. Instead, here are ten, hidden in plain sight, secret features of the iPad 2. You maybe aware of one or two, but let’s see if you knew about all ten.

Access Your iTunes Library Remotely

There are several ways you can access your media collection from your iPad. The first and easiest is to sync your library from iTunes. However, if you have enabled Home Sharing in iTunes on your Mac, you can also access your entire iTunes Library on your Mac while connected to the same Wi-Fi network. To access your Home Sharing library from the iPad you need to click on the Library tab in the iPod app. From here you select the iTunes Library you want to access (make sure you have Home Sharing turned on in iTunes on the computers you want to share from). Unfortunately it is an either/or situation. You cannot browse both your locally synced library as well as your remotely accessed library.

Capture Your Screen to Your Photo Library

This can come in handy if you want to send someone a screen shot of your latest high score, weather forecast, map directions, or preserve a crazy moment from a FaceTime chat. To take a screen shot, simply hold down both the Home and Sleep button at the same time. The screen should flash white and a shutter sound should be audible. An image of your screen will be saved to your Photo Library on the iPad. Use the Photos app on the iPad to review the screen shot you have taken.

Scroll to the Top of a Web Page

You will often find yourself reading through an article on a particular web site, and once complete, you want to get back to the top of the web page. Simply tap once on the top of the screen near the status bar and the page will automatically scroll back to the top. This works in many apps, too, like when you want to get to the top of your Twitter stream, for instance.

Find Text Anywhere On Web Page

When typing in a search term in Safari, notice the section titled “On This Page” towards the bottom of the search suggestions. Clicking on terms in this section will search only within the page. There is even a count of how many matches there are on the web page for that particular search term. By clicking on the search term in this section, a search bar will appear at the bottom of the screen with a “Next” and “Done” button. Unfortunately there is no previous button, but the search will cycle back to the first result after you click through the last available instance.

Join Wi-Fi Networks Without Asking

When roaming around town, I do not like it when my iPad asks me if I want to join some rogue network that happens to be nearby. Instead, I want my iPad to to remember and automatically join only the networks that I have specifically logged on to in the past. To accomplish this , simply switch off the “Ask to Join Networks” feature in the Wi-Fi section in the Settings App. The iPad will still automatically join any network you have joined previously, and you will still be able to manually add any new network configuration you may need moving forward.

Secret Keyboard Keys

With a virtual keyboard, each key may be more than it first appears. Simply press and hold certain keys on each keyboard and additional keys will appear. For instance, when entering a URL or email address, press and hold the .com key and you will be presented with .net, .org, .us and .edu optional keys (and other options depending on your country of residence). Press and hold any letter of the alphabet to reveal other languages variations of the same letter. This works with alternate punctuation as well. Press and hold the dash key to reveal the bullet and long dash keys. And if you are looking to enable the Emoji keyboard on the iPhone or iPad, check out the free Emoji app in the App Store.

Play Podcasts at Double Speed

As much as I like listening to Leo Laporte on TwiT, there are certainly times when I need to get through his shows a little faster as I am convinced that Leo has found some way to record more than twenty-four hours of audio in a given day. To that end, when listening to audio podcasts, you can click on the 1x and 2x buttons to speed up the audio playback to twice the speed, or slow it back down the normal speed. This only works in the iPod app, not when playing Podcasts directly from within iTunes, and not when playing podcasts from within the Remote app.

View PDFs Out Of The Box

Looking for a good app for reading PDFs on the iPad? Look no further than Apple’s own iBooks. To add PDFs to your iPad, simply connect the iPad to iTunes on your Mac and drag and drop PDFs directly from the Finder Application in OS X onto the connected iPad in iTunes on OS X. This is probably the quickest and easiest way that I have seen to get PDFs onto the iPad without having to sync or access the cloud through third party apps like iDisk, Dropbox or GoodReader. Alternatively, if you have PDF files as attachments in your e-mail, you can click and hold on the PDF which will allow you to open the PDF in iBooks. You can even use collections to manage your iBooks PDF library on the iPad.

Watch Feature Length Movies From SD Card

This feature requires the use of the iPad Camera Connection Kit and an SD Card. While you cannot play the movie files directly off of the SD card, you can import the movie files from the SD card onto the iPad and watch them in the Photos application. Make sure that you have two nested folders on the SD card labeled /DCIM/100VIDEO. Place all of your video files in this folder. Make sure that the movie format is compatible with the iPad. You may need to delete movies you have already watched, and you will not be able to see the name of the file itself in the Photos app. This is just one of seven additional features you get with iPad’s Camera Connection kit.

Enable Multitasking Gestures

When Apple released Xcode 4 to the Mac App Store, it also exposed the ability for anyone to enable the multitasking gestures on the iPad. Once enabled, you can use five fingers to swipe up and down to reveal the multitask bar, left and right to navigate through open Apps on the multitasking bar. You can also perform a five finger pinch to close the App you are in and return to the home screen. To enable multitasking gestures, you must first purchase Xcode 4 from the Mac App Store ($4.99) or simply download it from the Apple Developer Connection (ADC) if you are already a member. Then launch Xcode 4 and select the Organizer tool from the Window menu (or click Shift+Command+2). Attach the iPad to your Mac and click on the enable development button. Log on the the ADC and click through the error messages if they are presented. Finally, on the iPad go to the General setting in the Settings App and you will notice a new setting near the bottom labels “Multitasking Gestures”.

So there you have it. Ten features of the iPad that you may not have known you had before. Just because you want to do something you feel is unique on the iPad, your first recourse might not be the App Store. You may already be able to do exactly what you want with what you already have.

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Apple Rejects First App From PopCap's Edgy Label
PopCap’s recently announced indie studio 4th & Battery was aiming for edgy with its slate of games. It appears it might have been too edgy for Apple’s tastes. The label’s first game, Unpleasant Horse, has been sent packing by Apple because of mature content.

The company went public with its rejection on Twitter with a tweet that read: “WTF? Apple rejected Unpleasant Horse cuz of 'mature content?' We thought horses dying in meat grinders was wholesome family entertainment!” The tweet was later removed. Since then, the studio has taken a more upbeat approach saying it would appeal the ruling and resubmit with a higher rating. I reached out to PopCap, and a spokesperson said the company has no comment right now but may issue a statement later.

It’s unclear what age rating Unpleasant Horse was submitted under. The 4+ rating is for apps with no objectionable content while the 9+ and 12+ ratings state there can be some mild or occasionally intense cartoon, fantasy or realistic violence that is not appropriate for younger audiences. PopCap’s super popular Plants vs. Zombies, for example, is rated 9+. It could be that 4th & Battery needs to just resubmit under a higher rating, perhaps the 17+ rating, to get approval.

That might still prompt a debate about where Apple should draw the line on things like violence and issues of taste when it comes to apps. Unpleasant Horse has some violence but it’s done in a cartoony style. The game allows players to smash more well-adjusted horses and birds to the earth, where they're fed through "a perpetual meat-grinder."

Without having seen the game, it’s hard to know what rating it should deserve. But with a lot of violent and unpleasant apps already available in Apple’s mobile marketplace, it’s likely Unpleasant Horse will eventually find a home in the App Store. It’s not exactly the reception 4th & Battery might have wanted, but it shows that PopCap is indeed looking to break away from the more wholesome image of its existing brand. Or perhaps 4th & Battery intentionally set the rating for the game too low knowing it would get a little attention by being rejected. Now that would be edgy.

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Is Reading on Your iPad More Green Than Paper Books?
Many people use the iPad to replace a physical library of paper books, mostly because it’s very convenient to do so. But is it also better for the environment? A recent report considers the ecological impact of e-books in general, and specifically addresses the iPad’s impact, too.

Carbon Footprint

The report, prepared by non-profit organization the Green Press Initiative (PDF), takes into account the average lifecycle of e-reading devices, and even accounts for the general impact of the iPad (in terms of the production process used in making one) on human health when compared to that of the average book. Using Apple’s own published environmental report regarding the iPad (it’s the only e-reader / tablet maker that even publishes one), Green Press Initiative determined that an iPad is responsible for 130 kg (287 lbs) of CO2 equivalent greenhouse gas emissions over its average lifetime. The average printed book, by contrast, is responsible for only 8.85 lbs. So, an iPad owner needs only download 32.4 books instead of purchasing paper copies in order to reach the break even point when it comes to carbon footprint.

Resources and Human Health

But carbon emissions aren’t the only consideration when it comes to environmental impact. The report goes on to note that the iPad’s construction is roughly equivalent to between 40 and 50 books when it comes to fossil fuel, water and mineral consumption, and that a single e-book has 70 times the impact of a printed book on human health, owing to particulate matter resulting from energy use and the book’s production.

Known Unknowns

The report acknowledges that there are a few factors where the ultimate impact of the iPad and other e-reading devices isn’t yet known. These include energy consumption that occurs during the device’s use stage, which is obviously zero for paper books. It does point out that in some cases, even using a light while reading uses more energy than an active iPad, which uses about 3 watts when used specifically for reading e-books. Server storage energy use costs are another potential factor, but again the report stresses that this impact is likely relatively small and spread out across a large number of users.

E-waste and recycling are the biggest question marks when it comes to e-readers. Books can be recycled, but it’s not clear how many actually are. E-readers can also be recycled, but it’s a more difficult process and in some cases, recycling simply means a device handed down to less developed parts of the world for precious material recovery, with the remainder discarded in traditional landfills. This is by far the most difficult and nebulous cost to account for.

How Many Books?

In the end, the report suggests a sliding scale with ranges wherein the iPad and other e-readers might be more green than their paper counterparts. The more printed books you offset with an e-reading device, the better. At around the 30 to 70 book mark, the report estimates, is where the break-even point lies in terms of general environmental impact, and it’s between 60 and 90 titles where it starts to become better to buy e-books than paper ones. Matt Schneider, a researcher and graduate student working in digital and print culture, points out that the national average for books read per year in Canada is about 20. In the U.S., it’s is only around 9 (or 15 if you don’t include the Americans that read zero books). At these rates, it’s probably better for the environment that the general population continue to use paper books, while heavy readers move to digital formats.

The Green Press Initiative also points out, however, that since the iPad is a multi-purpose device, its environmental impact is defrayed over a number of activities, not just e-reading. Also, the impact of downloading an e-book for someone who already owns the iPad for other purposes is relatively small; so in fact it may be even more of an environmental do-gooder than even the Kindle , which has lower power requirements but is also generally a single-focus device.

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Apple Reportedly Looking to Level Up Its Gaming Story
Apple is said to be in the process of bringing on Rob Saunders and Nick Grange, two top PR execs working in the gaming industry, according to reports by UK gaming magazine MCV. Saunders just left a position as Nintendo UK’s head of PR, while Grange is currently Activision’s European PR director.

MCV doesn’t reveal its sources, and Apple hasn’t commented officially, but the gaming industry trade publication did break the news of Saunders departure earlier in the week, suggesting it has solid sources in this matter. Apple is also reportedly losing VP of Worldwide Marketing Communications Allison Johnson, according to a report from All Things Digital, so there is likely a PR gap to be filled.

If the reports are accurate, I think Apple wants to push gaming to the fore when it comes to marketing its App Stores, because this is already an area where it has a significant advantage over its competitors in the mobile space. The software library for iOS continues to be Apple’s greatest advantage when it comes to measuring the mobile platform against its competition from Google and others, and that’s an advantage that so far seems to have evolved without much active shepherding on Apple’s part (barring the “Funnest iPod Ever” campaign). If Apple puts a concentrated effort into promoting titles (gaming and otherwise) that are iOS exclusive, in the same way video game consoles have, it could help the company distinguish its mobile OS in the eyes of more consumers. Saunders and Grange know that game well, so it makes sense that Apple would be interested in bringing them on board.

Saunders has been with Nintendo UK for seven years, during which time he was crucial in the successful launches of the Wii and the DS, and established a strong relationship between the company and the mainstream media. If Apple wants to push the success of its devices as gaming platforms (games content is by far the strongest seller across the iPhone, iPad and Mac App Stores), who better to hire than a man who played a key role in the launch and ongoing success of two of gaming’s most successful hardware products ever? MCV reports that Saunders will focus on PR for iPad, iPod and iPhone apps.

Nick Grange has worked primarily on the software side. He spent time at Electronic Arts and Microsoft, and joined Activision in 2007, where he is currently the European PR director. MCV doesn’t report any specifics regarding what Grange’s role at Apple would be, but his area of expertise definitely matches the job description the magazine reported for Saunders, suggesting that Apple may be considering a significant broadening of its app promotion efforts.

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Fresh Apple

Saturday, April 9, 2011

GigaOMApple (6 сообщений)

Step 1: The Preferences Panel

Step 2: Importing Photos

Step 3: Cleaning Up and Taking Out the Trash

Access Your iTunes Library Remotely

Capture Your Screen to Your Photo Library

Scroll to the Top of a Web Page

Find Text Anywhere On Web Page

Join Wi-Fi Networks Without Asking

Secret Keyboard Keys

Play Podcasts at Double Speed

View PDFs Out Of The Box

Watch Feature Length Movies From SD Card

Enable Multitasking Gestures

Carbon Footprint

Resources and Human Health

Known Unknowns

How Many Books?

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