Series: App improvement discussion - App: iPhoto

[Diatribe]

To continue the app discussion, started with iTunes (http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=1113101#post1113101), here the new thread with the focus on iPhoto this time.

Here are mine:

- nested albums

- spotlight integrated, so I can actually find pics

- more filters or at least the ones preview has

- changing of .mac albums within iPhoto


As always, send Apple feedback. (http://www.apple.com/feedback/iphoto.html) It works.

[mattmook]

Better handling of large photo libraries would be good.

Any sensible search feature.

I like the idea of nested albums... but i also like the idea of a switching library function (as was suggested for iTunes). Nested albums is of course a lot more powerful but I like the idea of a more seperate library concept.

[cluthz]

Handling of videos (recorded with the photocam).
Atleast quicktime videos.

[munkle]

Implement something like iPhoto Buddy (http://nofences.net/iphotoBuddy/), have folders within albums and some sort of way to handle video content captured by cameras.

[Heart Break Kid]

would love to see iChat implementation, where i can right click on a photo or album and have it all zipped and sent as a file transfer to a friend online

would make life a wee bit easier

[PlaceofDis]

i think when you change the filename in iPhoto it should actually rename the photo!!!! #1 on my list

[Diatribe]

i think when you change the filename in iPhoto it should actually rename the photo!!!! #1 on my list

You do know that it changes it when you export the picture, right?
But I agree it should be an option in the preferences.

[PlaceofDis]

You do know that it changes it when you export the picture, right?
But I agree it should be an option in the preferences.

yes but that doesnt mean im exporting the pictures, but i am searching for them on the harddrive, which would make the process faster if they were renamed, because i know the name im looking for, but i guess with spotlight in Tiger it would show up because the name in iPhoto would be metadata added to the file so i guess that will work good enough

[chameeeleon]

My Suggestions for iPhoto:

1. A folder management system that actually allows people to navigate through it in the Finder. I know that iPhoto is supposed to replace looking for photos in the Finder, but still - iTunes bothers to have a very nice folder system.
2. A search bar in the top right hand corner that allows searching names, keywords and comments. And they HAVE to change how Keywords are added/deleted - it is WAY too slow and complicated at the moment. Splitting them into groups of "People", "Place", "Occasion", etc. would help. And letting users create/modify their own groups. But having to go through that awful palette window when I have tons of Keywords is a serious pain.
BTW, I've heard the iPhoto library can be searched through Spotlight. Can anyone comfirm whether it can find photos by keywords or names?
3. As others have mentioned, give the titles I give to my photos back to their original file.
4. Improve the books! Create a gallery of clipart/objects that you can drag in. Things like beach balls, flowers, etc. to decorate the pages.
5. In slideshows, allow a stretch-to-screen for vertical photos, but don't do it for horizontal photos.
6. Sync the iPod Photo right in iPhoto! None of this iTunes Photo business for us Mac users. And allow Photos from the iPod Photo to be dragged right off of the 'Pod and into iPhoto without having to go into the harddrive. After all, as Steve said - no copyright issues.
7. Definitely add some more minor-editing stuff. Things like rotating and cropping the photo to be straight (ie: when things in the picture are slanted), and more filters. This is bridging into PhotoShop Elements territory I know, but it still wouldn't be enough to discourage me from purchasing Elements.
8. Allow photo slideshows to be saved as Quicktime movies and easily put on a .Mac homepage, ala iMovie.
9. Fix the bugs! Often when I crop photos/red-eye them, the changes don't show up, the photo just zooms out. I have to switch back to browse mode to see them. And it's not performance - I'm on a G5! And often when I click the triangle by Library to see the calendars, there's a blank spot below the "2004" calendar, with no icon and no name. When I tried deleting it, iPhoto crashed.
10. Burn CDs that Windows users without iPhoto can still easily navigate.

That's all I can think of at the moment - I like iPhoto a lot, but it is still far from perfect. I've submitted all of these to Apple before btw.

[chameeeleon]

- more filters or at least the ones preview has


Preview has filters? I've managed to never come across them yet. I searched for "filters" in Help, but didn't find anything there either. How do you get to them?

EDIT: N/m I found them, you go to File-> Print, and change the third drop-down menu to "ColorSync". Then you can use the Quartz Filter drop-down menu to apply the filters. Correct me if there's an easier way.

[ravenvii]

Preview has filters? I've managed to never come across them yet. I searched for "filters" in Help, but didn't find anything there either. How do you get to them?

EDIT: N/m I found them, you go to File-> Print, and change the third drop-down menu to "ColorSync". Then you can use the Quartz Filter drop-down menu to apply the filters. Correct me if there's an easier way.

Yeah, was thinking the same thing. Never seen filters in Preview. Would be awesome if there are :)

[Mechcozmo]

I have a suggestion for iPhoto.

Make it able to include a comment about a picture. Not a title, mind you, but a comment.

iPhoto is, in my opinion, the least polished iApp.

[Inspector Lee]

8. Allow photo slideshows to be saved as Quicktime movies and easily put on a .Mac homepage, ala iMovie.


You can currently export iPhoto slideshows as quicktime movies. Haven't tried to incorporate them with .mac yet.

1) Something resembling control over the keyword panel in addition to what Keyword Assistant (http://homepage.mac.com/kenferry/software.html) can do such as grouping keywords.

2) Modifying the time of a group of photos by hours (i.e. time zones). I know it is my fault when I forget to change the time on my camera when I head west and I know it is an OCD thing but...

3) Hide the title bar if one is going without titles for one's photos. There exists an option to delete all titles and this would actually add an extra few lines of space for comments.

4) Sub-albums would be great too.

[chameeeleon]

I have a suggestion for iPhoto.

Make it able to include a comment about a picture. Not a title, mind you, but a comment.

iPhoto is, in my opinion, the least polished iApp.

You can definitely do this already. When you have a photo selected, press the info (i) button again. A comments field pops up.

[mattmook]

I'd also like to see a more list based view... i.e. a bit more like iTunes with one item per row - that way there is more space for things like the title, keywords and comments in the main panel perhaps along with a rating field.

[brap]

iPhoto is comparatively awful.

I should be able to:

1. Customise what I like to call the "Useless-bar" at the bottom. I don't buy prints online, nor will I ever.

2. View a picture at 100% size.

3. Context menu to 'Open picture in xxx application'.

4. iPhoto should manage multiple libraries itself, instead of having me find workarounds.

5. Nested photo albums.

6. A more sensible file structure beneath the app. It's a ********* mess.

I'm sure there are more. At least in the last iPhoto increment it fixed one bug; now it only removes all images from the camera after an import (when the camera takes movie files which aren't imported). Small mercies.

[wordmunger]

I'd like to see more iPhoto-native editing options: a Photoshop "levels"-type edit and an option to rotate an arbitrary amount would keep me out of Photoshop 99 percent of the time.

Brap, you can view photos at 100 percent when you "edit in a separate window". Woudl be good to have a command to go directly to 100 percent though.

I agree with all those who want quicktime movie import.

I'd like a better "export to Web page option," maybe even something with an editor that allowed me to "preview" the page and change captions and background colors. That would keep me out of Dreamweaver 99 percent of the time.

Fix the "feature" that starts the slideshow on the last image in the range you selected. (I think this is supposed to be a feature not a bug. If you shift-select the range by clicking on the last image first, then it starts with the last picture. However, it then just moves on to the first image in the range, so it's not much of a feature. If you shift-select by clicking on the first image first, then it starts with the first picture. I think if you shift-select a range, it should just play them in order, regardless of which image you select first. It does do one thing correctly: if you command-click a set of pictures, it will display them in the order you click. Now THAT's a feature!)

Edit: how about an export-to-JPEG that allows you to specify image quality! With a preview feature, that would be awesome!

[brap]

Brap, you can view photos at 100 percent when you "edit in a separate window".Aha! See, i never found that because I use Photoshop for my editing. Good to know though.
Edit: how about an export-to-JPEG that allows you to specify image quality! With a preview feature, that would be awesome!Yeah. I want to dump that POS "GraphicConverter".

[cemorris]

I would like to see a "find duplicate photos" option similar to what itunes now has. I have switched from Linux to OS X where I seem to have aquired many duplicate photos from family/friends. When I imported into iphoto, it did not catch these.

[mpw]

iPhoto is comparatively awful.

I should be able to:

...

3. Context menu to 'Open picture in xxx application'.

...

A triple 'x' application for triple 'x' photos eh! ;)

[wordmunger]

I would like to see a "find duplicate photos" option similar to what itunes now has. I have switched from Linux to OS X where I seem to have aquired many duplicate photos from family/friends. When I imported into iphoto, it did not catch these.
It usually does for new imports, iirc. But a "find duplicate" option would indeed be cool.

[cemorris]

Another addition I want. I have over 6,000 photos and always browse by album and never via the entire library. I want to know if all my photos are in at least 1 library. I just get this creapy feeling I have some photos laying around that are not in an album and I will never see them again because I don't browse the entire library.

[johnnyjibbs]

Search option. The whole keywords system is lame. But I guess we'll see Spotlight integration with iPhoto 5 and Tiger.

Performance is ok but why does it take 5 seconds to rotate an image through 90 degrees? My Amiga 500 rotated pics quicker than that.

Make the bar at the bottom customisable. Also, I know it's a general feature of Cocoa apps but, I hate it when iPhoto is in the background and say I'm using some other program (e.g. Safari)... If I click on part of the iPhoto window to bring it into focus and accidentally push part of the "iDVD" button or whatever, it will start processing that function - i.e. launching iDVD or whatever when all I want to do is switch programs.

Update the book system. More choice is good, plus how about a save option? It looks as though most of this hasn't been updated since iPhoto 1 was first released and it's all a bit Mac OS 10.1-like. It's a bit cumbersome to make a book at present, plus how about it being a bit cheaper?

View any photo in full screen option.

Fix the bug which means the photo title or comments text box sometimes and unpredictably loses focus while typing text in them. This has occasionally caused me to accidently delete a photo (luckily only to the trash) without really realising it. *PLEASE APPLE PLEASE* This bug was not present in iPhoto 2.

Option to rename actual filenames and make the folder system better. Still allow current file system to work to maintain compatibility with iPhoto photo CDs or DVDs (ones which have already been burnt).

Ticks confirming star rating in contextual menus consistent with iTunes. (Nitpicking now ;) )

Better presentation of titles when displayed in slideshows. Currently they have a crummy black background and are displayed at the top left of the screen and currently look so unprofessional that I never turn them on.

iPhoto slideshow music to take account of iTunes Sound Check option (so all music volume is the same - this applies to iDVD too).

Hmm.. that'll do for now :p

[veedubdrew]

I would really, really, really like iPhoto to make printing from my inkjet printer easier. Printing through their ordering service is great, but last night I HAD to print a bunch of 4x6 pics to bring to work and didn't have time to order.

This process took me well over an hour and about a half dozen f'd up 4x6 photo papers to get it right. The trick? To make stupid iPhoto print stupid 4x6 prints on the stupid 4x6 photo papter one must dig through the "page setup" option in "File." What is this, Word? THEN, the buggery thing says "photo will not fit on paper size" when you go to print. THAT trick? One must choose some stupid option that doesn't seem to correlate at all to what it actually does (I'm at a PC right now, so I can't check...) to get stupid iPhoto to print to a stupid 4x6 picture. iPhoto is, therefore, stupid.

Now, if you were writing a freaking photo managment app wouldn't you assume that one thing people would probably want to do at least every now and then is print freaking photos?! wtf. I was so so pissed last night I almost chucked my PowerBook out the window. This process needs to be more tightly integrated and resolved. And for Pete's sake, speed it up!

Guess that's kind of a rant, I need a cigarette...

-Drew

[johnnyjibbs]

Oh, and the ability to be able to do a slideshow of selected pictures from a non-iPhoto CD. Earlier today, my dad wanted to show my grandparents some photos of Prague he had just taken from a quick holiday there and he suggested using my Mac hooked up to the TV so everyone could see. The photos were burnt using Windows.

Rather embarrassingly, with no Finder slideshow option (like Windows XP has) or any way of showing them in iPhoto without importing 400 photos that I didn't want on my machine, the only way was to try to learn the Canon software that came with the program quickly to use that. My dad uses PCs, so I didn't want the Mac to come across as looking a hassle to use.

Now if only iPhoto would have allowed me to select the photos from a folder on that CD and displayed them without having to import them...

[howard]

iPhoto is useless to me without album hierarchies

also it would be nice if they changed there file structure so you could leave the pics in the folders you want them in but i know that that is not going to happen.

also a speed boast, and instead of going to your iphoto library when it starts up have a screen that gives you options of what you want to view. I don't want it to load my whole library so all those pictures are immediately viewable. I know you can collapse the albums in album view but that doesn't look that great.


a agree with brap, hahaha the useless bar, thats so true i hate that thing

also like he said, view pictures fullscreen w/o using slideshow would be great

[aafuss1]

My Suggestions for iPhoto:

1. A folder management system that actually allows people to navigate through it in the Finder. I know that iPhoto is supposed to replace looking for photos in the Finder, but still - iTunes bothers to have a very nice folder system.
2. A search bar in the top right hand corner that allows searching names, keywords and comments. And they HAVE to change how Keywords are added/deleted - it is WAY too slow and complicated at the moment. Splitting them into groups of "People", "Place", "Occasion", etc. would help. And letting users create/modify their own groups. But having to go through that awful palette window when I have tons of Keywords is a serious pain.
BTW, I've heard the iPhoto library can be searched through Spotlight. Can anyone comfirm whether it can find photos by keywords or names?
3. As others have mentioned, give the titles I give to my photos back to their original file.
4. Improve the books! Create a gallery of clipart/objects that you can drag in. Things like beach balls, flowers, etc. to decorate the pages.
5. In slideshows, allow a stretch-to-screen for vertical photos, but don't do it for horizontal photos.
6. Sync the iPod Photo right in iPhoto! None of this iTunes Photo business for us Mac users. And allow Photos from the iPod Photo to be dragged right off of the 'Pod and into iPhoto without having to go into the harddrive. After all, as Steve said - no copyright issues.
7. Definitely add some more minor-editing stuff. Things like rotating and cropping the photo to be straight (ie: when things in the picture are slanted), and more filters. This is bridging into PhotoShop Elements territory I know, but it still wouldn't be enough to discourage me from purchasing Elements.
8. Allow photo slideshows to be saved as Quicktime movies and easily put on a .Mac homepage, ala iMovie.
9. Fix the bugs! Often when I crop photos/red-eye them, the changes don't show up, the photo just zooms out. I have to switch back to browse mode to see them. And it's not performance - I'm on a G5! And often when I click the triangle by Library to see the calendars, there's a blank spot below the "2004" calendar, with no icon and no name. When I tried deleting it, iPhoto crashed.
10. Burn CDs that Windows users without iPhoto can still easily navigate.

That's all I can think of at the moment - I like iPhoto a lot, but it is still far from perfect. I've submitted all of these to Apple before btw.

8. I use Microsoft Plus! Photo Story 3 and does photo slideshows in .wmv format. Very cool and fun to create. Perhaps Apple should look at creating a similar integrated program into iPhoto (using .mov) that supports the .wp3/.wp2 file format for easy sharing with PC users with Plus DME! , and a send slideshow to iMovie for furthering editing of movie slideshoes .

Panoramic stitching- on the PC MS Digital Image Pro and Suite 10 can intelligently stitch images, PhotoSuite also does that, just to name a few. It is a brilliant way to create unique images and popular with many photographers But not iPhoto-perhaps as a project option.

[chameeeleon]

Just for the record, can I hope you start iMovie, iDVD, GarageBand, DVD Player, iCal, iChat, Safari, Quicktime and Mail/Address Book threads too? I'd love to see other's suggestions.

[Diatribe]

Just for the record, can I hope you start iMovie, iDVD, GarageBand, DVD Player, iCal, iChat, Safari, Quicktime and Mail/Address Book threads too? I'd love to see other's suggestions.

Yes you can. I will start a new thread every monday now.

[Diatribe]

Feel free to continue this one if there are more suggestions.

Here is the new one. (http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=96721)

[joed]

I personally don't reeally like iPhoto at the moment.

A while ago, I put together a design for some changes so if anyone is interested you can see it here (http://homepage.mac.com/jbadcock/mac_stuff/iphoto_ideas.html)

The main things are keep it consistant, like a camera or cd come up as a removeable device, like the iPod in iTunes. And it needs much better handling of keywords and searching generally.

[chameeeleon]

I sort of like your mockup - I agree that cameras (and the iPod Photo) should pop up in the source list ala iTunes, and I like your revised info panel (esp. the Keywords system). However, I must say I prefer the bottom portion of the current iPhoto - I'm a fan of the big, easy-to-make-out icons, and I don't think Homepage needs its own tab. Plus, if Apple revamped the Book designing to be Keynote-style, it would deserve its own tab. And as good of an idea that the search bar is, it should def. be put up in the top right corner, consistant with every other app (iCal aside).

[Quickslvr]

I really want the ability to export individual photo titles to iDVD. I spend a great deal of time adding titles to old family photos and creating slideshows in iPhoto. When exported to iDVD, the titles don't follow and there appears to be no automated way to move them into iDVD. At best, the photos can be pulled into iMovie, titles individually added again, and then exported to iDVD. Too much trouble when the information is obviously there in the first place!

[Col. Panic]

One feature on my Digital Camera (Pentax Optio S4i) that I haven't really used yet it the ability to add verbal comments to a picture as I am taking it. This seems like it would be very handy while on vacation so that I can remember exactly what I took a picture of.

The reason I haven't really used this feature is that iPhoto has no way of keeping the audio file with the image. So I guess my first suggestion would be to allow other files (audio, etc) to be associated with an image and tracked with that image inside of iPhoto.

I would like some way of syncing my iPhoto library at home with another computer via .Mac and iSync. I know the files sizes may be too much to transfer realistically in one session but if you set a limit of 10 MB or so per sync I think it would work fine. This way iPhoto would automatically load 10 MB of photos at a time on my .Mac account. Then my other computers would automatically download the images. When that was complete iPhoto would then load the next 10 MB. This process would work over as many days, weeks, or months that it needs in order to keep all the computers up to dat. The same can work with iTunes.

I would also like iPhoto to publish smart albums to my .Mac account. So when one of my smart albums (My Top Rated for instance) changes then it automatically updates my website. This way I don't have to keep creating new albums and have to manage my web site as much.

[Diatribe]

I would like some way of syncing my iPhoto library at home with another computer via .Mac and iSync.

I think it would make perfect sense if you could sync entire home folders. Not via .mac obviously but when in a network or via FW, etc.
Most people have more things than addresses and calendars that they want to sync between their macs.