Inside Apple's iLife '08

This doesn't mean that Events are helpful only for new users, but it does mean that longtime iPhoto users may need to spend time and effort organizing their existing libraries after upgrading if they want to make full use of the feature. To this end, Apple provides an option for batch-modifying time stamps on photos to properly group them as Events (though for large libraries with inaccurately grouped Events, even using this feature will be a time-consuming task).

Most people want to keep all their digital photos, even the ones that didn't come out well or are embarrassing enough that they don't want to see them all the time. IPhoto '08 allows photos to be marked as Hidden, which retains them in the library and allows them to be searched but doesn't display them during normal browsing of the library or Events.

This version also makes a much-needed improvement to the program's keyword-tagging capabilities. IPhoto's use of keywords has always been great in theory, because it provides an easy way to search your library and build Smart Albums. However, the method of setting keywords has been cumbersome and never truly updated since iPhoto's initial release. IPhoto '08 streamlines creating and assigning keywords, and they are also now offered as a unified search feature along with ratings, date, event and other options, making it easier to locate specific photos on the fly.

Although iPhoto has always offered basic photo-editing and color-correction features, the update brings some high-powered options that would previously have required advanced external editing tools. Intelligent cropping options and the ability to enhance highlights and shadows separately, reduce image noise, and adjust both colors and white balance make it easy to get photos to look their best.

IPhoto's image-editing tools have been beefed up. (Click for larger view.)

Additionally, the Straighten tool has been broken out of the Adjust palette for easier access, and you can now see the angle of adjustment. Being able to make all these modifications directly in iPhoto makes it an enticing option for users who don't want to spend the money or time to use more advanced photo-editing tools.

Inside Apple's iLife '08 iMovie iPhoto iWeb iDVD GarageBand

The new version's .Mac Web Galleries build on the photo album pages available from .Mac with previous releases. Web Galleries provide a visually stunning and sophisticated online album service that users can use to make updates from a Mac or iPhone.

The service also enables users to allow others to upload images to their galleries. Integrating with the Photocast feature pioneered in iLife '06, viewers can easily subscribe to Web Galleries for direct access to photos in iPhoto as well as through a Web browser or RSS reader.

Finally, as with each iteration of iPhoto, there are new themes for ordering photo books, calendars and cards. While other online services now offer similar functions, iPhoto's ease of use as a single product and as a desktop- rather than Web-based application continue to place it above most competitors. For those who want to print photos at home, iPhoto '08 also offers a number of printing themes. Overall, this is a great update, even if you don't use every new feature.

IWeb now lets you insert HTML code into your Web pages. (Click for larger view.)

iWeb

Since its release in iLife '06, iWeb has provided users with an easy way to create high-end-looking Web sites with minimal effort. IWeb '08, or iWeb 2.0, offers a number of advantages over iWeb 1.1, chief among them the ability to add snippets of HTML code. The lack of a method for either directly modifying HTML in iWeb pages or being able to drop in a small amount of code was previously a major complaint of many iWeb users.

The Web Widgets button is your key to quickly adding HTML components. An HTML Snippets option in the resulting pop-up menu allows entry of any type of HTML code; likewise, a .Mac Web Gallery option lets you add Web Galleries to pages. There are also options for Google AdSense and Google Maps, making it extremely easy to add either service to a site.

IWeb page types and templates also got some updates. The new My Albums page allows you to create a custom page that acts as a menu for photo albums and Web Galleries. Eight new themes have been added, offering a new range of high-end looks to iWeb sites. So far there is no sign of a theme editor to let users create their own themes or save modified versions of Apple's themes, although the adventurous can still do this by hand as they could in earlier versions of the program.

Another advance in iWeb when used with .Mac is the option to use personal domain names instead of the generic web.mac.com URLs for sites. This is a nice option for users who either already have a domain name or want to have a custom URL. It also provides an option to make use of iWeb's design features without immediately advertising that a site was created with iWeb or is hosted by .Mac (a feature small businesses might appreciate, for example).