After a public beta that started at Macworld Expo 2008, Nolobe today shipped Iris, a new image editing application for Mac OS X. Nolobe is the same company that brings the world Interarchy, a popular advanced FTP client.
What separates Iris from the competition is the single-screen user interface that dispenses with a lot of the traditional floating palettes that clutter screens with other applications. While it's a 1.0 release, a quick tour of the trial download shows that Iris is a surprisingly full-featured image editor supporting most major file formats, advanced compositing tools, and color correction machinery that lets you fix or enhance your favorite photos.
Here's a task that most computer users run into on a daily basis: cropping and dealing with small image tweaks. This could be a daunting task if it were not for the Mac and Automator. In this how-to, I will show you how to make a small Finder plug-in that will allow you to manipulate images quickly. Please note, some of the actions required for this how-to are dependent upon Pixelmator being installed.
For this automation, you will need the following Automator actions (in the same order):
Get Selected Finder Items
Transform Images (this action is only available when you install Pixelmator)
Photon just loaded 839 JPEG image previews for me in under 2 seconds. That's expletive worthy speed. And when it loads the full image, it's just as fast, even with RAW format images. And it loads every pixel of a RAW image. If you set the preview mode to fit-to-screen, clicking the image gives you a loupe-style zoom to full resolution. It reads photos–from folders or directly from cameras/memory cards–with a feature they call "Instant Import". I plugged in a camera and by the time I had looked back at the screen, it had recorded all of the images on the card.
Photon serves one purpose, but serves it well. It helps you do a rough cut of large batches of images before heading into Lightroom or Aperture for more advanced procedures. It lacks any form of image flagging, has limited viewing of metadata fields (the columns in the HUD aren't individually expandable or adjustable) and no search feature of any kind. It basically provides a very fast, very streamlined interface for creating collections ("stacks") of images and–once you've bought the full version–exporting them with options to convert the format to jpg, png, psd and more. It does provide histograms, which is handy for deciding on which RAW images you're planning to keep.
A demo of Photon is available for download, and costs $49 to purchase. That's shown as a markdown from $69, but I'm unsure if that's a limited-time offer.
If you're looking for a quick and dirty way to smudge sensitive information in photos before putting them online then give Seashore a whirl. We've written about this neat little open source Mac-only app before and think it's great for basic image editing and touch-ups.
To smudge parts of a photo, simply open the Seashore toolbar, then open the photo you want to edit. Select the "finger" icon from the left side of the toolbar and right-click on the mouse while dragging the cursor across the area you want to blur. Save the photo and you're done. Be advised, however, your blurring efforts can be undone just as easily so if you need to hide extremely sensitive information, you'll need to use another method.
We may have been playing with Skitch and teasing you with screenshot galleries since the app's debut at Macworld '07, but today is the day that some of you can finally start teasing someone else for a change. That's right: the plasq crew have officially opened the flood gates and have begun sending out Skitch beta copies to users who signed up (you can now sign up at the official Skitch site). Not everyone will receive their copy right away, mind you: by 'invite-only public beta,' I mean that copies will more or less be sent out at a moderate but steady pace and only to those who sign up, as plasq wants to make sure they can maintain control over testing (after all: it is still a beta) and ensure their slick MySkitch photo sharing service can handle the load.
That said, if you get a copy, start testing away! It's a beta, so it'll act funny and it just might eat the family cat. Just remember: Skitch will be a commercial app when released as a 1.0 (though no official word on price yet), and the plasq crew is still kicking around whether they need to split some services or features off into a Pro version, so send in that feedback.
It's been over a year since we first mentioned Pyro, the powerful Mac OS X client for 37signals' Campfire web-based chat service for groups and businesses. While I personally didn't pick up a copy back then since I wasn't a Campfire user, I'm not entirely familiar with every change that has come since April '06. Still, even the most recent list of changes warrants Pyro another mention, especially since I'm looking at using Campfire for a few uses and projects.
In addition to already offering a dashboard and central location for all your Campfire chats and displaying message status alerts in the Dock icon, check out what's new in Pyro 1.6:
Any file type can be dragged onto Pyro to share in a Campfire chat
Pyro will automatically zip a folder or .APP
Dragging an image from a web browser will insert a URL for that image instead of uploading it
Campfire's new sidebar search field now works in Pyro
Support for the new WebKit installed by Safari 3 beta (mentioned on the Pyro development blog)
and of course, bug fixes
As Campfire's example uses page details, there are a lot of great scenarios for such a slick web app, and Pyro looks like the perfect tool to bring together the coolness of Campfire with the power of Mac OS X. Surprisingly, Pyro is still offered free, and even though Campfire primarily focuses on business users by offering a few paid accounts, it too has a free account with which you can register and tinker around to see if Campfire is right for your use.
The moment I saw John Gruber link Pixelmator - a powerful new Core Image-based image editor with support for layers, a wide variety of tools, iLife/iPhoto, Automator and more - I had to get a closer look. I remember the days of Apple hyping Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger and all the power of Core Image, and then never seeing a formidable editor make use of them. Sure there are a few apps that make use of Core Image in one way or another, but nothing really struck me as truly leveraging all there was to leverage in Apple's Core image.
While Pixelmator may technically be vaporware according to Gruber, I managed to snag an exclusive demonstration video of the app in action from its developers, brothers Aidas and Saulius Dailide (who you might be interested to know also founded Jumsoft). The demo showcases some impressive Pixelmator features, including working with multiple layers and objects, opening Photoshop files and moving layers from one image to another, taking a picture with an iSight camera and embedding it into the current working image, and even some slick blending modes.
From what I see here, I can definitely say 'wow', especially since Pixelmator is expected to ship in late July for only $59. Stay tuned for more info as soon as we can nab it.
We've been blogging Skitch, a new 'hybrid' photo editing and web services tool from plasq (makers of Comic Life), since Scott first met and fell in love with it at Macworld 07. Using the app through its development, it's clear that Skitch is going to knock people's socks off, with a well-executed blend of desktop editing and integration with web services like Plasq's new MySkitch and Flickr. For example: a major new feature in an upcoming public beta (that's right, I said 'public': join the mailing list for your chance to get a copy) includes iPhoto and Aperture integration:
Simply double-click an item from the library panel shown here to begin applying all manners of Skitch editing. Another feature that brings the 'hybrid' element to the table is Skitch's tight integration with web services. Skitch can send pics to FTP, .Mac and even Flickr accounts, but it also integrations with a new MySkitch service that will debut. MySkitch does a lot of interesting things, like giving you embed code for zoomable thumbnails (ideal for the likes of eBay and blogs with thin columns), a direct link for sending in email and even forum-friendly embed code. Skitch doesn't stop there though: you can also remove images from these web services directly from within Skitch, effectively making it a one-stop management shop for your images both local and otherwise.
That's enough blabbing about features for now though. The folks at plasq were kind enough to allow us to publish an exclusive Skitch screenshot gallery, and published we have. Check out more screenshots of Skitch's good side, and don't forget to hit up plasq's mailing list for a chance to snag your own copy when they release an upcoming public beta.
Skitch became an instant hit around the TUAW offices when we first heard about it at Macworld, and a couple of recent updates to this well-integrated screenshot app have only made it better. As you can see, watermarking has made an appearance for eBay sellers and paranoid bloggers alike, and the overall UI has received quite an overhaul. Taking snapshots of app windows (the Mac OS X equivalent is cmd-shift-4) also now has the ability to place a white or transparent background behind the window, or simply your desktop wallpaper - no matter what you actually have running behind said window when you snap it. The History feature has also received a new coat of polish: not only can you drag and drop images straight out of the History, but you can search any text you have written on top of any picture in your History.
Plenty of other innovative new features have made their way into the latest builds, but plasq said something about 'sleeping with the fishes' if we published them, so they'll have to remain under wraps for now. As Skitch's teaser page says, a public beta is on its way, and a price is still forthcoming.
Until Skitch goes public, you can see it in action at blip.tv with a video of plasq's own Rachael demoing it at Macworld.
A while ago we found an Automator action that lets you drag and drop images to set them as your desktop background. No fuss, and no clunky System Preferences pane. I didn't notice it at the time, but TUAW reader Tice commented with a link to his little app, named Desky, that can do the same thing without any of the Automator setup work involved (sorry Tice!). Fortunately, Desky is finally getting its time in the TUAW spotlight, as I caught an update in my RSS feeds that adds the ability to set Desky as a button in the Finder toolbar, as well as Universal Binary goodness.
Photojojo is a community focused on photography tips, tricks, DIY projects and other kinds of picture-taking goodness. Recently, they introduced Project 365, essentially coining a(nother?) term and offering tips for those take-a-picture-a-day-for-a-year-or-three projects that broke out on the interwebs over the last year or so.
Inspired both by this Photojojo post and the recent 'snap a pic of users who commit invalid login attempts' hack, Adam Pash at Lifehacker penned a Photo projects for the New Year post in which he put together a script that can automate this process on iSight-enabled Macs, more or less taking the effort out of your own Project 365. The script can be set to run each time you login (properly, of course) or at a specific time of each day, and Adam includes instructions for tweaking them to your needs. By default, they're set up to snap the pic and save it in ~/project365/pics/, adding a timestamp to the name of each file to help you keep track of everything when you're ready to make your YouTube debut.
I think this is a fantastic idea, and now that I have an iSight in both my MacBook and iMac, I think I might actually take a crack at this myself. A big thanks to Adam for putting together such a cool script, and be sure to check out Photojojo's original Project 365 post for tips, motivation and ideas on what to do with 365 pictures of you and/or your stuff.
Fraser Speirs already released a Flickr plugin for Aperture, but what about the Adobe Photoshop Lightroom users in the crowd (John Gruber has a nice piece on the ridiculousness of adding the 'Photoshop' prefix to Lightroom's name)? As it turns out, through a little trickery, Lightroom can be tweaked for uploading your images to Flickr.
This Mac OS X Hints post describes the simple setup, as well as a couple of drawbacks, to using Lightroom and the official Flickr Uploadr tool in conjunction; one simply needs to change the external editor preference to the Flickr Uploadr, then chose the Uploadr as the option from the Post-processing page during an export. Check out Mac OS X Hints though for more details and possible inspiration for asking Mr. Speirs (nicely) for a true-blue Lightroom Flickr plugin.
For all those times when you need to enable Private Browsing and 'private downloading' in Safari, a macosxhints reader has posted an AppleScript with setup instructions that can enable Private Browsing and mount a disk image and temporarily changing Safari's download folder to said disk image for the ultimate in browsing privacy (macosxhints uses 'online banking' as a usage scenario; I guess that works).
The script requires a little bit of setup and customization however, so check out the post for instructions. When you're finished you'll have a simple, handy AppleScript that prompts you to enable or disable Private Browsing in Safari, and then it will mount your encrypted (password-prompted) disk image for safe, secure and private downloading as well. Enjoy.
It seems that I'm not the only one being inflicted with a new wave of image spam, as Bill Benson, a MacInTouch reader, has posted his rule solution for this junk that seems to so easily elude Mail.app's filters. Tim Gaden at Hawk Wings, also a victim, elaborates on how to set up this rule, as a trick is involved. To summarize:
for the first condition, select 'Edit Header List...'
in its accompanying option, chose 'Content-Type' (or create it if you have to)
The Content-Type option will then take first place in the rule (or you might have to select it from the criteria list), allowing you to finish building the rule as pictured
The rule is based off of Bill's observation that these spam emails always come from a different address, and the content type header (as you might now assume) begins with multipart/related'.
Since I have been receiving around a dozen of these messages on a daily basis, I think I can say that, so far, this rule has been a success. Three cheers for the power of community -based spam filtering. If you aren't using Mail.app, however, I would imagine this trick can be adapted for other email apps. Anyone else try it outside of Mail.app?
No, Google hasn't brought Picasa to Mac OS X, but they did release two tools to let Mac users upload photos to their Picasa Web Albums service (think: 'Google does Flickr'). The first app (honesty a bit of a surprise) is a full-on plugin for iPhoto to let users upload their images right from within Apple's popular photo-management app. The second tool is a good ol' fashioned stand-alone uploader for those who want to fly solo.
I've never used the service before myself, though I signed up when Google first opened it up (I like to make myself available, when possible). I just took the iPhoto plugin for a spin and it works well, though I don't think Picasa Web Albums is aimed at your typical Flickr user (its largest and most obvious potential competitor). Most of the social aspects of Flickr, such as tagging, groups, etc., don't exist in Picasa Web Albums - it seems much more geared to those who mainly want a place to upload their photos online, with a simple gallery that is easy to link family and friends to (it's also obviously geared towards Picasa users on Windows too). Users can chose whether to make uploaded albums public or private, which is where one of Picasa Web Albums' social features comes into play: users do have the ability to set other users as favorites in order to more easily view images and albums they upload (though, strangely, I can't seem to find any kind of public area where I can go hunting for other users). On the downside, however, Picasa Web Albums only offers a measly 250MB of storage space for free, with a $25 upgrade option for an extra 6GB of space.
All in all this is a handy service and the new tools are a great gesture on Google's part towards the Mac community. However, due to Flickr's overwhelming popularity (especially among Mac users) and a seeming lack of integration with other Google tools (where are my GmailThis! and BlogThis! buttons?), I think Picasa Web Albums has a little ways to go before it gains any significant interest among Mac users.
Here's a task that most computer users run into on a daily basis: cropping and dealing with small image tweaks. This could be a daunting task if it were not for the Mac and Automator. In this how-to, I will show you how to make a small Finder plug-in that will allow you to manipulate images quickly. Please note, some of the actions required for this how-to are dependent upon Pixelmator being installed. 
A while ago we found an 
Photojojo is a community focused on photography tips, tricks, DIY projects and other kinds of picture-taking goodness. Recently, they introduced 
Fraser Speirs already released a 
Now that we know how to 
No, Google hasn't brought Picasa to Mac OS X, but they did 
