Software : Hands on: Mac App Store review

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Hands on: Mac App Store review Posted: 06 Jan 2011 07:22 AM PST Good news for bank managers everywhere: impulse program purchasing is now on the Mac in the form of the Mac App Store. Download the latest OS X 10.6.6 update, and once you've rebooted you can launch the Store in two ways: from the new Dock icon, or by clicking on the Apple menu and selecting App Store. What you'll see looks like the iTunes App Store, albeit without the iTunes interface elements. We encountered a few teething problems – weird layouts on the main page and mysterious "unknown error" reports that turned out to be because we hadn't agreed to the new T&Cs – but other than that the Mac App Store worked quickly and smoothly. The process of finding and acquiring apps works just like it does on iOS devices: there are buttons for Featured, Top Charts and Categories at the top, together with an icon for Purchases and one for Updates, and there's a search box too. ORGANISED: As with the iOS App Store, everything is organised into categories. There's already a huge selection Buying works like any other iTunes purchase, with the App Store asking for your iTunes ID when you click on the Buy button. As with the iTunes App Store each program has its own page, with reviews and ratings as well as a panel of information about the program, its age rating and its publisher. Many of the pages appear unfinished, though, so for example the Twitter for Mac page doesn't have any product information; just a screenshot. QUICK LOAD: Apps appear in the dock sporting a progress bar until installation is complete. Getting the new Twitter client takes seconds There are some nice touches. The App Store knows what's on your system, so if you already own iPhoto it shows that as Installed (and presumably that means it'll be monitored by the Updates panel), and that applies to third-party apps if they're available from the App Store. Installation works in much the same way as it does on iOS devices, too: the icon appears in your dock with a progress bar, bouncing when it's finished. If your Mac is a family Mac you'll be pleased to discover that OS X's Parental Controls have been updated to take account of the App Store: in the Apps > Limit Applications bit of the preference pane there's a new Allow App Store Apps drop-down that lets you prevent the kids from opening age-inappropriate apps. You can also disable the App Store altogether. ADULTS ONLY: OS X's parental controls have been updated to keep the kids away from apps and the App Store The most interesting thing about the App Store to our eyes is the aggressive pricing: the individual iWork and iLife apps are cheaper than you might expect, so for example iMovie is £8.99 and Pages is £11.99. That's great for two reasons: it puts such programs in the impulse-buy territory, and it enables you to pay only for the programs you need – so you can have Pages without Numbers, or iPhoto without Garageband. AFFORDABLE: Apple's pricing its apps very aggressively here. Twelve quid for Pages is great value for money Apple isn't the only one offering decent prices: Autodesk's SketchBook Pro is £17.99 (there's a free Express version too) and many apps are below the £10 mark. The inevitable Angry Birds is £2.99. It'll be interesting to see how this pans out, because there has been plenty of grumbles about the pricing race to the bottom on iOS apps – although it's possible that cheap apps may do more damage to free and open source software by removing the "how much?" factor from paid-for programs. Teething troubles aside, the App Store is pretty much what we all expected: an easy and convenient way to spend all your wages on things you didn't know you needed.

Tutorial: How to make a movie trailer with iMovie 11 Posted: 06 Jan 2011 05:00 AM PST Making a movie is hard enough, but designing a trailer for it and condensing the essence of your story into a minute and a half without revealing too much or cramming it with just your best parts is even more difficult. At least it would be, if you didn't have iMovie '11. One of the most advertised features of this new version of Apple's video-editing program is its ability to do most of the work when you've decided to design a trailer. All you have to do is supply the shots it requires and the results will look impressive. That's the theory, anyway. In reality, things are a little more complicated. Apple's engineers have done a great job of explaining with images which type of shots are required. They can't go and do the job of choosing the right one for you, but at least they can help narrow down your clip search. Coupled with the Movie Trailers feature is another extremely useful new tool added to iMovie's arsenal: the ability to identify people within your footage and determine which type of shot you were recording for each clip. This isn't like Faces in iPhoto: it won't be able to discern whether you've shot Jane or Jack, but it will be able to tell you if you've got one or more people in the shot. Once that information has been determined by iMovie, you'll find making a trailer a much easier and rewarding experience. We'll be using this tutorial to guide you through the initial steps of creating a project using one of the new Movie Trailer themes. This is a big subject and we can't cover it all in just eight steps, but we will be able to get you started, so you can enjoy this new feature. We'll cover other parts of this process in detail in future issues. For now, let's see what iMovie '11 has to offer off the bat. How to get started making a trailer in iMovie '11 01. Finding people Let's start by analysing your clips. You can do this with one, some, or all your Events, but this can be very time-consuming. To select one, click on it; for two, Command-click on another. For all of them, go to Edit > Select All Events. Then, go to File > Analyse Video > People. 02. Initialising keywords You must reveal some concealed features to help you in the forthcoming steps. Go to the Preferences window (hit Command+,) and tick Show Advanced Tools. Next, reveal the Keyword pane by clicking on the magnifying glass icon, bottom-left of the interface. 03. Previewing themes Go to File > New Project. At the bottom of that drop-down sheet are the 15 new trailers you can work with. To help you decide, click on one and watch a trailer based on your selection in the preview pane to the right. The music you hear will be the same as the one used for yours. 04. Initial settings Once you've chosen, name your project (in the field top-right of the drop-down sheet), select your aspect ratio (you can choose either standard or high-definition) and your frame rate (which will most likely be PAL at 25 frames per second for us Europeans). Then click Create. 05. The Outline The regular project pane will be replaced with an outline of your story. Mouse over each editable field to see a preview of how it'll get used, top-right of the interface. Customise any text to see the changes. Once you're done, click Storyboard to start building your trailer. 06. Focused selection The trailer will be deconstructed into a series of images representing the type of shot that is needed at a specific time. Click on one needing one or more people in it. The Keyframe pane will light up the request and the Event pane will display shots matching that criteria. 07. Next image The image you selected will be replaced by the clip you chose and the next image will be automatically highlighted. This will change what is displayed in the Event pane so you can focus on finding the shots you want from a reduced selection, speeding up the process. 08. Fine-tuning If your selection wasn't good enough, mouse over the clip in your Project and click on the icon, lower left of the thumbnail. This brings up the Clip Trimmer to help you choose another part of the same clip. To remove the clip, click the icon top-right of the thumbnail.

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