iLife '09 Update: GarageBand

ByMike Moffit

At Macworld, Phil Schiller introduced a new version of GarageBand. The biggest new feature is called “Learn to Play.” It is designed to teach people to play instruments such as guitar and keyboards. You see the a representation of the instrument on the screen with a video of the instructor facing you.

Celebrity instructors include Sting, Sarah McLachlan, John Fogerty, and more. Apple says “learn to play a hit song from the artist who made it famous,” which I think sounds pretty cool. Additional video lessons can be purchased from the new GarageBand store for $4.99.

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  • iLife '09 New Features and Mac Box Set

    Get the most out of the photos, movies, and music on your Mac with the latest versions of iPhoto, iMovie, GarageBand, iWeb, and iDVD! It has lots of new features, which we’ll highlight below. *Note that iLife ’09 includes all five applications which are not available for purchase separately.*

    On a related note, the Mac Box Set was announced as well: this is one package that includes Mac OS X Leopard, iLife ’09 and iWork ’09 for $169.99 (You’ll save over $100; Leopard alone is $129.99!) Also available in Family Pack: $229.99

    This will ship late this month; reserve your copy below!

    Single User Edition:
    http://www.smalldog.com/product/72889

    Family Pack:
    http://www.smalldog.com/product/72890

  • iWork '09: Numbers

    Noted features:

    * Easily create formulas, using *visual placeholders with plain language text.*
    * Perform calculations using *over 250 functions.*
    * Organize your data instantly using *Table Categories.*
    * Check your calculations at a glance with *Formula List view.*
    * Create two-axis charts and combine line, column, and area series in a single mixed chart.
    * Choose from *twelve new Apple-designed templates* (30 total).
    * *Open, save, and email Microsoft Excel files* from within Numbers.

  • iLife '09: Changes in the iTunes Store

    Millions of cheers were heard ’round the world when Phil Schiller announced some of the changes coming to the iTunes Store. The main one: all DRM-free music, meaning that songs can be played and burned without restriction. The four major record companies (Sony, Universal, Warner and EMI) are all now on board with the change, which was crucial to feature songs without the “DRM”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_rights_management encoding.

    Beginning today, over 8 million songs in the iTunes Store feature:

    * No DRM restrictions
    * Higher-quality 256 kbps AAC encoding for audio quality virtually unchanged from the original
    * Same price for song downloads onto iPhone 3G over their 3G network

    The remaining 2 million songs in the 10 million+ iTunes library will be available without the DRM restrictions by the end of March. According to Apple, they will offer a “simple, one-click option to easily upgrade their entire library of previously purchased songs to the higher quality DRM-free iTunes Plus format” for 30 cents per song or 30 percent of the album price. Sounds intriguing, but it could get expensive… I say choose your favorites wisely!

    In April, songs will be available at three price points: 69 cents, 99 cents and $1.29. This will be dictated by what the music labels charge Apple for the above licensing.

    “Read Apple’s entire press release here.”:http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2009/01/06itunes.html

  • Grace gave me an advance 60th birthday present just before I left for Macworld. She is taking me to Tanzania to see hippos in the wild. After watching the keynote with the new version of iMovie, we have decided to bring along a digicam, too!

    Our friend Chet Newbold from Olympus is going to loan me one of their ultra zoom cameras, too, so I hope to bring back some great photos and video from this trip. I am so excited about fulfilling this dream and spending my 60th birthday in Africa!

    I think we are going to see a lot of new products coming out of Apple this year. When they are ready on schedule, I am much more optimistic than most about 2009. I think that Apple is well-suited to innovate its way through this economic downturn.

    Thank you so much for reading this issue of Kibbles & Bytes!

    Your Kibbles & Bytes Team
    _Don, Kali & Ed_

  • iLife '09 Update: iPhoto

    iPhoto has gotten many updates in the iLife ’09 edition. iPhoto is arguably the most-used application in the iLife suite, behind iTunes.

    For starters, there are now three ways to sort your photos:

    * Events
    * Faces
    * Places

    Events was a new way to view and sort photos with the last iLife release, but both Faces and Places are new.

    Faces relies on face recognition, and assists in tagging photos. Amazingly, it will find a face and ask in other photos if it is the same person… I guess we’ll see! There’s also integration with Facebook and Flickr.

    Places works with Google Maps to zoom in on a location. It uses latitude and longitude, and will automatically add a location to your photos. This is great because you’ll be able to ‘geotag’ your entire set of photos. Phil uses the example of “Yosemite” in that if you have just taken a vacation there, it will geotag all of your photos from the trip!

    I’m really excited to check iPhoto ’09 out, especially the tagging and face recognition features. As Don mused, “will it be able to recognize dog’s faces, too?” Unfortunately, apparently not, but we’ll be reporting more on iPhoto’s features in future issues of Kibbles & Bytes!

    “Learn more and pre-order iLife ’09 here.”:http://www.smalldog.com/product/72885