We have been busy off the charts, not that we are complaining, but as much as we love our Mac’s and want to keep everyone informed and help them, we just been a tad bit to pre-occupied in posting gibberish to the site — kind of like this.

So keep coming back to check on things, but just like I say at the meetings, we cannot help you if you do not help us in what you need help with. So don’t be shy, open your mind and ask us questions…

Summer time heat and fun

Greetings everyone; hope all is going well for you this July of 2010; it has been a hot one and for me, as I am sure for others, it has been very busy — at times it almost feels like I cannot breath — but I excel in that type of environment although I may look like I want to just give up I find something to keep me going and finish the task and finish with fireworks.  Anyway, I do hope everyone has been safe, cool, and stayed creative with their Mac's.

Speaking of Apple; there have been some exciting new additions and updates to their line of products and software; take a visit to APPLE INC and see what has been happening.

Windows has been touting it's IE 7 with some strange and really stupid commercials — in my opinion — where people go into a bank and give their most secretive information just to get $500 to start a savings account?  Come on.  It's gonna cost them more than $500 to get me to tell them who broke my heart, what kind of underwear I wear, and my password for my bank account.  Please… Microsoft, stop insinuating that we are stupid, unless that's the market you are looking for to buy your imperfect products?

I may be a Apple Fan Boy, geek, and a Mac head, but I am not a total dweeb about it — thinks about it;  Anyway, I do have some issues with Apple;

• I have never understood why they do not have more USB ports, FireWire Ports, and other connections on ALL their macs — just make it standard like you did the airport card.
• Why they took away target mode.
• Why they made a laptop without accessability on it (macair)
• Why they made a smaller version of the MacAir and called it iPad and lets limit its use to certain things. (no, not an ipad fan)
• Why they took away laptop batteries for one built in that has never been tested to give the results they claim especially since the batteries they had before never gave the results they claimed.  So your telling me they got this figured out without testing it in real world use?  I don't buy, don't get it, and do not agree with it.
• Why they cannot make a laptop or computer, all in one complete with everything you can get a dell for the price of $499?  I mean, those guys are just laughing at us for spending too much money.  Hey I know we got the best and they have to buy more, but it's the idiots that they are selling to, the financially challenged, the first timers or the returning windows customers.  Can't Apple lower their prices a bit.

So as you can tell, I am not 100% sold on Apple, maybe 99.25%, but like with anything, we deal with it, we live with it, we get accustomed to it, but it sure beats dealing with the dark side.

August 2nd topics

• Matt will show us some neat tricks about browsers and website information downloading and saving — if I am correct; anyway, it is well worth the time to come and listen — Matt's demo of "1Password" was awesome last month and I am sure this will be no different.

• I will try and showcase some of the popular calendar apps, such as, iCal, Gmail-Calendar, Entourage, Hotmail, Yahoo, PreMinder, and others to remind you of important dates (we did have a question about Now-Up-to-Date to iCal and I found some interesting sites that help you do that)

• I will also cover an interesting topic about Identifying loss in available hard-drive space that Jim Heck brought to my attention; this would be a great topic for Rick Hartmann; but he is one busy person; hmmm, where have I seen that before?

• If anyone else has a topic, demo, or interesting tid bit they would like to, and are ready to, share then please let me know.  The more you all participate, the purpose of this group comes to life.

September 6th topics

• iPad demo by Matt?

• Questions and Answers

• I have a little test to give to everyone.

• If anyone else has a topic, demo, or interesting tid bit they would like to, and are ready to, share then please let me know.  The more you all participate, the purpose of this group comes to life.

Don't forget: MONDAY, AUGUST 2ndt, 2010, 7pm: LIBRARY: http://www.sierramousetrap.org/?page_id=4

Jim Heck has done a great little PDF tutorial.

iMove Slide Show Demo rev6 and review the steps to make a great movie slide show.

Mac Meeting iMovie Tutorial
As I’ve mentioned before Jim Heck did a great job on the iMovie tutorial: instigating it, putting it together, and executing it — it was no easy task.
We will do a review — as quickly as we can — and cover questions, which there are plenty of; seems we had no idea what can of worms we were opening.

Before we do the review, we have MATT VANDERPOL to discuss Password Management; He will cover both Keychain Access (built into the OS) and 1Password (purchased add-on). This is an important topic and should not be missed.

A visual tutorial of the iMovie tutorial is put together for your viewing — it’s not the best, but it will help you refresh your memory on what we covered.

WEBSITE POST: http://www.sierramousetrap.org/?p=306
TUTORIAL POST: http://sierramousetrap.org/smmug/20100503-meeting/

I will go over this in some detail in the review.

Review topics for iMovie Tutorial for JUNE 14th meeting:

√ Setting up iMovie’s preferences for optimal performance.
√ Overview of the application, such as, its window layout, buttons, and features.
√ Importing media: pictures, movies, and music.
√ Inserting the media into the time line.
√ Making edits with video.
√ Adding motion to stills — (called the Ken Burns Effect).
√ Inserting transitions: dissolves, fades, ripples, and more.
√ Inserting and adding music and sound effects.
√ Exporting to web, dvd, movie, and others.

So bring your laptops, computers, and yourself to participate in this in depth coverage of the built in — so to speak — video editing application for Mac.

Any version of iMovie will work, but we will be doing the tutorial using iMovie 09 — so don’t be shy thinking we will not cover anything you can use; don’t be quiet if you don’t understand or have a question; and don’t be square by not showing up.

The post by Jim and a sample of the movie he showed at the last meeting is located http://www.sierramousetrap.org/?p=261

NOTE: If you need more help — in the form of one on one; you can either call me, email me, or check with Jim and we can walk you through some difficulties you may be having, or there are many sites that have some answers to questions you maybe having like many others do — do not think you are the only one and don’t feel compelled to ask your question: iMovie — or for that matter anything — any application or activity is no fun when you get stuck and frustrated.

July 5th Meeting
I know it is right after the fourth and you may be tired from the long holiday — or still be on it for that matter — so we will make the July meeting one of not so complicated, as I will not have time to put something together

• Greetings (5 – 10 min)
• Q & A (15 min)
• Matt Vanderpol will do a demo on Web Page Reading Tools – focusing on Readability (http://lab.arc90.com/experiments/readability/) and Instapaper (http://www.instapaper.com/)
• Demo on working with iCal and other calendar programs (send me list of one’s you use) to create to do’s, appointments, and notifications.

August 2nd meeting

• Greetings (5 – 10 min)
• Q & A (15 min)
• New items and some not so new but still work great on the Mac.

September 6th meeting

• Greetings (5 – 10 min)
• Q & A (15 min)
• Possible guest speaker and demo of: http://macvideotraining.com/

Matt Vanderpol has an older 19″ CRT (iiYama VisionMaster Pro 450 – Review: http://www.anandtech.com/show/407) that he’s not using.

"It’s still a great monitor with fantastic color and display but it’s just too big for my desk since I got an LCD. I’d love to find a new home for it by giving it to someone rather than recycling it as ewaste.

-Matt"

Well, it has been an adventure trying to get the tutorial put together: I do not have iMovie installed on any of my Mac’s (4) — reason to be explained later — Jim has been busy working on his end of the tutorial along with his daily activities — busy man, but I finally got a hold of a computer, my daughter’s, and reenacted — for the most part — the tutorial that was done on May 3rd.

Anyway, we have a start that you can view at http://sierramousetrap.org/smmug/20100503-meeting/ please keep in mind that it is a start — it has been a few weeks and more will be added, but if you feel there is something left out or would like to more, let us know.

or you can download the pages in PDF (Portable Document File) form.
#1) 20100503_iMovie-INTRODUCTION
#2) 20100503_iPhoto_QUICK-TUTORIAL
#3) 20100503_iMovie_TUTORIAL

KEEP IN MIND:
The June meeting is JUNE 14th, and there will be a quick review of iMovie by Gerald Davenport; we will go over what Jim did so well on and just cover some of the most common and important points, as well as, go over some not so easy or well known features that will speed up your work flow.

• Also we will have Matt Vanderpol go over Password Management; He will cover both Keychain Access (built into the OS) and 1Password (purchased add-on).
This is not just useful but very important for you and your information on your computer, if you use the internet — and who doesn’t?

M³: (May Mac Meeting)
Well Jim Heck and I got together and created a nice tutorial class for the May meeting on iMovie until we discovered an issue with connecting his Intel MacBook Pro to the projector — seems we need a "Mini DisplayPort to VGA Adapter" to do this and we may have found one.

To be prepared — cause we know we will find away to connect to the projector — we are asking you to download the files from http://www.sierramousetrap.org/?p=285 (please follow directions on downloading)

TOPICS COVERED:
   √ Setting up iMovie’s preferences for optimal performance.
   √ Overview of the application, such as, its window layout, buttons, and features.
   √ Importing media: pictures, movies, and music.
   √ Inserting the media into the time line.
   √ Making edits with video.
   √ Adding motion to stills — (called the Ken Burns Effect).
   √ Inserting transitions: dissolves, fades, ripples, and more.
   √ Inserting and adding music and sound effects.
   √ Exporting to web, dvd, movie, and others.

So bring your laptops, computers, and yourself to participate in this in depth coverage of the built in — so to speak — video editing application for Mac.

Any version of iMovie will work, but we will be doing the tutorial using iMovie 09 — so don’t be shy thinking we will not cover anything you can use; don’t be quiet if you don’t understand or have a question; and don’t be square by not showing up.

The post by Jim and a sample of the movie he showed at the last meeting is located http://www.sierramousetrap.org/?p=261

Meeting agenda

• Greetings (5 – 10 min)
• Q & A (30 min)
• iMovie tutorial (1.2 hours – want to get as much time in as possible)

NOTE: And as soon as I finish it, there will be a questionnaire, kind of like the census, but about you and your Mac(s).  Nothing to provacative or revealing, just want to know how you use your Mac and what are your favorite apps and the one’s you would like to have an update for.  Again, this is coming soon and it will help us get to know what our members are doing with their Macs and how we can help them.

June Meeting (second Monday, June 14th)
The June meeting has been moved to the following monday, the second monday which is the 14th. We hope you can make it as it will be the follow up meeting to finish the iMovie tutorial.

• Greetings (5 – 10 min)
• Q & A (30 min)
• iMovie tutorial (what ever is needed)
• Q & A about iMovie, media, pictures, and ????

July meeting
As a heads up and trying to figure out what can be given as prizes, if any, I am giving notice that we will have a photo and video contest — two separate things — that will begin in July and end in August; one month, and the theme most likely will be the Fourth of July.

I want everyone to take pictures and do what you want to do to them in photoshop, iPhoto, GraphicConverter, or just leave it as is.

For those into video, make a short 3 min production either will stills and video or just video and using iMovie make it great! This is the class assignment after iMovie has been covered.

Anyone have an idea for prizes?

• Greetings (5 – 10 min)
• Discuss the Photo and Movie contests
• Q & A (30 min)
• Working with iCal or other calendar programs to create to do’s, appointments, and notifications.
• New items and some not so new but still work great on the Mac.

And in conclusion
May meeting is MONDAY the 3rd
June meeting is MONDAY 14th
July meeting is MONDAY 5th
All meetings are from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the Madelyn Helling Library, Nevada City The Madelyn Helling Library: 980 Helling Way, Nevada City 95959

peace – SMMUG Officers

Demo movie garden2 37.8mb

I-movie jpeg files (called Archive Zip) 57.3mb

Demo i movie garden xx 76.6mb

To download:

Firefox right click on link , select ‘Save Link As…’

Safari: Right Click on link, select ‘Download Linked File.’

These may take awhile. After download, Un-zip the ‘Archive.zip’ and drag the jpeg picture and movie files into iPhoto. Name the ‘untitled event’ “iMovie Demo”. Merge events if needed.

P.S. best to download files to desktop.

Thanks

Have you ever performed a ‘repair permissions’ on your hard drive. Ever gotten a message [Warning: SUID file...] or [Permissions differ...]? After a trip to the Mac store and some research I discovered these messages are ‘ok’. Well, according to Apple. Here’s a list of some of the ‘ok’ ones. “http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1448″

Gerry and I are working on a beginners Class for the May meeting; we will be showing how to use iMovie to put together a DVD slide show;  this will be a hands on demo.

Some pictures and a short video clip will be supplied, so bring your laptop to follow along. If you don’t have one I am sure you can look over someone’s shoulder to see how it is done.

We will keep this to the basics: importing the pictures and video, adding transitions, adjusting slide duration, adding music, etc. and exporting to a video DVD or other format.

The Disney movie clip was put together by my son as a first try with iMovie. When you view the short clip please note the use of transitions, Kens Burns effect (which is taking a still photograph and adding movement to it), integration of music, and the transitions in and out of the light parade video. Any questions please e-mail me (Jim Heck) or Gerry.

imovie Disney sample clip

clip credit: Jeremy Heck  WHAT THE HECK PRODUCTIONS ©2008