MAC question

[hendon]

I know my new Mac is only a little over a week old, and I know I'll get used to it, but I'm just SO frustrated and lost and panic-ed and wondering why it's meant to be better than a pc !!!!!!!!

I'm slowly plodding my way through and finding where my stuff has gone and how to open/use it, but this is currently my big panic .... on a pc, you could right click on a photo, select properties/summary/advanced - there was your camera info (exif?), author, and description - title, subject, keywords, comments. SO WHERE IS IT NOW that I've copied my photos over to the mac?!!???!! (sorry I'm yelling at the mac not you ). I've found some of the exif data under 'preview/inspector/...' and again with 'get info/more info', but none of the entries I made on the pc for title, subject, comments are there. I used it a lot to add info about my photos. I've also looked in Bridge and iPhoto but can't find it there either.

So, is it lost? is it under my nose? do I have to re-enter it (and if so where?) - maybe 'spotlight comments' under 'get info'? Is there another program/application I can open it with?

I don't like iPhoto and I don't really want to have to install new software. I just want to right click and see the info I typed in under 'comments'. Any ideas? Been there before?

Thank you for any light you can shed

[Britgirl]

I have never added titles or comment to my exif data so I cant help I'm so sorry. BUT I do want to say DONT be disillusioned with your mac. its awesome, promise. I think I say this to everyone but get the 'missing manual' book and work your way thro it. I know its a thick book, but everyday I did a little more from the book and now... wow. I still know things other mac users didnt know from just doing that. I do however remember at least two weeks of panic when I first switched to a mac -its a case of speaking 'mac' rather than Pc, they are not the same.
I dont use iphoto, I import to LR, then final edit in CS and then save each months photos in a folder...
sorry I couldnt help you with that exact problem, - apple help will tho- but anything else I will be glad ot help,. just PM me or shout out here.

[hendon]

Hey thanks Mel
Did you get 'Switching to the Mac: The Missing Manual, Snow Leopard Edition, or Mac OS X Snow Leopard: The Missing Manual ??

[DonnaNJ]

Hi Donna Just wanted to let you know that you're not alone.. I got my Mac in December and it was a bit overwhelming. Mel's advice to get the Missing Manual book is right on... it's one of the best pieces of advice I ever got. Since you just got your machine last week you'll need the Snow Leopard edition. What I did was... I read the first two chapters (I think) that basically go over the differences between Mac and PC. Then I did one thing at a time and read the part that applied to what I was doing... I moved my music so I read the music part.. then my documents, etc... because it is a huge book so it's hard to digest all at one time. I figure when I have the things I need to do down I'll go back and explore the rest. The book is great because the index allows you to look up things by what you're trying to do (ie: rename a file, EXIF data, etc) and then points you in the right direction. You also get access to a website where you can type in questions like 'Where did my EXIF data go?' and it will display a nr of posts. Also do a search on DD for different subjects there are some great posts here. I did that with 'Organize with IPhoto' and got a lot of great info like go into IPhoto and turn off the 'copy photos on import' so IPhoto only creates a link and leaves my photos where they are. HTH if you really get stuck the people here are great about helping. DonnaNJ

[anxela]

I got the "Snow Leopard: The missing manual". I considered buying "Switching from PC to mac: Missing Manual", but found out I wanted the pure mac version. I love it, and I do what Mel does - I read a little bit every day. It's also great just for reference. If I'm wondering about something, I can always find it.

[digigrandma]

Donna, not sure if I understand perfectly what information you are looking for with your photos, but, I use Bridge to view my photos after I get them on my computer. I don't import my photos to iPhoto. I import them from my camera to my desktop. Then, I put them in a folder on my desktop.

Next, Open Bridge. Navigate to the folder with the photos. Open the folder. Bridge then lets you see all the photos as thumbnails which you can make bigger or smaller; whatever you prefer.

Now, click once on a photo. It will now appear in a little preview window. In Snow Leopard the preview window is on your right.

Now, look at the side bar on your left. You will see a window with lots of information about your photo. Scroll down to see all the information from your camera about the photo.

If I want to open the photo to work with it, I double click on it. It then opens with PSE 8.0 for me. You probably are using CS4.

Sorry, I don't tag my files so I can't help with that.

Donna, stick with it! It will all be worth it. Your Mac will keep working beautifully for you. I have never upgraded to a newer Mac because my old one didn't work. It has always been because they come out with a newer model with more capabilities. My dh is now using my old laptop and it is 10 years old!

Maybe that is the info you are looking for?

[Chris]

I agree with Mel about the missing manual book. I read the first half and used the rest as I needed the info. I keep meaning to finish it because it has so much information that I don't think about until I read it.
What program did you write your info to the photos? My computer was so old I could only do it in Photoshop. I assume it's still there, but I have way too many photos since moving to Mac or I'd check. I do remember the frustration!

[HeatherPrins]

Did you know that over time all those folders on your desktop will slow down your computer? Iphoto is truly the best way to sort and store your photos, its designed for that. We use LR on a separate hard drive to edit (the external drive acts as a back-up), then put them in iphoto. Iphoto also has facial recognition, gps data, slideshow creation, info and the EXIF data is also available here, by the way EXIF data is also able to be viewed by pressing command i on the image file.

[anxela]

One little thing about viewing metadata in Bridge: It might be that you don't have your metadata panel open. If not, go to "Window" in the menu bar an tick the "Metadata" box.

Your title should be present in that metadata panel under "IPTC Core"

Hope that helps!

[digigrandma]

Thanks, Heather, for pointing that out about the folders of photos slowing down the computer.

Just to clarify:
I don't keep my photos in folders on the desk top for long. They are deleted from my desktop after I save them to an EHD and burn them to a CD or DVD and upload them to Shutterfly. I do this weekly or even more often if I am taking lots of photos. I really don't like to slow down my computer, either, Heather!

I keep a few favorites in iPhoto for slide shows. I just would rather edit in PSE than in iPhoto.

I use Bridge to view and delete the photos that I don't think are good enough to keep because I never delete photos from the memory stick while the memory stick is in the camera. I take off the photos that are keepers and then put the memory stick back in the camera and delete the whole batch (the good and the bad) using the reformat feature. This erases the memory stick clean and from what I've been able to learn it is the best way to delete your photos instead of deleting as you go in the camera.

[HeatherPrins]

yes slow = LOL

[Chris]

Donna, I now know what you mean by exif files and just wrote to one of my photos on my pc laptop and brought it into mac. I tried to view the title etc. that I wrote and can't see it in any of my programs (can see the camera data though), so even though it's probably still there (for windows) it might be unreadable on the mac. I know these things are frustrating.

I've held on to my pc for this very problem, reading old files and programs mac doesn't carry, and I choose not to divide and bring windows into my macs. I probably will always be a mac/windows person. lol

[FlowerGirl]

Not sure if someone said this, but you can click 'command i' to get the info for any photo or file.

[hendon]

Thank you all for you help. I know how to find most of the exif data, it's just this specific part that seems to be lost in cyberspace .

This is it shown in windows, but I guess if you haven't been using windows you won't have any data there!

I know there are other programs I might have to get used to like iPhoto or Bridge, this was just a nice easy way for me to attach info to a photo, and it's just the way I'm used to. I store my photos in 'Pictures', then just have a folder for each year [recent stuff] or by person for heritage stuff. It was useful in particular for adding info to old scanned heritage photos - perhaps adding who the original [professional] photographer had been, whose 21st or wedding they were celebrating, who some of my nana's old friends in the photo were, and also source documents/web sites where I had gotten certain genealogy pictures/documents, etc. {And I now find my 'Family Tree Maker' software doesn't have a mac version either].
I guess I just felt like all my important info was somehow more 'attached' to the photo this way.

Anyway, I guess I just have to keep looking for somewhere else to store this, although I'm obviously going to have to re-enter it all manually.

Thanks for your help and thoughts.

[Chris]

When I was on Windows, I hadn't been long on a digital camera when I switched my main use of the computer to Mac and didn't know this little nugget existed, now you've introduced me to it and I've tried it, I'm kind of sad it isn't on the Mac., it's so nice and easy.

[mommydawn]

can't add much more than above but to be patient! I switched completely to mac Sept of 08. Took about 3-4 months to completely adjust, but now, OMG...will NEVER go back and cringe when my husband or kids call me for help on the pc. I now have not only the macpro I first started with but the macbookpro and am caving and switching to an iphone this week (was stalling for verizon but not going to happen).

so hang in, get the books and you will eventually be VERY happy!

[anxela]

Did you try opening your photos in Bridge and looking under "IPTC Core" in the Metadata panel? All your highlighted fields are present about my photos in Bridge. I was so sure that would do the trick... It would be interesting to know if it worked.

[sam ellis]

Firstly let me say I LOVE MY MAC - but I can so remember feeling very frustrated and it was a super challenge at the time.

I was wondering if ANYONE knows how to sort out my one issue with Mac. I am a "watch my hands" typist and the CAPS lock is often on and I only realise after a while.
On my PC I could shift.F3 and poef like magic. Anyone ???? I will truly love you forever.

[echogirl]

Sam
Great questions. I don't know the answer but until you do if you go to
System Preferences>keyboard>modifier keys under the caps lock key you can select 'no action' and then even if you hit caps lock it won't DO THIS TO YOUR TYPING!
Hope that helps,

[anxela]

...And that, of course, can be done for all the modifiers. You can remap to other keys as well. So if you want the CTRL-key on your mac to hold the CMD-key functions - in other words feel like on Windows, you can do that too. There are probably many that keep hitting CTRL instead of CMD when they are switching to mac - I know I did!

[anxela]

I was too curious to wait for your answer, so I tried adding a title to a photo using "properties" in Windows in Parallels Desktop. It showed up under "IPTC Core" in the Metadata panel in Bridge. Hope you get it to work!

If not, you could always use Windows on Parallels (virtual machine running Windows simultaneously on your mac, like any program. Great if you're used to ACDSee and want to keep that until they come with the first non-beta version for Mac)

[hendon]

Originally Posted by anxela

I was too curious to wait for your answer, so I tried adding a title to a photo using "properties" in Windows in Parallels Desktop. It showed up under "IPTC Core" in the Metadata panel in Bridge. Hope you get it to work!

If not, you could always use Windows on Parallels (virtual machine running Windows simultaneously on your mac, like any program. Great if you're used to ACDSee and want to keep that until they come with the first non-beta version for Mac)

Hey thanks for your continued efforts on my behalf Anxela . You're right, I can add that information to my photos in the ITPC Core section of the Metadata panel in Bridge. It won't, however import that information from my windows files. So I will have to re-enter the details, but at least I have a place to store it that I'm happy with. Once it's entered there it also shows up with 'command i' (although it's not edit-able from there). And I also found a place to store 'source' type information for my genealogy stuff too, so I'm pleased.

I've ordered the switching to MAC book from amazon - I can't believe it's not available in New Zealand yet.

I'd also like to announce that I LOVE MY MAC! I know there's a lot I have to get used to but I just so enjoy using it. I had to do some stuff on my windows notebook the other night and I was tearing my hair out! And I've already gotten so used to using the MAC that I was having trouble using the pc - I kept pressing wrong buttons and getting frustrated not being able to do stuff 'like I do on the MAC'! I think that's hilarious!

So if you've been thinking about changing but were too scared - believe me when I say it's worth the initial frustration and confusion. (That's coming from a [previously] die-hard pc user).

[anxela]

I'm so glad you worked it out, and that you are getting used to your Mac!

[mela280]

Hi Donna,

I moved from PC to Mac about a year ago and love my Mac (still PC based at work). All my photos had their keywords in the Organizer section of Photoshop Elements, which uses full IPTC [as does Bridge] and ALL the metadata moved over. That said, sadly there is no fix for you. While it may look like it, Windows Explorer (whcih is where it looks like you entered your data) does not support IPTC, which is the standard across platforms. Windows Explorer uses its own, proprietary set of metadata (your title, subject, keywords, comments), and an image can have both IPTC and Windows meta data, independent of each other. That's why you're only getting some of the data (the IPTC camera info) but not all the stuff you added to your photos. The intention behind this was probably that you can enter your own meta data in Explorer without destroying existing IPTC information. I'm thinking that if if you were still on your PC and imported your photos into PSE Organizer, Picasa or ACDSee you'd likely find the same problem. Sorry for the disappointing news. Please don't give up on the Mac. I'm a data analyst, spend all day on the computer, and I've found it to be all around a far better operating.