TUAW Tip: Make iPhone ringtones with GarageBand

An earlier post about PocketMac Ringtone Studio for iPhone reminded me of how I put together ringtones for my iPhone. I just fire up GarageBand and iTunes, do a little quick magic, and out come the ringtones I want.This doesn't work with protected files such as those you've purchased from the iTunes Store -- hell, Apple wants you to spend $0.99 for the tune and another $0.99 to turn it into a ringtone. The method described here works very well turning those CD snippets that you've ripped into iTunes into ringtones. Follow along after the break for the step-by-step.Continue reading TUAW Tip: Make iPhone ringtones with GarageBandPermalink | Email this | Comments

Excerpt: Learn GarageBand tips and tricks

It’s no secret that GarageBand is entry-level music editing software. But at the same time, GarageBand can perform feats that aren’t immediately obvious. In this excerpt from Take Control of Recording with GarageBand, Jeff Tolbert shares some tips and tricks for the music-creation software.

Possibly restore older iPhoto themes in iPhoto '08

Upon trying to create a book in iPhoto '08, I noticed a lot of the old themes were not available. Browsing around, I found the theme folder for iPhoto in the top-level Library folder, in Application Support » iPhoto » Themes. Inside that folder were many themes not available through iPhoto itself, but that were available in older versions. As one example, BabyBoy-Hardcover.IPBookTheme isn't available in the list of book themes pop-up menu, but it is in that folder. I can't guarantee how safe/legal the following process is, but I was able to enable the old themes by editing a parameter in that theme's Contents/Resources folder. I opened Contents » Resources » Implementation.plist in a text editor (or Property List Editor) and changed the Hidden parameter from yes to no. After saving my changes and restarting iPhoto, the old theme was available in iPhoto. [robg adds: I used BBEdit and ran a multi-file search to find the hidden th...

What iDVD '08 Compression Options Really Mean

Every time I've used iDVD '08 and reached the point of checking the Project Info pane's Encoding options, they never make complete sense, even after searching the web for answers. I'm in the process of transferring my Laserdiscs to DVDs and have now built up enough experience that I think I've figured this all out. Here's what seems to be going on.The gist of the confusion about encoding is that the word "quality" is used in two different ways. There is the quality of the rendered video to be burned on the DVD, which is really what is important. But, unfortunately, the word quality also appears in the naming of the compression algorithms used, Best Quality and Professional Quality. This latter use is ill-advised, because the amount of compression applied to your video may or may not affect the quality of the video you end up with.We all understand the meaning of picture quality, and iDVD '08 usefully indicates final DVD video quality via a color grading scale, from g...

Briefly: iPhone ads, iPhone Firmware, iLife, Airport updates

Apple has posted three new iPhone ads on its web site as well as updates for the iPhone software (+SDK) and iLife updates read more

Apple issues quartet of iLife '08 updates

Apple on Tuesday afternoon released four patches for its iLife '08 creative suite that touch on iMovie, iPhoto, iWeb, and the supporting infrastructure. iLife Support 8.3 Apple's most universal of the new updates, iLife Support 8.3 (10MB) is sa...