Mac Soda

iLife 09 came, and I am partly amazed, and partly disappointed. Here’s the rundown…

iMovie 09: iMovie is amazing. While I wasn’t a big fan of the last overhaul, its clear that that it was paving the way for this iMovie. With amazingly advanced features, such as quality filters, precision trim and stabilization, it easily takes the cake as the best entry level editing program. On top of that, it is downright gorgeous. The menus, the core animation, and the overall look and feel is simply stunning. You really need to see it for yourself. Overall score: 5.

iPhoto 09: Faces is awesome. Places is average. While I’m sure for some places will be amazing, for me, so far, its not that big of a deal. On the other hand, the face detection technology in iPhoto is revolutionary. Tagging faces is a breeze, and it does an excellent job detecting people. The only problem I’ve found with it is when someone’s head is titled to the side, it tends to throw it off, and when you take pictures at a sporting event, it can get a little irritating when every face in the background is tagged. Also, like iMovie, the interface is top-notch. Ultimately, Faces alone makes this iPhoto upgrade successful. Overall: 5, because of Faces.

iWeb 09: Disappointing. The potential Apple has with iWeb is extremely high, but they’re blowing it. It seems as though they put very little effort into this upgrade, as only two new themes have been added. The overall look and feel is very much improved over the past version, and domain name support has been worked on, but that’s not enough to convince me to leave WordPress yet. Overall: 2.5.

Garageband 09: So in a nutshell, this update to garageband is stellar. The lessons are very interesting, the create a new project menu has been updated to look more like Logic (in a very good way), but most importantly, the interface has been perfected. It is off-the-hook unbelievable. I had a ton of issues with the last Garageband, and this is unreal what they’ve done. Seriously. If you use Garageband, this is enough reason to buy iLife 09. Overall: 5, hands down.

iDVD 09: Apple didn’t even add a few new themes. Its exactly the same as the last one. What a shame Apple. Overall: 0.

So those are my first impressions of the program. If you have any questions, please leave them in the comments and I’ll address them. Overall, I have to say the 79 dollars is more than worth it. Buy it now, unless the only application you use is iDVD.