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Transferring photos to your iPod
by Dean Mortlock
09.01.07 |
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iPods will accept pictures as JPEGs, TIFFs, PNGs, BMPs or GIFs, but don’t worry if your images are a different format as it’s very straightforward to convert them. On a Mac, drag and drop the file into Preview (which you should have on your Dock), go to File > Save as and then save it out as something that iPhoto will recognise. On a PC you can open the image in Windows Picture Viewer (right-click on your image and go to Open With > Windows Picture and Fax Viewer) and then click on the disc icon on the bottom list to save the image out in a different file format.
TRANSFERRING IMAGES
Now it’s time to get the images ready to be transferred, so let’s start with iPhoto on the Mac (image 1). Because they’re both part of the iLife suite of software, it’s unsurprising to discover that the transfer of photos from iPhoto to iTunes and then onto your iPod is extremely straightforward. As you probably won’t want to transfer across your entire iPhoto library (ours currently stands at nearly 4,000 photos), it’s worth setting up an album of your favourites. iPhoto works in a very similar way to iTunes, so creating albums, moving files around and editing them is practically the same as iTunes’ playlists. You can even add various tags to your images and create Smart Playlists – although they’re called Smart Albums in iPhoto.
If anything, setting up an images folder on a PC is even easier. First you need to create a folder for your iPod photos, so you might as well do that in My Pictures (unless you use a program such as Adobe Photoshop Album). Then simply copy the files into it and you’re ready to go.
When you’ve got your photos folder ready on your PC or Mac it’s then time to set up iTunes, so open the software up, connect your iPod and click on the Photos tab (image 2). The first thing you need to do is work out the source for your photo. Click on ‘Sync photos from’ and then pick the folder or program that contains the images you want to sync. If you’re going to be syncing from a folder, then it should be straightforward enough to find the one you need. If you’re going through a program like iPhoto for example, select that and then choose to either sync your entire photo library or pick from a selection of albums.
When iTunes has transferred all the photos across to your iPod, you’re then free to disconnect it and view your photos. Select Photos from the main menu and then you’re faced with an impressive range of options. The quickest way to view a photo is to go to the library and just scroll through the thumbnails until you find the photo you’re looking for. If you look at the top of the screen, it’ll display the month and year that the photo was taken, so that might make it easier to find what you want. When you’ve picked one it’ll be displayed for as long as you want it to (image 3), but when you’re ready for a change you can skim through your photo library by using the scroll wheel. If you’d rather go slowly though, just press on the forward and backward buttons to go one photo at a time. Finally, if at any point you want to start a slideshow from the photo that’s currently being displayed, just press the play button.
SLIDESHOW
Looking through your library and selecting individual images is easy enough, but it’s the Slideshow function that everyone will normally head to. You can start a slideshow at any time by pressing the play button, but it’s worth looking at the Slideshow Settings before you do. Here you can alter the time each photo is displayed, change the music playing in the background, shuffle them and change the way they flip from one to another.
And that’s it. Simple, wasn’t it? Now you’ve done the basics though, it’s time to get creative and see how your iPod’s ability to display photos can be used in many creative and original ways.
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1. Tick on ‘Include full-resolution photos’ in iTunes’ preferences and the software will automatically store them in the Photos folder on your iPod’s hard drive – make sure you enable disc use to find them. |
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2. If you get Apple’s AV TV cable, then you can connect your iPod to a television to display your photo collection, complete with slideshow effects and the music of your choice. |
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3. You can add new photos to the folder that iTunes syncs with at any point, and when you next connect your iPod to your computer, iTunes will automatically transfer them across. |
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