Fonts. You can't live with them, you can't kill them. A system heavy with installed fonts is slow to start up and can also see slow downs in applications that load your installed font list like Word or Photoshop. There are lots of font managers out there, but the commercial applications are usually overkill for a photographer and a lot of the free ones lack the ability to load a font on the fly. Today, we recommend to you Linotype FontExplorer X, a freeware font manager for Windows and Mac OS X.

This little freeware goody will not only allow you to load fonts on the fly, it also has a very iTunes like ability to create sets of fonts to organize your collection. You can create a simple set that will allow you to drag and drop fonts in to, or you can create a smart set based on a number of criteria like name, postscript name, font family and so forth. Add to this the ability to compare multiple fonts at once and it becomes all that a photographer or photo lab needs to manage a large font collection. This one has become one of the standard install items in the lab and though it is listed as being a beta application we love it here.

To go with your new found font manager have a look at this zip collection of freeware fonts. This 108 MB file contains over 4,700 freeware fonts from various sources on the Internet.

I downloaded that 108 MB zip file of fonts and discovered my first problem with this application. It doesn't do large imports without crashing. I got around this limitation by importing 2 folders at a time, setting my import to skip fonts already imported and it worked just fine. This was also a reminder to me that the program does not like OpenType fonts. There is another little dinger for you.

Here are the known issues for the beta:

Known Problems

Restrictions:
The functionality of the FontExplorer X is severely limited under Windows Vista due to issues with user privileges. For this same reason, a user with limited privileges and in the Admin free mode may also experience problems under Windows XP.

Export Error:
Errors occur when exporting the preview of a non-TrueType font to a PDF.

Linotype Font Store:
If the Internet connection is interrupted while surfing in the Store, the Store will no longer function even when the connection is restored. In this case, FontExplorer X should be restarted.
Jumping to the previous or next page is not always correct; therefore functionality of the back and forward buttons is limited.

XTensions/Plug-Ins:
There are some known problems with auto activation in the QuarkXPress XTensions and discrepancies in functional consistency with the Adobe Plug-Ins.

Cosmetics
Manual sorting of Folders and Sets in the source list is difficult. This will be improved in a later version.
Occasionally the focus is incorrect which may result in information not being updated at all or with delay.
When activating a single part of a TrueType Collection, the path may be incorrectly set and the status incorrectly displayed.
The font preview can be lost after multiple activation and deactivation of TrueType Collections and System fonts. This behavior can be resolved by restarting the FontExplorer X.
Performance issues with TrueType Collections while displaying Information/Characters.
Performance in the WYSIWYG Font list and maintaining WYSIWYG view following selection of a font needs to be optimized.

Technorati : Font, Font Viewer

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OpenOffice.org is the open source (free) alternative to Microsoft Office. I know that this seems like a cheap out doing both a Mac and a Windows download together, but this one is certainly worthy. OpenOffice is standard software that we install on all of our new computers at the lab. Our office needs for the most part are slight and I always found swallowing the $300+ price tag of MS Office to be very difficult.

Given it's ability to open, edit and save in to MS Office formats without the high price tag of a Microsoft suite is the huge claim to fame for this software. It's OpenOffice formats are gaining in popularity, but native MS Office files are still the worldwide standard in office files. While OpenOffice is missing any kind of an Outlook replacement it certainly covers the other major applications in the MS suite. Here is how the two compare:

OpenOffice Writer –> Word
OpenOffice Impress –> Powerpoint
OpenOffice Base –> Access
OpenOffice Calc –> Excel

OpenOffice also includes a Draw program which I will admit that I have never even used. Of the four listed above I use them all, with Writer and Calc being my most heavily used. Keeping in mind that I am a photographer and photo lab manager, not an accountant I have yet to run in to any kind of compatibility issue at all. Everything that I have been sent, and everything that I have created and saved in to MS format has just worked.

I also don't mind the missing Outlook alternative since I have started using Google Apps for my domain email hosting. The online nature of the service coupled with a local download of all mail in to the equally open source Thunderbird email client and I haven't opened Outlook in about 3 months. I keep my calendar now in my Treo and sync to Palm Desktop for a local backup.

The official OpenOffice release for Mac OS X is an X11 package and as is typical in this scenario it is barely usable. NeoOffice is a full Aqua port of OpenOffice for Mac and is actually seeing faster releases than the main OO.org releases. Follow the links below for more information or to download either.

OpenOffice for Windows & Linux
NeoOffice for OS X – Aqua

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Probably shouldn't have titled this "download of the week" because that implies that I will do this every week. I'll try.

I hate Windows Explorer. Not for what is wrong with it but for what it doesn't do. My biggest complaint is having multiple windows open to do drag and drop functions between folders. I tried a number of free replacements that offered tabbed windows but just never found >the one<.

This is Ultra Explorer, a free tabbed interface replacement for Windows Explorer. I have pretty much settled on this one for all of my uses as it is light on resources, tabs as mentioned and other extras like favorites and history. It is also much faster browsing network shares at the lab compared to WE. I don't know why, but network drives in UE load in a snap. There is always a 10 or 15 second delay with WE. You can download for yourself from: Ultra Explorer from Mustang Peak

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I gave idImager a look several years ago when I trying to decide on a move from ACDSee 4. I don't use a photo browser for many tasks, but the ones that I use I really do need. For sorting and rating images as well as assigning keywords for searching and editing IPTC info I do rely on a good photo browser every day. I had used CompuPic but hated the missing features that I needed as well as a total lack of RAW file support. The fact that Photodex abandoned the product didn't help matters for me.

In searching for a replacement or an upgrade I did download and try idImager back in 2004 but took a pass on it for IMatch instead. I liked IMatch at the start, but abandoned it after a year and went to ACDSee 5. A week or so ago I got an email from idImager announcing their new FREE Lite version of their software. I didn't go and get it for several days because I just didn't think I would care. I have been mostly happy with XnView and ACDSee though I have again had the itch to look. Finally I went and got the Lite version and was sadly let down. Slow, buggy and disappointing. Then another email arrived in the middle of the week that announced another new version. What a difference a few weeks make. I installed the Lite version on all of my workstations and set about giving it a ring. Here are some of the highlights that I like.

 Looks just like a typical photo browser. Tasks panes to the left, basic tools on top and images in the middle. The main browser window can be customized to display custom thumb sizes and caption data as well as to change the background color and the thumb frame style and color. The main screen has a file info section along the bottom task bar that gives you location, resolution and creator info from EXIF. No real surprises here, but the default setup uses colored tabs on the info panes and has a very annoying large up folder icon in the browser window. Once I made it look OK I started looking at some of my key needs in a browser.

Sadly it is not as fast at loading thumbs as either ACDSee or XnView. It is not painfully slow, but it is also not "instant" as the other two at least feel to me. It is color management aware and is quite good with rendering color, even in Kodak .dcr files which are notoriously horrible for browsers to display. In this regard, idImager is the best that I have used. Fair trade for me in terms of thumb loading vs. thumb quality.

As you can see on the middle thumb idImager uses a dual rating system. In the green bar to the left is a yellow dot for the 5 color rating system and it also has a 5 star system. You can use one or the other, or use both for two different rating systems. Though really difficult to see here, along the bottom of each thumb there are quick tools to describe the image, change it's catalog assignment and to show a quick preview. The nice thing about the preview feature is that it opens both a full preview as well as a 100% crop.

The task panes seemed odd to me at first, but I adjusted to the change very quickly. I am very used to window tabs being located at the bottom. It does contain both a full EXIF window as well as an EXIF Summary tab. Very nice feature for me. By clicking on the image details tab you open up the IPTC editor window. You can individually caption your images in this window, or make a selection of images in the browser window and edit the details there. The Lite version allows XMP read and write but is not extensible. You can add or remove tabs from the main window, but I haven't yet found an easy way to change the order of the tabs. Still looking for that one, though not very hard. Here is a screen of the IPTC editor for the single image mode:

And here is the screen of the multi image IPTC editor:

These two items are big on my hit list. If you don't need them I understand, but if you do need these features and use them regularly idImager has the best free IPTC editor that I have ever seen. I'm going to stop with the big screen captures and continue with other likes thus far.

• Integrated CD/DVD burner worked very well for the few disks that I needed to make.
• Search feature was right on the money. I was able to quickly locate several images that I needed.
• Email images, while low on my list, is very well done.
• While thumb loading is slowish, it worked very quickly compared to others at browsing network drives.
• As just noted, network aware. Very nice (must have) feature.
• Integrated downloader is a very nice touch and worked very well for me. I haven't used downloaders because I just never found one that I liked. This one might win me over.
• Calendar view, while kind of a gimmick to me is actually a nice added touch.
• Integrated image editor provides a fairly quick full view and has all of the usual suspects in terms of tools. The full view window also has an editor for image details. No real opinion here yet as I haven't had a chance to make use of the tools.

Dislikes thus far.

• Slow thumbnail creation. Not the slowest I have ever seen, but much slower than ACDSee and XnView as well as my very old copy of CompuPic Pro. Not a show stopper for me, but something that I would like to see improve.
• Somewhat heavy on the RAM. Again, not the worst that I have seen, but far from the best.
• Slow startup time can be an issue. I wouldn't let something like that stop me from using it but it might just annoy you to no end.
• Inability to customize the main title bar above the image browser window.
• Inability to edit the tool bar. They might say that all of the available tools are included which is fine, but I would like to reorder the tool bar a bit. Again, far from a show stopper.
• Light table in the free version is limited to two images. If you want more, buy one of the paid versions.
• Slide show tool, while nice, is slow.

idImager won me over with this Lite version. So much so that I am trying their Professional version and will buy it when my 21 day trial expires in a week or so. I have long wanted something better than I had and while idImager Lite doesn't fill the void totally it certainly comes much closer than many I have tried in the past. It is clearly better than the free browsers that I have tried and also beats many paid options as well. To me it is better than ACDSee 8 (my last), Breeze Browser, CompuPic (not a real contest) IMatch and ACDSee Pro. As an avid and heavy user of the ExpressDigital software my needs for an image browser are fairly limited. Until something better comes along this free version of idImager will take over my daily needs.

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Posted 10/17/06: I signed up for Google apps for your domain a long while ago but never did anything with it. I didn’t mind if Gmail hosted the POP portion of the server but I didn’t want my outgoing mail server to show as gmail.com. We don’t host our web server or mail server in house because I have no knowledge nor do I want any. Spam was largely under control for us, but over the last 3 or 4 weeks it had really gotten out of hand. I get 60 or 70 emails a day that I need for business in my main email account and the 50-100 or so spam messages a day were really becoming a drag. Not only does it clog up Outlook, but it really hoses my Treo in box.

I bit the bullet and set up the Google service. I did test it to see if I could continue to use my own domain SMTP server and when I found that would work I set Gmail up to be my POP server. All is now quiet on the spam front. The stock alert emails and oil scams that were easily passing through Spamassasin have not found their way through the Gmail filters. Here are my mail stats for the three days that I have been using Gmail for my POP server:

• Total email messages (Spam/Not spam): 471
• Total messages caught by spam filter: 296
• Total false positives (non-spam collected by spam filter): ZERO
• Total spam messages missed by spam filter: ZERO
• Total email delivered to in box/Outlook/Treo: 175

Spamassasin had very, very few false positives as well. I would say less than 1 in 100, but it would pass through about 30% of the spam messages a day. Not good. Not good at all.

If you are like me and don’t want the hassle or the headache of hosting your own mail server look at the Gmail solution. You can change the MX record of your server to allow Gmail to collect mail sent to your domain and use your domain server for outgoing mail. Setup was quick and took less than 15 minutes. We were all set and ready to roll in about 30 minutes.

UPDATE 10/31/06: I have lost track of the totals. Thousands of emails across all of our addresses. 70/30 split favoring SPAM still. We have had 5 false positives and 17 SPAM messages passed through. Google Apps has a significantly lower false positive rate and has passed through far fewer actual SPAM messages. No longer perfect, but a monster leap forward from what we had been using. My Treo has had one (1) SPAM message since we changed the server over.

Technorati : Gmail, Google, SPAM

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I found out about Filmloop.com on the Guy Kawasaki blog. His VC firm invested in them and he made mention of them one day because of this new feature where you could enter a search term and the “loop” would download images and links from eBay based on what you entered. I thought that it was pretty neat so I downloaded it.

I used it to make a loop of images from the school play for my daughter to share with her friends. Then my wife is sharing it with her friends. The thing just took off. I was impressed, but saw no real use for the thing other than to share snapshots. Then I got a call from a friend.

A long time friend said that he was getting a lot of grief from one of his soccer leagues to hand over action images for the front page of their website. Naturally he didn’t want to do. I told him about this Filmloop.com. He loved the idea. He takes about 20 of the best shots each week, adds a big fat watermark and then adds them to the loop, removing some previous pictures. Moms can add comments, and yes, save the low resolution watermarked file to their desktop.

What good came of it? His online sales from the league are way up. Not quit his day job up, but up.

No, I am not suggesting that I think that everyone should use Filmloop to share images. I’m not going to start doing this, but as more and more leagues demand more and more in terms of access to image files it will be up to all of us to find a solution that works best for us while still keeping the league president happy. Just a thought.

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