Intro to PJ Remix webinars

This week we've been holding "Intro to PJ remix" webinars for those who contacted us but missed out on our first series.

Well we've two more planned for this week but they're not quite full yet, so we thought we'd open them up to everyone.

Here are the dates and times:

Session one

NEW ZEALAND (Auckland): Wednesday 10th December at 9:00 AM

AUSTRALIA (NSW): Wednesday 10th December at 7:00 AM

UK: Tuesday 9th December at 8:00 PM

USA East Coast (EST): Tuesday 9th December at 3:00 PM

USA West Coast (PST): Tuesday 9th December at 12:00 noon

For other time zones click here

Session Two

NEW ZEALAND (Auckland): Thursday 11th December at 11:00 AM

AUSTRALIA (NSW): Thursday 11th December at 9:00 AM

UK: Wednesday 10th December at 10:00 PM

USA East Coast (EST): Wednesday 10th December at 5:00 PM

USA West Coast (PST): Wednesday 10th December at 2:00 PM

For other time zones click here

There are 15 spots left on both sessions so just like last time it's first in first served. Questions welcome. Flick me an email telling me which session you'd like to attend and I'll book your spot.

Be quick

Cheers, Nigel

All taken care of

Ian likes his car. It feels like the manufacturers had him in mind when they designed it. It feels good. It seems to know what he needs. It thinks for him. It's a pleasure to drive.

Enough about Ian's car, but if you read this blog regularly you'll know we want PJ Remix to be like that: to think like you, look out for you, be a pleasure to drive.

For example, when you're working with lots of images it can get tricky keeping track of the ones you've used in your album design, so Remix remembers the images you've used and highlights their filenames for you, like this. Pretty smart ha?

Unused versus Used...

HTH, Nigel

Psst... Ian didn't realise we'd done this, and reported the new feature as a bug ;-)

How to watch on Vimeo

If you've already checked out the Photojunction channel on Vimeo, you may have been wishing, like me, that the video was better quality! Well it is. Here's what to do. First, get into full-screen mode by clicking on the little button in the very bottom right-hand corner of the screen (above).

Then, make sure your settings look like they do on the left. In other words, HD is on and scaling is off (if you can't see the controls, roll over the video area with your mouse and they'll appear).

Once you do that your video will look like the introductory webinar we recorded (below – click on the image to see it in all its glory: much better quality!)

HTH, Ian

PS Even in a busy airport lounge with gazillions of people on the wireless connection, the video played back well. Thank you Vimeo.

Intro to PJ webinar now online

Just quietly, our first crack at hosting webinars was pretty successful. We had heaps of interest and received some really great feedback. We also had lots of requests to record them and make them available online to watch. So here you go...

Click here to watch an 'Intro to PJ' webinar (59mins)

We've only uploaded one of the four webinars we ran because they all covered the same content.

You'll hear Danny and I answering questions that attendees were asking via a chat function (much like Sykpe). You won't see the questions or comments that came in during the webinar but you'll get the gist of them by the way they're answered.

Enjoy it and hope to see you at future webinars!

Cheers, Nigel

PJ Webinars

In case you didn't get our email, we're running FREE HOUR-LONG INTRODUCTORY WEBINARS with Danny showing you how to fire up the software and start using it.

What's great about this is that you can see Danny demonstrating on your own computer screen, hear him talking and ask questions via chat or a headset mic.

We had a great response to our last invitation and all four sessions filled up really fast.

If you didn't get a spot we don’t want you to miss out, so we’re going to run a couple of extras in the near future. If you'd like to join in please email me and let me know. I’ll send an invitation when we have finalised times and dates.

In the meantime - if you've got an suggestions for topics you'd like us to cover in future webinars, please leave a comment and let us know.

Cheers, Nigel

PS If you didn't get the email and would like to be notified of upcoming webinars email me and I'll put you on the list.

WIPR: Cheeky

Ed te Pas used his photoshop skills for this cheeky image.

Thanks again mate.

Danny (and Team PJ)

Drag and drop faster

Here's a wee tip about something I never noticed before. Now that I have, I notice it all the time! Or rather the time it saves me...

You can set a default aperture size in Photojunction so that whenever you drag a new image onto a layout, it defaults to the size you specify instead of the standard 7x5. Pretty handy if you use one size a fair bit - saves you having to resize heaps of apertures!

Open the PJ preferences and under the Supplier option, you can choose whatever size you like from the drop down box.

HTH

PS • If what you want to do is drag the same size as the last aperture you added, here's how.

WIPR: Lyttelton

Johannes and Jo of Moda Fotografica  sent this clever shot through to us.

I was lucky enough to try their local Lyttelton coffee shop when I was speaking at an NZIPP meeting a few months back, and the coffee much, like the town, was just charming.

Thanks guys!

Danny (and Team PJ)

WIPR: Growth Rings

We asked some of our friends to help us get some shots of PJ in their corner of the world.

Here's your first installment of "Where Is PJ Remix?"

Angelique Buckley of mk photography, one of our dedicated beta testers, took this wonderful shot for us of "Growth Rings" by Kate Kaman in Philadelphia.

Angelique said, "It seemed like the perfect spot to put the button. I see these circles everyday, so it was the first thing I thought of when I received the letter asking for a photo of the button in "my neck of the woods". It also seemed so appropriate given how far the application has come."

Doing my research I also found this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kG6hbXuqh8Q

Thanks again Angelique!

Cheers
Danny (and Team PJ)

Registering for the first time

Hi everyone, there has been some understandable confusion because when you open PJ Remix for the first time it asks you to register "either a full version or a 30 day trial version". That's out of date now but we can't do anything about it until we release a new version. That won't be long, but it's confusing meantime.

We've uploaded a brief movie to show how it works, but here's a brief run-through.

Click the "Click Here To Register" button in the Registration Window. That will open your web browser and take you to the secure Queensberry server to set up an account so you can register (you won't need to buy anything). You will need to be online (to register off-line computers, see below).

If you already have an account, but don't know the details, click the link for us to email your details.

Once you're done setting up your account, go back to the Remix Registration Window, click the Get Unlock Code Online button and you'll be good to go for 12 months.

The picture above shows what the window looks like when you're done.

HTH, Ian

We’ve gone global

In the past 12 hours or so we've had software downloads from the following countries (lucky we upgraded our server):

United States
United Kingdom
Australia
Canada
Italy
Ireland
Japan
Malaysia
Portugal
Philippines
New Zealand
Spain
Mexico
France
Switzerland
Austria
Singapore
Netherlands
Puerto Rico
Hong Kong
India
China
Russia
Fiji
Romania
Norway
United Arab Emirates
Germany
Poland
Brazil
Latvia
Nigeria

Plus 14% "unknown" ;-)

Free to all

The best album design software is now free to all.

The Directors of Queensberry and Photojunction are delighted to announce a major change of direction for Photojunction.

Effective immediately PJ Remix is a free download for photographers everywhere. The “price” will be to register with Queensberry and allow us to send you a monthly message.

Click here to download the free software now.

• Photojunction will continue to enable third-party album resources as well as the “DIY” functionality that allows users to design un-matted layouts sized for any vendor.

• Software support and training will be available free via the Photojunction website, support forum and blog. One-on-one support, including by email, will be on a paid basis (US$ 99.00 for twelve months).

• Existing subscriptions will continue on exactly the same basis as now until they expire, including one-on-one support.

• Subject to a more relaxed minimum purchase requirement, Queensberry customers will qualify for free one-on-one support. As in the past, purchase of a Starter Kit will be required to become a Queensberry album client.

This marks a new beginning for PJ Remix, but the end for our long-standing "supplier-independent" business model, which has been stifling the software. Instead, Photojunction will in effect be progressively integrated with Queensberry as a sub brand.

As part of the Queensberry group, Photojunction will have three goals going forward:

1. To build a great in-house development and support team.
2. To maintain our standing as the most powerful album design software available, and build an active user community around the free software.
3. To develop a dedicated, intuitive, hassle-free workflow for all Queensberry clients.

Click here for more details.

Big day!

Cheers, Danny

Hide and go seek

A while back we talked about screen real estate.

Well, because not all of us have huge screens, here's a short video with a few tips to maximise PJ Remix if you're lacking screen space.

Cheers, Danny

PS we'll post a video with some tips for those with big screens soon.

Growing Pains

We're suffering from growing pains...

Our download and server traffic is pretty high, and demand comes from all over the world so we've splashed out on a CDN (which basically means you're PJ downloads and updates will be much faster.)

So if you have any feedback about our download speeds, we'd love to hear how you're finding it.

Cheers

Danny

PJ Remix 1.2 Final Released

PJ Remix 1.2 Final was launched yesterday. Open your existing version and software update will take care of the rest. ( release notes )

Also we've been private beta testing a new feature, portable projects. Feedback has been good and we're looking for more eager testers. If you're keen please email and let us know. info@photojunction.com

Cheers

Team PJ

Free PJ Remix!

We're at it again - we're giving you the chance to score yourself a free 12-month PJ Remix sub.

We want you to share your favourite PJ feature or useful tip with us.

Record a short video explaining or demonstrating your favourite PJ Remix feature or tip, send it to us, and well credit your account with a 12-month PJ sub. 

We’re not looking for a feature movie; a quick recording on a digital camera or screen shot software will do the job! Check out an example here.

We’ll upload them all onto our YouTube channel, and we’ll post the best ones on our blog.

Either send your videos to info@photojunction.com, or upload them to YouTube, send us the link, and we'll add them to our channel.

Happy movie making!

PS standard quality YouTube video has a picture of 320x240 pixels. 

Portable Projects

I don't like talking about features prior to release but I'll make an exception for this one. We're currently reworking how your data is stored for PJ Remix as there are shortcomings with our current implementation. If you're up for it, grab a cup of coffee and I'll tell you the full story ;-)

First I need to explain our decisions to date.

In PJ Retro we (and users) had four things to keep track of (the PJF and PJT files and the High and Low Res image folders). Our point of view may be different from yours, but support was a nightmare - clients (and not just the computer illiterate) got it wrong, frequently.

PJ Remix came along and we (over)simplified things by putting everything into one database, from which you could "import" and "export" projects if necessary.

This hasn't worked for everyone, but we do feel we're on the right track. In other words we don't want to "fix" our current problems by reverting to how Retro did things, with Retro's shortcomings. Rather we need to move forward.

So we are going to create individual "project files" that contain the client/event/album data and the low resolution images. These files will be "portable projects" that can be moved and saved anywhere you like (eg on a networked server, your desktop or external hard drive).

Some data (eg supplier resources etc) will continue to be stored locally in the user's central data base. Amongst other things, this will have a speed advantage if you want to operate over a network.

Keep in mind these Portable Projects will be reasonably large in size: 200Mb for a standard event and upwards of 500mb for a larger event (2000 images). While your first reaction may be to think that's a big file, it isn't really in proportion to the size of the 'event'. For instance a 200Mb project file was generated from a set of 700 jpegs totaling 3.5GB.  That's quite reasonable by comparison but a lot of data to open over a network.

These will be cross platform and will work on any machine, but keep in mind that high resolution exports will require access to the original high resolution images (which you can re-link, as now).

Portable Projects will also be 'double clickable' to open them in PJ.

By default PJ Remix will still store Portable Projects in a 'managed back-end' but you'll be able to move them individually if you desire. PJ Remix will also try to keep a record of these files which will be opened whenever you access them.

We're actually not that far off, in fact we're ready for a small private beta to test so if you're interested let us know by emailing info@photojunction.com

Cheers

Danny

Photokina Roundup

Photokina was huge - over 160,000 visitors and more than 140 countries represented.

The exhibition center was equally impressive with eleven different halls; some of them two stories high (my feet are still sore from all the walking!)

There weren't really any surprises. The album companies we saw didn't show us too much that we hadn't already seen. I guess that's a good thing. We got to meet and chat to a number of album companies based in non-English speaking countries, most of whom knew all about us. Another promising sign.

IMHO we didn't come across an album PJ couldn't design, or a piece of comparable software. But... of course we'd say that ;-)

Cheers. Danny

PJ reviews, reviewed

Can't believe Danny and Stephen interrupted a perfectly legit wedding to grab this shot (in Switzerland)

Our 'PJ Remix Loves U' promo is over, but our little button has been popping up all over the place. Which means we've been giving away heaps of 12-month PJ Remix subs.

Thanks to all those who posted a review. Here are some of our favs...

- Top marks to Karen Dahlquist from Happyfish. Not only was she one of the first to review, but also one of most in-depth. Karen runs a design service with PJ, in case you're tempted.

- Dean Kaus raved about PJ Remix on his blog - flexible is our middle name ;)

- Vito Amati shared how PJ Remix fits into and streamlines his workflow

- Jennifer Bowen from Jennifer Bowen Photography gave us a run down of some of her favourite PJ Remix features (including it's drag-and-drop interface, export functionality and template management).

Thanks again to all those who reviewed.

Try this at home

Drag an image to the page – leave it selected – then hit ⌘1, ⌘2, ⌘3 ... through to ⌘9 (CTRL+1 through 9 on Windows). Cool, eh?

Then hit ⌘Z a few times (CTRL+Z on Windows) to try out Undo.

If you liked that, check out the rest of our shortcuts.

We try and get as much functionality as we can out in plain view (as buttons) because most of our users would rather be shooting pictures than learning software. But remember a few of these and you'll really save time.

HTH, Ian

What do you do?

You're designing an album and you want to take a quick look at the page layout, full screen. What do you do?

a) Click 'Album' on the menu bar and select 'Review Layout'

b) Click the resizing button in the bottom left corner of the Album Layout window and select 'Fit to Screen'

OR

c) Hit - ⌘↑R (Ctrl+Shift+R on a PC)

If quick is key, then it's easily shortcut c). You'll be able to view your layout at full screen in an instant.

Esc will take you back to your Album Planning space.

Guten Tag!

Stephen and I are planning to attend Photokina as visitors (not exhibitors).

We'd love to catch up one night and chat - maybe over a beer.

Email me if you're keen.

-Danny

Not Photojunction

Have you noticed that almost all album planning software assumes that (a) all albums are flush-mount, and (b) templates are the only way to design them. Not PJ.

Coffee table books are cool, and so are templates - but there are other albums, and other ways to design them.

Sales Talk

Queensberry offer sensible sales advice (using PJ, of course)

http://blog.queensberry.com/2008/09/no-surprise.html

Do your supplier a favour

PJ Remix has four great things going for your album suppliers: we built it from the ground up to resolve their challenges, it sends business to them (not just to their competitors), they don’t need to support it (we do) and it costs nothing for them to get started.

That's a good deal, don't you think?

We've had a few calls from new vendors as a result of photographers lobbying them – thanks for that!

If you'd like to encourage your suppliers to get involved, here's a link to send them.

Contextual slideshows

Contextual slideshows are all the rage.

Sort your images into groups or collections then right click on them to create a slideshow.

This will create a new slideshow of all the images in that particular group or collection. 

Opt/Alt-drag

Want the next image you drag to the layout to be the same size as the last one?

Hold down the alt key as you drag (the opt key on Mac).

If you don't hold down the alt/opt key, Remix uses the default aperture size that you set in Preferences.

HTH, Ian

PS You could also just copy and paste the aperture, then drag new images into the copies.

Guest post contender

Michael Moster of Langley BC has gotta be a contender for this month's guest post giveaway, with this, his "best marketing idea ever".

As I live in a rural area, I have to do a fair bit of driving to go to location shoots, run errands and get supplies etc, so I decided to have the following sign painted on the back of my truck. "If you see this vehicle being driven in an unsafe manner, please call 604 530 8022".

I tell you, I had to install two more telephone lines into the studio to handle the call volume.

The typical call might go something like this: "I'm calling to report that @#$% jerk driving the pickup truck. He was driving like a maniac. He cut me off and was passing everyone while in the curb lane"... etc etc.

My reply of course would go something like this... "Thanks for bringing that to our attention. We'll certainly look into it...

"But seeing as I've got you on the phone at the moment... How long has it been since you've had a family portrait? Let me tell you about a special we're offering..."

But wait, there's more: Question: What's the difference between a large pepperoni pizza and a professional photographer? Answer: A large pepperoni pizza can feed a family of four. Hey, we didn't say it. Thanks for making us laugh out loud, Michael.

Straight and Narrow

When you're dragging an image around on a layout you can hold down the Shift key to make the image "sticky" on one axis.

What's that mean? Hold down Shift while dragging and...

• If you drag in a roughly horizontal direction you won't change the vertical alignment.
• If you drag in a roughly vertical direction you won't change the horizontal alignment.

HTH, Danny

I didn't know this myself

Here's something I learnt today! Less than a minute long.

Cheers, Danny

PJ Remix release 1.13

This morning we all sat down and had a chat about release 1.13...

What we've changed;

What we've developed;

What we've fixed.

Click here to download the full video (11mins)

To replace, or not replace?

We recently talked about how aligning images can be tricky, but a Shift key shortcut makes it easier.

Here's another shift key tip...

Sometimes you'll align your images just right only to decide that, actually, you'd prefer a different image there after all.

We've made it easy to swap the images out. You can replace an image by dragging a new image over the top of the existing one (even if the aperture is locked).

Now that's pretty handy, but what if you don't want to replace an image? Instead you want to drop an image on top of a background image

Again, easy. Hold the Shift key while you drop the image on the page and it won't replace the background image, it'll just drop nicely on top of it.

“Fast as a dealer in Vegas”

We offered you PJ Remix free for twelve months in return for a review on your blog or forum, and we've noticed quite a few already. Thank you!

But Karen Dahlquist went the extra mile. Karen is an album designer with lots of professional experience using both Retro and Remix, and she offers lots of thoughtful commentary. Thank you Karen. If we say so ourselves, it's worth a read.

Apologies to Woodsy for messing with his image.

Fine Tuning

Accurately aligning images with a mouse can be tough.

So when I'm designing a layout, I use the mouse to place the images roughly where I want them, and get back to where I'm comfy, the keyboard.

Using the arrow keys allows you to nudge an aperture in very small (1px) steps - if you hold the shift key while you nudge, the image will jump in bigger (10px) steps.

And, to make it even easier, the alignment lines also show up when you use the keyboard.

HTH

Danny

P.s once you get it just right, you should think about locking the aperture. 

Where in the world is PJ Remix?

Looking for a friend at your place

We have a really great deal for everyone. Click here...

Where in the world is...

Always on my mind in Thailand.

Where in the world...

Defending you against the slings and arrows of outrageous workflow.

In G33ks we trust?

The boss blogged about trust the other day. Stephen is a volunteer fire fighter and medical first responder, and he used two medical emergencies to examine the importance and limits of trust.

In his first story the patient's trust in his uniform meant he "could be effective without wasting time". (Stephen was glad to see the paramedics arrive, though, because he knew he could trust them!)

He thought his second patient was having a heart attack, but the guy responded so quickly he wondered whether he'd got it wrong (the patient's wife thought it was asthma).

Long story short, the paramedics noted both Stephen's volunteer status and his uncertainty and went with the asthma option. Wrongly as it turned out. "Later that day, while on another job with that crew, they told me I’d been correct and the man had in fact had a heart attack."

And the lesson is? It's just as easy for geeks to distrust users. It's very common, and it's a bad attitude. When you send in a bug report our support team review it carefully. Sometimes what they're dealing with is a bug. Sometimes it's a feature request. Sometimes they need more information to understand the problem. Sometimes what's called for is a little light education! What we never do is ignore you.

If you ever feel ignore or dismissed by us please let me know.

Cheers, Danny

Power users do it on their keyboards

Power users really like keyboard shortcuts, especially in winworld it seems, so here's a list of Remix's many keyboard shortcuts from our online tutorial pages.

Next week we'll post about right-click and modifier-key functions.

HTH, Ian

Productivity – adding multiple images

Here's how to add multiple images to a layout at one time. You'll be album planning in a heartbeat.

1. CTRL-click to select the images in the event window (CMMD-click on Mac).



2. Drag those images onto the layout (click on the image to enlarge and you'll see I'm dragging four).



3. Drop 'em, and voilà! Makes Retro look a little clunky.

Here when you need us

From time to time we have to defend our subscription model. We get it, it means paying money each year and I can see how people don't like that.

We've also been around long enough to know how important it is, when deadlines are looming and the computer gremlins are running amok, that we're here to give you a hand.

Here’s a one-minute clip from one of my faves to illustrate the point. If you're not into The Office, the guys in the car won't make sense!

Cheers, Danny

Error free cover design

In PJ Remix we've introduced a much more flexible architecture for cover design. Dust jackets, hybrid, photo covers, motifs, gathering text, embossing, engraving, you name it. If your vendor isn't taking advantage of this feature, why not ask them to contact us. You'll improve your own PJ experience too.

Doing what you love

We like making new features almost as much as you like using them. And after working on the final release for so long it's good to be working on new stuff again.

For instance, today we've...

- Vamped up our automated testing system.
- Prototyped a new feature (one that's very heavily requested).
- Dreamed up a cool solution to a long standing "quirk".
- Contacted new album companies.

I bet this is a bit like shooting pictures for you. I mean how much time per week do you really get behind a camera?

Cheers, Danny

Now that we’re final

Yesterday we expressed our thanks to our beta testers. Today I'd like to talk about the future, and our plans. We're not going to ease up now, so here are a couple of promises from Team PJ.

1. We will release at least two final versions each year for the foreseeable future. They’ll include ongoing feature enhancements and be free to you as part of your subscription.

2. If you want to stay involved, and we hope you do, beta releases will continue thick and fast just as they’ve done for the last year.

The idea is to speed up development as our user base grows, and we're itchy to show you some of the cool stuff we have planned.

Warm regards, Danny

PS We haven't forgot those suggestions of yours that haven't been dealt with. Yet.

Pay it forward

Well it's been a tough week. No plague of locusts, but nothing else came easy! But we’ve reached final and it’s an amazing feeling. Our company’s growing and we want to show our thanks.

Here goes…

From Day One our goal has been to build an outstanding application, which is impossible without supportive, committed beta testers.

But beta testing is like jury service – who wants to get involved? It's purely voluntary, everyone benefits, and that’s why we’re so grateful.

We know it’s been tough at times, but what we've done together is build cool software - thank you. Trust us – the version we're releasing today is just the beginning.

Below you’ll find a list of 20 people to whom we owe extra-special thanks.

If your name is on our list you have a free, personal subscription to PJ Remix for as long as the application exists, or as long as you want to use it.

If you’re a beta tester whose name isn’t there, it’s tough to be #21 (and hard for us to draw the line) but we appreciate your help too. Email us and we’ll extend your subscription for an extra three months with our thanks.

All the best from Danny and the Dev Team

And our special thanks go to…

Scott Mullen
Paul Stobbe
Stephen Layton
Johannes Van Kan
Randy Kepple
Paul Wilkinson
Brian Charrette
Albert Lewis
Ed Te Pas
Mike Dickson
Steve Meyfroidt
Justin Scobie
Trevor Phillips
Joe Mikos
Israel Smith
David Smith
Tony Bramley
Angelique Buckley
Tim Wild
Mark Miller

The dev guys heart compliments

Charles "The Storyteller" said… Version 1.10 has been a lifesaver. We are designing albums with much ease and love the simplicity of PJ Remix. I can't wait to get our new duo album. Here is a link to the design (nice work - and the new version will fade the music - Ian).

angelique said... Possibly my favorite version yet! I read through all 75 fixes before hitting download to see if any of my bugs were taken care of...and they ALL were!

Aran Anderson Photography said... The new templates are great on Remix. I have been waiting for an album design program to work with Asuka Books and thank god you have done it! You are ahead of the competition, good work!

rexyinc said... Oh no no no no! … You have no idea how bad this move is going to make me look in front of my bosses! … What used to take me a week or more to do by hand, now takes just a couple of hours with Photojunction … Now what am I going to do with the other five days of the week?

PJ Remix 1.11

On June 26, barring floods, plagues of locusts and unexpected software meltdowns, PJ Remix goes “final”.

Today’s release, v1.11, is our last pre-release beta. Don’t miss this last chance to grab our special offer!

Cheers
Team PJ

P.S. PJ Remix v1.11 release notes

Thought required

Ever wonder what goes into adding an "easy" new feature?

Case Study: Our thumbnails truncate the file names if they're too long to display, like this:


That's not very useful if you store important information at the end of the file name. Umm?

EASY! Just reverse it, so we get "...end.jpg" instead of "start..."

Nope. Maybe having the end without the start isn't so useful either. Hmm?

EASY! I've seen other awesome apps do this. Let's put 'etc' marks in the middle, like this: "star..end.jpg"

Nope. Turns out we're using the smallest font and still it's not quite right when the thumbnails are small. Hmm?

EASY! Let's strip the file extension if there isn't room for it! "start..end"

So the final result is...


After so much debate, let's hope we got it right.

Random thoughts on your comments

1. What's the significance of an increasing rate of referrals and WOM? Healthy signs of a growing business, no more nor less, recession or not.

2. After so many years in this trade it's hard not to notice that some of the most successful photographers don't win awards.

3. And that some award-winning photographers don't know how to translate their abilities into cash.

4. “The average client just wants good believable pics that are vibrant & clean & candid. The challenge is to give them that + more by way of making sure that we include some masterpieces that are beyond the ability of the semi pro masses.”

Right on! Like the poor, the weekend warrior is always with us, and you can’t beat ’em on price. The challenge is, what do YOU do to add another zero to what they charge.

5. Years ago, Ivan McLellan, who founded New Zealand’s premier pro lab (now part of Queensberry) used to tell his clients that you could market to the Carriage Trade or the Bottom End, but the market in the middle was disappearing. Good advice for decades.

Trend to "hybrid books"

There's growing interest in PJ Remix's ability to handle books that incorporate both flush-mount and matted pages. Photojunction is the only vendor-independent software that can handle them, and Remix does a much better job of it than Retro. Hybrids are a great reason to upgrade.

So who won?

We're going for a literary tone today, and Nina mentioned Bill Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice. Well, blogging is like being on stage, reciting your lines… with no real idea whether anyone’s listening or not.

We’re not up with the big guys yet, but it’s great that our blog is now attracting some regular, thoughtful comments. – So who won this month’s free PJ subscription?

Well, we considered Megan for “PJ rocks some major bootie”. But sorry Megan, Daria offered tea and bikkies as well (where in the world are you, Daria?)

Then there was Nina. She writes vividly, Danny and I both love Blue-Grass and I’ve never been to Kentucky.

But the winner has to be TomK – for thoughtful comments, and several of them, most recently here. A plug for Tom's blog, too. Hard to do well, but what a great way to market, differentiate and present your work.

Thanks to all – keep an eye on Junction Newsletter 2 for our next freebie.

Cheers, Ian

Lead Sources

I recently spoke at seminar in Christchurch for the NZIPP. The other speaker, Bruce Gabites talked about measuring where your leads come from.

TomK mentioned the same, very relevant, issue (hey, wanna write for this blog ;-) – thank you for your input).

In times of economic instability it highlights the importance of knowing where your leads / bookings come from. You'll be able to react to and encourage the successful channels.

A starting point. Word of mouth, Magazine, Bridal Fair, Web, Venue Referrals...

A slightly, temporarily mercenarily-minded,
Danny

Differentiate or ...

Interesting comments on Danny's "Downsize me" post, especially TomK's point about housing crisis pain trickling down to other spending. FWIW, I've been hearing stories like this off and on for 30+ years, and they are always true. For some people. The marketing challenge is to make "some" people mean "other" people.

If you've been a price taker chances are high you'll suffer in a downturn. If you've consistently marketed yourself as a differentiated price setter, now's the time to be grateful for your foresight ;-)


Differentiate Or Die (great book).

Cheers, Ian

Downsize me

Interesting times...

We've seen the first indicators that the average amount spent on photography at US weddings has slipped. (Down almost $100 or 5% - theweddingreport.com). Is this a trend you've noticed? How could you respond?

Aunt Dorothy out of the money

If you read Junction News No. 1*, you'll know we're giving away a 12-month PJ Remix subscription free every month. This month's freebie goes to the person who writes the best Comment on this blog.

Be in to win! We're picking our favourite at the end of this week.

Cheers, Ian

We've enjoyed what we've read so far, both funny and thoughtful, so Danny's Aunt Dorothy has missed out ;-)

*Our monthly newsletter to PJ subscribers.

Version 1.10 ready for action

We're pretty happy that Remix v1.10 is ready for you to download. We've done pretty much nothing but bug-fix and test for weeks. It's still beta but...

We're REALLY looking forward to our first final, so we can get back to coding new stuff!

If you haven't already, please take our baby for a spin, and our sincere thanks in advance.

The PJ Dev Team


To auto-update to the latest version, just open up your current version of Remix while you're online.

Any template will do

We've posted a bit about PJ templates here, but apparently not everyone realises they don't need to be vendor-specific. Anything you can grab off our template download page will do. Just drag the template corner to fit your page, and ungroup to edit.

HTH, Ian

Of course you can also author and share your own templates. We understand some photographers are working on collections (try googling Photojunction templates occasionally).

There's gambling and there's...

Why is it when I chat to photographers about their flash memory, they say things like...

"Oh, that card's a bit dodgy," or

"I don't really trust that one"

BUY NEW ONES! Compact Flash, SD, or whatever you use has never been cheaper than it is now. Even if it wasn't, imagine the cost of losing a wedding.

A slightly concerned and conservative,
Danny

Tip tip

We're building up a lot of juicy PJ tips here, with plenty more to come. To turbo-charge your PJ experience, click on the "Tip" tag (eg on the right of this page). You'll get a list of "handy hints" with all the other blog posts filtered out.

HTH, Ian

PS - apologies for our last post, made meaningless by the missing image. Here it is.

Geek Bait

We're growing. Two more Dev Gurus have started at PJ HQ after this advertisement caught their eye. Does it appeal to the geek in you?

Define “Templates”

Templates are pre-designed page layouts. They may help save you time, make up for a perceived lack of design skill, or give you inspiration.

Templates are not to be confused with Album Resources, which contain all the data necessary to design an album for a specific vendor. You can do without templates but not without album resources.

The two get confused occasionally so I thought I might clear it up ;-).

HTH - Danny

Cunning plan?

Assorted stress balls... Is this how The Boss judges who's working hardest at Team PJ? We hope not 'cos we hear Akshay pinched Vanessa's* (after rubbing the smiley face off his own).

Hey, we're ALL hard at work to put smiley faces on our clients. And thankfully our own haven't worn off!

Cheers, Danny

* Vanessa and Adam had another baby, William Daniel – all well, even #1, Benji ;-). Take care Vanessa.

PJ Remix web winners

Special PJ Dev Team Award for Enthusiastic Support: Queensberry - "Yay For Remix!"

Most Creative Use Of A Trademark: Kiss Wedding Albums – "Geez, Get A Room!"

Most Demanding Clients: Cypress Albums - thanks guys, sorry to keep you waiting: the resources ARE available now!

Most Enterprising User: Melissa Jill – "Templates now available for PJ Remix!"

Big thanks from Team PJ

"Projects, Clients, Events..."

As you know there are important differences between PJ Remix and the old software, Retro. We posted on this last year, but we have a lot more users now, so here's an updated introduction to one of Remix's basic concepts (for more info check out the web link below).

In Retro each job was in a separate PJF file and (as our support team can tell you) some of those files got very lost, or people ended up with multiple versions etc. Remix, on the other hand, keeps all of your work in a single database which the software can keep track of.

Remix uses certain words in a very specific way to describe that data. We work on Projects, which consist of four linked components: Clients, Events, Products and Exports:

We shoot an Event (eg a wedding) for our Clients (eg the bride and groom), who buy Products (eg albums).

Why do we use words like Event and Product instead of “wedding” and “album”? Because they’re more generic. Not all Events are weddings, and not all Products are albums.

Before you can create a new Product (let’s say an album) you need to take a few seconds to link it to both a Client and an Event. That way you'll be able to find it in the PJ database. You can view the database using the Project Browser (accessible from the Start window or the File menu). To illustrate, the following screen shot shows my copy of Remix after the FOCUS show in Birmingham UK recently – click on it to see it full size.



I have one of my Clients selected ("Focus Demo"), which is associated with a single event (Henry and Grace), which in turn has dozens of demo albums linked to it. There could be slide show "products" too, but as it happens there aren't any.

Your Products in turn have Exports or "Outputs". For example, the Outputs from an album design are the orders and image files that you export and either:

• Save to your hard disk, or
• Send to your album vendor and lab for manufacture.

After they have been created, these will appear in the right-hand "Outputs" column of the Project Browser.

Click here for an overview of Remix, including all the main windows and wizards, as well as the Project Browser.

HTH, Ian

Remixed album vendors

In alphabetical order, here are the album companies now directly supported in PJ Remix...

Asuka Book (unofficial)
*Cypress Albums
Finao
Glorious Books
Graphistudio
Kambara (unofficial)
*KISS Books
Leather Craftsmen
Photo Mounts
Queensberry
Seldex
Zookbinders
* Recently added or updated

And don't forget it's easy to design flush mount / magazine style / digital books from other suppliers using Remix DIY (see my previous post).

If you'd like to see your favourite Album Company get 'Remixed' tell them about us – demanding clients are great motivators! And we don't mind chasing them up either – tell us who to pursue on The Junction.

Cheers, Danny

Harder or smarter? Help!

Danny's on a mission to have us work harder not smarter - NO, smarter, not harder!

He asked me to identify the biggest issues in last month's support emails in order to focus the developers. There were hundreds of tickets, lots of hundreds. Not all were "issues" - many were auto replies and bounces, or just plain questions - but I needed to open most of them to see exactly what they were about.

Unfortunately I did such a good job he wants me to analyse your emails for every team meeting. Darn.

So I can work smarter, what I need is descriptive subject headings so I won't need to open each ticket - just look at the subject and tick the appropriate box. A general idea of the issue is all I need, eg registering PJ, export problems, installing, template issues. It would make my life a lot easier and I would be ever so grateful.

Oh, one final thing - Can you give every new question a new ticket? If you're hitting Reply, just change the subject and remove the ticket number if you're raising a different issue.

Thanks! Christine

PS Don't worry - we will still respond to your email - this is just to speed up analysis :-)

On the up and up

Hi All

At the end of our fiscal year and a round of trade shows it's a good time to reflect on progress.

This year with the release of Remix we've seen the most successful sales at trade shows for both clients and vendors, but we're ambitious folk with big plans. So with another year's data and maybe a little wiser for the experience we'll reset the sights and carry on.

I encourage you to do the same. We're big on stats at PJ HQ, we want to know our clients and what they're like.

A few questions you might want to consider while pondering the business stuff:

Where did my clients come from (bridal fairs, print advertising, client referral, web, venue referral)?
What package is selling the best? Should I shift a price point?
Am I profitable (enough)? Have my operating costs changed?
What % of my turnover is from albums? Reprints? Other categories?

Developing a list of questions and answering them every quarter will help give you a sense of perspective...

Cheers
Danny

Technicolor Mats

Hi All

If you're using an album company that offers different mat colors in the same album...

We don't have the functionality yet, so in the mean time, right click on the layout and 'add note', then specify what color you'd like on that particular layout.

It's just a short term work around, but it will work for now.

Cheers
Danny

1.09 Released and Rocking

Hi All

We've released 1.09, upgrade. We've made some ground with your favourite ( or not so favourite ) issues.

A few highlights...

1. Import - Export has been worked on even more and the developers practically begged me to post a 'howto' - so thats the a separate post.

2. Quicktime Movie, we think it's awesome but so does someone else. Forum Post

3. Templates - quicker and more robust.

Anyway thanks for the feedback from our survey (results coming soon).

Take care for now,
Danny (and the Developers)

Projects are go

As of 1.09 you can Import and Export Projects to your heart's content.

A few steps, straight from the horse's mouth (or a Developer's: sorry that wasn't a joke towards you Akshay!)

1. Right click on Client in the Project Browser and select Export Project. This will bring up a window...



It might be a good idea to Duplicate the Client before exporting, because the original Client will be deleted from the Browser after export.

Selecting Export opens another window. If necessary choose where you want to save the exported project by Browsing, and whether you want to include the original high-res files.



3. Click Export.This will create a .project folder in the location you selected, along with a project.pjr file, the proxies and the originals if you chose to include them.

4. Copy this folder to the Destination Computer (DC).

5. On the DC, run PJ Remix and select File > Import Project > Choose File. Once you're done the project will be up and running on the destination computer.



HTH
Danny (on behalf of Akshay)

Ready for final??

Sorry this is a bit long... You’ll recall that in mid-February we surveyed PJ users asking how close Remix was to final release. We had a lot of responses, and some of you went to a lot of trouble over your replies – thank you.

So, how did we go? And what progress have we made since then? We asked, “How likely is it that you would recommend Photojunction to friends or colleagues?”

40% of regular users gave us a score of 9/10 or 10/10. For pre-release beta software we felt that was pretty good. Click here to read some of the compliments we got.

But still, a quarter of people were negative to a greater or lesser extent - not good enough to go final. The main concern was crashes. There were also clear problems with templates. A few people were concerned about “portability issues” (eg how to shift work from one computer/staff member to another, or to a design service). And as expected there were other specific bugs, lots of feature requests, instances where people were confused by Remix's behaviour, or the differences between Remix and Retro. And of course a few people who simply think Remix should be a different program. That’s cool too (fortunately there are different programs!)

The Dev Team listened hard. One of their first responses was to develop a piece of code that kept a log of what happened if a crash occurred (very helpful when one of the main challenges is replicating problems). And over five or so weeks they’ve released three more updates, including over a hundred more bug fixes, and we have more to clear before we go final.

But we feel we’re very close now. Crashes seem very rare, albeit just as frustrating when they do happen. So we have invited people who identified themselves as “regular users” last time to repeat the survey.

If you HAVEN'T been contacted but would like to participate, please click this link. We'd love to get this show on the road. Tell us what you think!

Cheers, Ian

Manage expectations 2

Another recurring lament at the trade shows was what I call "Album Revision #11" (you'll know it better than me):

Revision 1: You design the album (probably the best one).
Revision 2: Bride wants changes.
Revision 3: You redesign the album.
And so on until...

Revision 11: You're glad to see the back of them after they twist your arm to cram 160 images into a book that should've had 80.

Here's the thing. Some photographers have this problem, others don't. Why? Are their customers different? I don't think so.

The secret, again, is managing expectations. Speak confidently, project your expertise. If they signed up to your design, assume it's the "finished product". If they're spoiling the album, work out how to say so.

If they're entitled to a few edits, great (a good idea, and PJ makes it easy). If you charge for edits, no problem: put your charges up front in your price list - and in your conversation.

This takes practice and confidence, but next time see if you can reduce your revisions, and sell the best album you can.

Cheers, Danny

Manage expectations

Danny's suggestion not to spend time on images you haven't sold, some people have a real problem with it. They assume their pictures have to be perfect before anyone sees them.

Who says?

When Heather and I were married, I think our photographer showed us proofs, maybe even contact sheets (yes, it was a while ago!) But we understood we couldn't judge the final prints by the proofs.

I'm not suggesting going back to proofs, but people are spending days enhancing unsold images. Automated procedures sound like a good compromise. Aiming for salable, not perfect.

The key is to set your client's expectations accordingly. These are not finished images, they're "proofs". Your sample albums show them the finished product.

Then you get to go home early. Have a beer. Play with the kids. Catch a movie.

Cheers, Ian

A better return for working less

Hi all - please bear with me while I climb on my soapbox. This is on my mind after a few intense conversations at the trade shows...

[clears throat]

Workflow is a touchy issue, but our philosophy is simple: only work on the shots you get paid for. By which I mean...

Do as little work as possible on your images until you've sold them (for example, included them in an album design). Time you spend on images that you don't sell is time wasted.

PJ lets you export a layered PSD, and you can edit that to your heart's content! Just take care not to decrease your hourly rate too much ;-)

[steps down from soapbox]

I'll call it a day and wait to hear from the people I just offended! If you're reading this by email, please click through to the blog to comment.

Warm regards, Danny

Up to date and good to go

Noticed the little green check mark in the corner of your page layouts after exporting? And the lock symbols on the apertures?

PJ Remix displays the check mark and locks the apertures as a gentle reminder that editing the layout will make your exports out-of-date. You can unlock and edit if you wish, but then you'll need to re-export. The green check mark will change to a red alert until you re-export.

What's the point? We're making sure that your prints will fit the album. Expensive if you get it wrong.

One catch. You can edit the file freely in Photoshop afterwards - but don't change the file size, dpi, or position on the layout or you'll create a mismatch.

HTH, Ian

Home at last

Hi All

We've arrived home from WPPI and are back to work. Some highlights from the show:

- Chats with you guys! I was talking to this person for a while and forgot to check her name badge. As she was walking away I looked down and saw she was a long time support and tester of PJ. Putting faces to names...

- "I love PJ Remix." We gave an extra discount to people who would wear our badge of love around for the day - no one refused. One lovely couple asked for a badge because one of them was named PJ!!!

- Sales. The highest number of sales at any trade show, ever.

- Album Vendors. We have new and exciting album vendors coming on board and some old friends getting up to date with PJ Remix.

Take care for now, talk to you soon.
Danny

On the road again

No sooner back from the UK than we're off again to WPPI. Or at least I am, with Stephen this time. Not to complain, though, I really enjoy the adrenaline rush of a trade show. And we don't often get a chance to chat with clients face to face.

So again, please come and see us!

If you buy at the show you'll get the best subscription price around - just US$150 - and you'll be able to use both Retro and Remix Beta.

We do like listening to your stories (good or bad) so do stop by.

Cheers
Danny

p.s. And if your album vendor doesn't support PJ yet, be sure to tell them while you have the chance.

Very exciting, really

Image © byBrett

So Danny and IanB got to travel to Focus and feel the love, but what about the rest of us? The line at the coffee machine got a bit shorter, that's what. Whoop-di-doo.

As you can imagine, with Remix in beta, it's been pretty hectic for the support team recently. Lots of new people learning the software and an inbox stuffed with emails...

So your Support Stars implemented a new strategy called Inbox Zero. It involves us getting everything out of the inbox by the end of each shift. We have folders for individual team members where we can transfer anything particular that they're dealing with, but people get a bit agitated if you use this to pass the buck! The result has been big gains in efficiency and response time, and I don't get so stressed any more :-)

Cheers,
Ian C
We've been able to reduce Ian's meds - Ed ;-)

I wanna be a Support Star

My first reaction when asked to write a post was No Way! I'm a support person. Luckily I got time to think about it. How hard can it be? Danny and Ian B blog all the time with, umm, flair and finesse. But since Focus they've been hard to live with because, like the Conchords, they have a fan (one).

I wanna be a star too, but my job description calls for "calm and methodical". When did that make you a star? But calm and methodical is a good way to approach Photojunction Remix, especially in the beta phase. Especially if you’re an ‘I hate computers’ or ‘I’m not technical’ type.

Some of us don't like change, and PJ Remix is very different to Retro. Although you'll be amazed how familiar it feels after a while. I find it a pleasure to work with. Okay, it’s still a beta, but the more you use it, the more you’ll find the shortcuts that fit your work flow, and the better and quicker you’ll get.

Here are a few things I like:

You can scale the album layout window to 200%. WOW, so much easier to work with.

QuickTime Slideshow interface - so many more options, and the next release will be as fast as Retro.

The Lab File interface is much clearer (just remember that the aperture size list must be in order, smallest to biggest).

One final piece of advice – make sure you give your album designs logical names, so you don’t end up like me with a dozen different albums all named “Test Album”!

Best wishes from Christine

PS Greetings back to everyone who said Hi at Focus.

War Story 2 - Photoshop

We told War Story 1 (about the guy whipping out a flash drive and challenging Danny to replicate his Photoshop layout) to a gentleman, who... whipped out his own flash drive and challenged Danny to do the same! He signed up too - thank you sir.

Think of PJ Remix this way - as a tool for laying out PSD files. Really fast.

Unlike most programs we saw at Focus, Remix doesn't compromise your Photoshop experience, it supercharges it.

Cheers, Ian

Thanks to our Brit friends

Show's over, we had a blast. Sold out but postponed the dreaded moment by pinching CDs back from our friends. We have more people to thank...

The people who've been with Retro from Day One.

Boyd, Mars and others who've been our phone friends for ages (nice to put faces to names - Christine says hi).

Talking programming shop with Paul W - nice to meet his wife, who puts up with his beta testing.

Louise M for sharing our vision of the future.

And everyone who shares our confidence and subscribed.

Off to get jet-lagged again - Cheers, Ian and Danny.

PS - Paul, I hope this post is up to your standards!

Sold out

We must take a lot more media kits to WPPI, as we're out of stock at FOCUS. Folk who take our special offer on the last day will have to download or wait for a CD by courier.

Danny is a laugh - I've never seen an uber-geek so hyped! We're getting a great response, had some very helpful feedback from beta testers (hi Evagoras) and only a couple of bugs to report.

Cheers, Ian

Busy Stand

Hi All

Ian and I have been working at our stand at the Focus On Imaging trade show. Longish days with 8 hours on the stand and not a hope of a lunch break, but we're not complaining and PJ Remix is being well received. We're almost out of all the media kits we brought with us and our fliers and order forms are disappearing at a rapid rate.

We have some great stories that clients shared with us and we'll write about some of those in time. ;-)

Cheers, Danny

p.s. Thanks to everyone who stopped by and took the time to give their feedback and chat!

War Story 1

At our FOCUS booth a guy walked up to Danny and asked him how long it would take to replicate a design he'd done in Photoshop. It took a slightly anxious Danny 3-4 minutes, and when he was done the guy whipped out his credit card and signed up.

Now, we know it's a lot faster to copy an existing design than it is to dream it up in the first place, but the point of the story is to confirm that you'll save heaps of time if you design your PHOTOSHOP page layouts in PHOTOJUNCTION.

Album design keyboard shortcuts

Demonstrating today reminded me of something I've been intending to mention for a while...



If you've been thinking that the keyboard shortcuts for the edit menu (Copy, Paste, Duplicate, Undo etc) are a little flakey, bear in mind that for them to work the Album Layout window must be active. In other words, if you've got the cursor over the Events window or the tools, the Edit Menu shortcuts will not be active. Shift the cursor over the album design and you'll be fine.

HTH, Ian

Walk on up

If you're coming to Focus (Birmingham UK) or WPPI (Las Vegas in March), please come and see us.

Order and pay at our booth you'll get the lowest subscription price available anywhere - just US$150 - AND you'll be able to use both Retro and Remix Beta (switch when you're ready). Don't miss out!

Danny and I are looking forward to some great debates!

Feeling frustrated? - or did you give Remix 10/10 in our survey? (30% of people did - however you feel, we're there to listen).

Do you still prefer RETRO? (Good grief! But tell us why - we're meeting Pavan in London and he'll be pleased.)

Designing albums with Photoshop? Or Brand X? (Surely not! But tell us anyway.)

You won't find a software company more ready to listen and learn. See you there?

Great feedback from the survey

Hi everyone

It's been a strange couple of weeks. On the one hand vendors are doing more business than we expected via Remix, we've squished hundreds of bugs, and the feedback we're getting is generally very positive. On the other hand a few users are still having problems. We expected v1.05 to be a big step forward, but for some people the opposite was true. Thank goodness 1.06 is out today (be sure to read Danny's "bug finder" post).

Anyway that's why we surveyed you to see where we stand. If you've registered PJ Remix as a demo or subscription you should have heard from us, and after 24 hours we've already had a lot of very useful responses.

It feels good at this stage of the game that one in eight subscribers use their software every day, and one in three (so far) say they would be VERY likely to recommend Remix to friends or colleagues.

But we need to focus on the people who're still having grief. The survey has been so useful because people went to so much trouble in their responses. It will take us a while to process them but we're on the case. We've also got lots of insights about where to focus regarding work flow issues, education and support.

Thank you again - Ian

Bug Finder

Hi Everyone

Long time, I know... but we have a good excuse! Today we've released v1.06.

There are many tweaks and fixes in this (like all releases) but one that needs special mention is our new 'bug finder'.

In future, if Remix runs into trouble and crashes, it will know where in the 'code' the problem occurred. This should help in a big way with those tough-to-replicate problems some people have been experiencing.

BUT after a crash you need to send us a Bug Report from INSIDE PJ Remix. The report will now include the 'bug finder' information. Reporting crashes on the forum won't help solve the problem. You should also report immediately - before starting work again. Just reboot Remix and file a Bug Report.

Maybe we should've done this sooner...

Enjoy, Danny

Thank You, Merci, Danke, Gracias...

In case you don't get the point yet, we're very thankful for the support you've given us! PJ Remix is taking shape fast because of you, and nothing says thank you like putting our money where our mouth is.

We're running another 48-HOUR HALF PRICE SPECIAL and we definitely don't want you to feel like you suffered through seven weeks of v1.0b bug fixes for nothing!

So email info@photojunction.com with your PJ Remix Unlock Code and we’ll extend your subscription as though it started today.

If you haven't bought already, click here NOW for more details - trust us, we can't afford any more half price offers :-|

Cheers - Danny

You'll get mail

It's Friday, we're feeling good and we're grateful for your patience and feedback. What could we do to say thank you?

Keep an eye on your email (nudge nudge, wink wink)

- Danny

What a View...

• Have you wished to see the whole album design in one re-sizable window?
• Have you wished to create an instant slide show of your album design?
• Have you wished you could reorder the album layouts?
• Have you wished for an easier way to navigate through your layouts?

Wish no more - just check out the Preview window. Open an album, and click the Preview palette in the Tools window.



Preview can be separated from the Tools window by simply dragging it out or clicking on the arrow next to the Preview tab. Once separated it can be resized from the corner. If you close the Preview window it returns to a palette in the Tools window.

You can navigate to any layout in the Album Layout window by double clicking on it in Preview.

Right-click on Preview and you get the option to create an instant slide show for the album.

Drag a layout to a new position in the Preview to change the order of the layouts in your album.

Preview updates live (ie immediately after you make a change in the Layout window). You could work on one monitor and maximize Preview on another monitor so your clients can admire what you're doing (that's really cool).

If you have other ways of using Preview we'd love to hear them. Visit The Junction and leave us a comment.

Enjoy – Cheers, Chetan