iView MediaPro 1.4 Adds Framed Galleries

iView Multimedia has released iView MediaPro 1.4, the latest version of their surprisingly deep media cataloging program. Version 1.4 adds a number of welcome features, including a built-in backup feature that can copy files to CD-R or other removable disks, JPEG lossless rotation, mouse wheel support, support for Mac OS X’s thumbnail icons, an option to create frame-based HTML galleries, performance improvements when running under Mac OS X, and a variety of bug fixes. The upgrade is free to registered users; you can use a trial version (2.3 MB download) for three weeks, after which it costs $50 ($30 to upgrade from the earlier iView Multimedia or the rebranded PhotoRelay).

Although iView MediaPro and Apple’s recently released iPhoto (see "iPhoto Joins the iFold" in TidBITS 611) would seem competitive, the two are actually quite complementary. Drag-and-drop works perfectly between the two, with iPhoto happily importing images dragged in from iView MediaPro and iView MediaPro happily linking to images dragged in from iPhoto. Plus, iView MediaPro provides brightness, contrast, and sharpness adjustments along with basic color correction tools (from the Window menu, choose Display Calibrator, where there’s also a cropping tool that doesn’t compare to iPhoto’s for ease of use) but lacks iPhoto’s red-eye reduction and black and white conversion tools.