iPhoto is finally available on the iPad

Apple released a line of new iLife applications for the iPad today, including a brand-new photo-editing app called iPhoto.

“Don’t ever let anyone tell you that you can’t create on an iPad,” said Apple senior vice president Phil Schiller at the iPad press conference in San Francisco.

iPhoto has never appeared on the iPad as a dedicated application before, but adding it shows Apple’s commitment to making its mobile devices the only camera you’ll need. The app will take advantage of the iPad’s new five megapixel camera, and high-resolution 2,048 by 1,536 pixel Retina display. Photos exist in the iPhoto app as separate albums on a shelf, similar to the Newsstand. Here, multi-touch gestures help you surf specific photos, view all your photos at once, click to enter the edit interface, and examine multiple photos side-by-side.

These gestures extend into the edit view as well. The user can enhance color, brightness, shift the tilt of an image and more using their fingers. This is particularly useful for lightening a face, or paying attention to smaller details on the photo. You can access the different editing tools by clicking on a set of brushes that pop up from the bottom of the screen (see example in the video below).

Apple’s classic effects that are known to users of the Mac version of iPhoto and PhotoBooth are available in a “swatch” pallet-like menu. These effects include black and white layers, sepia tone, edge blurring, antiquing and more.

Sharing photos is all new through iPhoto as well. You can now make photo journals, or collections of photos Apple hopes iPad users will share, using iCloud. Similar to Dropbox, a distributable link will point friends and family back to your collection, which can include more content than just the edited photos. When adding photos to a journal, users can assign weather data, the date, maps, notes, make favorites and even choose between different image sizes to share. Apple used the example of a trip, associating images with a specific leg of the journey.

The introduction of iPhoto completely the collection of iLife applications available on the iPad. Along with it comes updates to both GarageBand as well as iMovie. Apple announced “Jam Session” for GarageBand, an app for playing, recording, and editing music, today. The feature allows music lovers to connect wirelessly via their iOS devices to play and record music together from remote locations. iMovie also got a spruce-up with a function for creating Hollywood-style trailers on your iPad.

iWork also got a minor facelift with new charts are intended to look better under the new Retina display, as well as landscape orientation for Pages — Apple’s document editor — on iPhone and iPod Touch.

iPhoto and iMovie are only compatible with the iPad 2, the iPhone 4, and later. GarageBand and iWork applications are compatible with all versions of the iPad and the iPhone 3GS and up.

You can purchase iPhoto in the App Store for $4.99. iWork applications are also available for download for $9.99 each.

Check out the video of the editing interface below.

You can also browse some photos from the event:

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