Comparison books Iphoto 4, iPhoto 5 early, iPhoto updated

Question

I just had delivered last night 5 copies of a hard cover 52 page book.
First off, very fast turnaround time as it took 5 days from order to delivery. Impressive.
Half the photo's in these books have been repeated in 2 previous hard cover books, one was made with iPhoto 4 right after that was released and one was made right after iPhoto 5 was released but prior to any updates.
The initial iPhoto 5 book was made from the default dpi pdf setting and the 5 books were created at a hacked setting of 300dpi.
The iPhoto 4 book is by far the sharpest, most balanced and cleanest as far as image out of the 3.
The newest 300dpi books are a slight improvement in sharpness over the previous iphoto 5 book - however the contrast and color balance are quite different on some of the repeat images from the earlier 2 books.
Somewhere the newest version of iPhoto 5 or the production pdf seems to blow some of the contrast way out. The invisible PDF is not like this and test prints form this same pdf to a high end printer I have access to were not like this.
The lpi of the images has changed along the way - I will measure the actual screening used tonight and post back. A much coarser screen appears to be used now.
Addiionally, according to FedEx, my books were shipped from a New York State address unlike the west Coast pick-up point of the previous orders. Maybe the problem is varying equipment/QA, etc., from factory to factory?

Answer 1

I did take home a line gauge and a loop to give the 3 books a once over. Just a reminder that all 3 books are hardcover, 1 from iPhoto 4 with default dpi, 1 from iPhoto 5 (initial version with default dpi), 1 from iPhoto 5 after updates with increased dpi to 300dpi. The last iPhoto 5 book I had delivered via FedEx shows a New York State pick up point instead of the previous West Coast pick up points. Maybe books are being produced in multiple locations?
For comparison I looked at common photo's used in each version of the book. The photo's are the same ones from my iPhoto library and were not changed and reproduced the same size,
Because of the fineness of the screen I could not get an accurate reading on any of the screens but they appear to be 150lpi+ in all books.
There is a noticeable difference from the iPhoto4 Book and both iPhoto 5 books. The iPhoto 4 book was a finer screen and I would say by a decent enough amount. Both iPhoto 5 books had slightly coarser screens and if they are different between the 2 it would be by a small amount.
There is a large difference of clarity between both iPhoto 5 books and this is mostly due to the 300dpi change in the prefs file. Though some of it could also be due to equipment differences or quality control as well. The sharpness of the iPhoto4 book is unmatched in the others.
One item I noticed is a difference in the paper. I did not have a paper gauge to measure the weight of the paper but it seems similar as does the vibrancy and coating of the paper. The iPhoto 5 books have a paper that folds over easier and when turning the page can fold in on itself if the paper is gripped lower towards the spine. This may be the result of the chance the paper grain being vertical instead of horizontal. Maybe this is a result or requirement of the 2 sided printing?
Also, in both iPhoto 5 books there is a noticeable difference in image tonal range. There appears to be less mid-range tones and an increase in each extreme resulting in images having much more contrast with increased shadow and highlight. This means more blacks/darks, and white areas being more white with less midrange tones. It appears to be more of a problem with single tone images (black and white but saved as rgb and not greyscale) rather than color images. Sepia images exhibit this a great deal as well.
Why this happens can be anyone's guess but may be as simple as a problem with iPhoto and how it handles the images, to incorrect calibration on the image output, or the actual reproduction mechanism or simply less quality control.
Lastly, the iPhoto 4 book is top quality, the initial iPhoto 5 book was only OK and print quality certainly improved with iPhoto 5 updated with the 300dpi resolution change but does not equal the level of quality with iPhoto 4. The 5 books I had delivered this week will be used and hopefully appreciated but it is too bad they are not to the initial quality I was excited about.