New mac user struggling with iPhoto

Question

OK, I feel like an idiot, I never imagined moving from a PC to a Mac would have such a learning curve! I have added about 1500 photos to iPhoto, sorted them into albums and folders and batch changed to text titles.... My library looks good.
I take my zillion digital photos and maybe download to the computer every week or month. There will be photos from several different events. Since I don't want that whole batch left together, I immediately sort into albums and folders. I can do this and use iPhoto easily, but my problems come when I try to access my photos outside of iPhoto. So if I choose to attach a photo to an email, or more importantly, create something in Shutterfly, all heck breaks loose! In my old world (using first Photo Shop Album and then PSE) I could just jump on Shutterfly, click add pics, browse and my album names would show and I could just import to Shutterfly. Now I do the same thing but I can find nothing. What am I missing? I thought when I batch changed everything it would solve my problem. Am I just not looking in the right place? This seems like it should be simple and I am a very experienced computer user, but I have not used a Mac in years and have never used iPhoto until now.
I wanted to just buy PSE for the Mac but I read that it is not really for the Intel based machines, so now I wait. I have no idea what other programs might work for me. Honestly, I want to do very simple stuff here, this surely can be done
Please advise : )
Lesa

Answer 1

Lesa,
Welcome to the Apple Discussions.
Yes, there is a learning curve. Apple has some helpful information about the how to use the features of OSX: http://www.apple.com/support/mac101/ and for PC users switching to Mac: http://www.apple.com/support/switch101/.
Once you import photos into iPhoto, there is no need to access them through the Finder (think Windows Explorer). In fact, it is strongly recommended that you do not tamper with the items inside the iPhoto Library folder from the Finder in any way. Changes you make will not be recognized by the database, causing damage to the library and even a totally corrupted database. With your PC you were used to file browsing. iPhoto is not a file browser, and browsing through its structure to access your photos can lead you to damage the database.
To use your photos, launch iPhoto. There are many ways to organize them from within the application. To use them outside iPhoto, select the ones you want and do File > Export > File export to a folder on your desktop. The export dialog gives you the option to rename based on your iPhoto titles or album. You also have the option to resize your photos for better performance in an email or on a website. Upload the exports from the desktop, then delete it when you're finished. The originals remain safe in your iPhoto Library folder.
Albums have no representation in the Finder at all. They do not contain your files, but only a set of instructions for iPhoto to display your photos together. This allows photos to be in many albums with no duplication of the files.
When you title a photo, you do not change its filename. iPhoto keeps the original intact with no alterations, including the filename. The only way to rename the file itself is to do it before importing into iPhoto, or upon export from the library as I described above.
Two other ways to access your photos are to drag a thumbnail to your desktop, which creates a copy on your desktop for use in another application. Or right-click (Control-click) a photo and choose "Show File" from the contextual menu. A Finder window will open with that photo selected.
You can set iPhoto to work with an external image editing application in iPhoto's preferences. I use PSE 4, and I highly recommend it. With it set as my editor, I choose my photos from within iPhoto, double-click to open them in PSE, edit, then Save. This gets them saved back into the iPhoto Library, and my edited version replaces the thumbnail I see in the iPhoto viewing window. My mini is a PPC, so I can't give you an idea of how well (or how slow) PSE works on an Intel Mac. I haven't personally seen anyone not use it due to being on an Intel machine. There are others here who know - perhaps they'll chime in.
Another excellent resource is the iLife Multimedia tutorials. You can begin with iPhoto, then find links for iMovie and the others. http://www.apple.com/ilife/tutorials/iphoto/
Please don't hesitate to ask as many questions as you need.
Regards.