Help with adding lettering to a photo on a Mac

Someone on a Mac forum, also wanting to add text to photos, got a reply that referenced Appleworks.
http://www.macworld.com/weblogs/mac911/2005/03/textandpix/index.php

Hmm, can't find Appleworks on my Mac..

Appleworks is a defunct software suite.

I'm sure there are plenty of freeware apps that can do this. I'll try to find you one.

Free and kind of a pain: Image Well

$39.95 and actually pretty great: Acorn

There's also various GIMP versions, but I don't care for them much (I'm also a Photoshop user so I'm biased)

Thank you Alba and Elvis Telecom. I just visited the GIMP pages.. Maybe I'll go forAcorn..

I've been liking iPhoto thus far - though I don't know why they neglected to incorporate text adding!

http://seashore.sourceforge.net/index.php

If you want something really basic, try a program like Paintbrush.

For a good Photoshop substitute, try Graphic Converter, which I haven't used for a while, but I think it allowed text overlay. It's shareware, but doesn't nag you for a while.

Don't use any of those. If this is something you're going to print, you need the type to be set with a vector program. Illustrator, InDesign, Pagemaker, Quark etc. Otherwise it probably won't look very good. Unless you do some kind of fancy filtering and fading and shadowing on the type. But if you want clean lettering, use one of the above. I don't know if there are cheaper or freeware vector/EPS programs, but look for that ability.

Sorry - dan is quite right. I didn't really take note of the fact that it was for publishing. It seems a bit weird that he's getting you to do it if you have no experience in the matter.

if you want to add COMIC BOOK lettering, try Comic Life which is awesome

(this would possibly not work for certain kinds of books)

Thanks for your replies. I have just been talking with my boyfriend about this. With all the writing of it, he hasn't till now thought about the book's cover too much. On reflection, my help alone might not be enough to take it to the level it deserves. We are wondering if there is anyone on here with access to more professional editing gear, who might be prepared, for a reasonable fee, to do something more adventurous with the text (to put on the supplied image). And, quite importantly, how much would you charge?

The book is going to be self-published - early 2008 - and the author does have a modest but growing readership. His last book sold out its run. Sorry to be so mysterious -- I'd be happy to give more info through email.

what is "reasonable fee"?

We have a budget, but I would rather not say what that is. You tell me what you think your artwork is worth, we'll check out your work and decide if it's worth going for.

I have the pro software, I do this for a living, I take Paypal, I work pretty cheap. (I won't say how cheap on the board though.)

I'll send you an ILXmail.