iPhoto munges resolution of JPGs?

[tony]

I scanned in a large number of photos recently, and added them to my iPhoto Library. If I open one of them with GraphicConverter, it says the image's resolution is 300 x 300 dpi. This is correct, since I scanned them at 300 dpi.

I've noticed that if I edit an image in iPhoto (this includes just rotating it 90 degrees), iPhoto saves the image at 72 x 72 dpi! This happens to every image that iPhoto touches. I don't see any way for me to change this in the configuration. (I'm using iPhoto 4.)

To get around this, I've configured iPhoto to use GraphicConverter (which preserves the resolution) as its editor. This works fine as long as I don't accidentally use iPhoto's rotate button.

Is this a known issue? Does it still work this way in iPhoto 5 (or iPhoto 6).

Thanks.

[symphonix]

I take it then that you're running in iPhoto '04?

[tony]

I take it then that you're running in iPhoto '04?

Yes. iPhoto '04 on a PowerMac G4 running 10.3.9.

[symphonix]

I haven't seen this problem before, but it looks like you're not the only one to notice resolution problems in iPhoto '04.
http://macosx.com/forums/mac-os-x-system-mac-software/265458-iphoto-resolution-problem.html

[tony]

I haven't seen this problem before, but it looks like you're not the only one to notice resolution problems in iPhoto '04.
http://www.macosx.com/forums/showthread.php?t=265458

I don't think that looks like the same problem.

I should point out that saving it at 72dpi doesn't actually lose any data/pixels. It just means the next time you open the image in Preview or GraphicConverter, it displays it ~4 times larger than it was originally supposed to be.