Apple releases "Aperture" software for pro photographers.

symphonix

symphonix

Scratch & Sniff Committee
Apple has just released a new pro-app called "Aperture" which is a photo management power-app similar to iPhoto, but clearly aimed at professional photographers... and it looks SWEEEET. Its fast, handles RAW files in a non-destructive way and applies corrections to RAW instantly, also handles EXIF data in new and powerful ways. There won't be a self-respecting professional photographer who won't be tempted by this offering, and I think quite a few amateurs will consider splashing out on it too.

http://www.apple.com/aperture/
 
It's nothing like Photoshop like i first saw, its for manipulating RAW camera images using Core-Image

Starting to dream that i had a dSLR camera and a Powermac or iMac G5....anybody care to spot me $3500 ??? ::ha::
 
the demos look really cool. love the menu sounds. and the uk price point is very good.

i can see colleagues of mine ditching their 'real' light boxes and loops - also, its one more reason for them to go digital. selecting / and editing images for designs etc should be much much easier as a creative team with this.

i dont think this is any sort of 'competitor' to adobe's suite of apps - they are very different things.
 
yes. photoshop is now more for complex bitmap image editing/creation, a counterpart to illustrators complex vector creation.

Aperture is far more focussed on the photographer, a place where i always thought photoshop lacked (contact sheets are very awkward in photoshop, for example). these two will go hand in hand, not head to head.
 
My wife just bought the Rebel XT and I got the iMac G5. I sent her a link to Aperture over IM and she liked it a lot. Unfortunately, it's out of our price range. She's looking to do professional photography and that would help her out as well.
 
If she's looking to go professional with photography, I guess Aperture would be really worth its money soon. I'd think about it if I weren't just using my Sony DSC P-150 for snapshots.
 
Actually, CS2 pretty much covers everything I saw in the Aperture demos. Granted, I haven't taken advantage of CS2's features along this path, but when I was playing with it, it looks almost identical to Aperture to be honest.

What I'm really talking about is CS2's Bridge, which is the organizational tool much like what you see in Aperture's demos. It has all the same search, filtering, keywording, star ranking, etc. Plus, CS2 is very RAW aware.

From what I can see, Aperture's only advantage over CS2 is the Core Image stuff, which isn't that big a deal if you've got a fast Mac anyway.

I'm not dissing Aperture, I'm sure it has more to offer if I dig into it, but CS2 and Bridge are pretty much there from what I can tell.
 
Well, I don't think they're in direct competition. Rather I think that even if you're using CS2, Aperture can add to the workflow. Actually, it can become the center...
 
Fryke,

What I'm suggesting is that the Bridge already IS the center for CS2. Aperture wouldn't really add much of anything.

Admittedly, I haven't looked deep enough to Aperture to find more advantages/differences to CS2/Bridge, so I may change my mind down the road.

I did, however, try to implement the CS2/Bridge workflow but it just really wasn't worth the trouble for our workflow. I think it would really shine in an environment with a lot more staff. With just a few of us, it's not as critical.

And for $500 I'm going to need to see something really freaking impressive. So far I'm not seeing it. I'm just seeing a nice photo management/editing tool that doesn't have a fraction of Photoshop's depth (but doesn't have Photoshop's bloat and purpose, either).

I'm anxious to see more and see how people integrate it in to their work environments. I'll be curious to see if my photographer colleagues are stoked or not. Where I suspect Aperture will really shine is with, well, Photographer. Obviously it's targeted directly at that audience. While Photoshop has become a much more diverse app than pure photo editing, Aperture appears to really focus, no pun intended, on what high volume photographers need to do day in and day out. Apple's been very good lately at focusing an app at a very target audience (or purpose) as opposed to trying to make an app that does all things to all people.
 
Admittedly, I haven't looked deep enough to Aperture to find more advantages/differences to CS2/Bridge, so I may change my mind down the road.
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I'd suggest visiting the Apple site for Aperture and watching the demo there (a rather tight and easy to follow QuickTime demo). You'll see that while it does sort-of take the place of Bridge, it is by no means the same, as it is about managing your RAW photos in a non-destructive way, quickly comparing a large number of similar photos, and so on. The good thing about Core Image, aside from its astounding speed, is that if you apply a string of a dozen effects it actually only alters the image once. That is to say, when CoreImage has a number of adjustments in play, it adds them together into one calculation and applies that to a copy of the original. That means there is less error due to interpolation or quantising, even after applying hundreds of adjustments.

I've just ordered in my first D-SLR camera last week, and while I probably won't be getting this for budget reasons, I know from flicking through photography web-sites and magazines that there are hundreds of people in every major city who would by a Mac just to run Aperture. You only have to look at the number of people who own 10 different telephoto lenses for bird-watching photos - at $1000+ each - not to mention the users for media, advertising, wedding and commercial photography.
 
Personally I have no need or interest in this application, mostly because I already have all these features in CS2...

That being said, if this hits a price point that is cheaper than CS2, I can see it being a good option for a lot of people.

So it's cool, I just wont be needing it ;)
 
symphonix said:
I've just ordered in my first D-SLR camera last week, and while I probably won't be getting this for budget reasons, I know from flicking through photography web-sites and magazines that there are hundreds of people in every major city who would by a Mac just to run Aperture.
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Just curious, what dSLR did you get and what lens?
 
RGrphc2 said:
Starting to dream that i had a dSLR camera and a Powermac or iMac G5....anybody care to spot me $3500 ??? ::ha::
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Do your really need to spend $3500 though? A camera half (or less) the price of that is more than capable enough for most (note: most, not all) uses.

Personally I'd grab a good one in the lower price range and then keep a 35mm or medium format (or large format) one the side for the really important or "large" stuff. Anything the D50 can't handle is probably outside the use of even today's top digital cameras to begin with...that is until we start to see 30 to 50MP cameras arriving. Of course that depends on the use of the image and other factors...I'm just generalizing here.

I wound up buying a Nikon D50 after a week or so of debating this summer and narrowing it down to three cameras: Nikon D50, Nikon D70s, and Canon Rebel XT. The D50 and D70 shot pretty much the same (couldn't justify the extra $300 difference) and the XT's images were blurry and color wasn't as good, even though it has 2MP more. If it's something I need a lot of info from (which is very rare), then I can always borrow a 120/220 camera my father has (or possibly use a Nikon 35mm SLR) and do a film scan.
 
what you have to remember is that this is for PRO photographers.

i work with some of them - and most that have have CS2 dont use more than 15% of whats there - its not within their remit to have it or use it. most have some version of photoshop - and for what they would need to do (i.e. - view / manage / group / organise / edit / comp / present / etc / etc) photoshop just doesnt cut it.

from what ive been reading about aperture - it blows adobe bridge out of the water for what it does at its core - and as a 'one-stop-shop'.

if your not the type of photographer who's going to take 500 / 600 / 700 / etc+ pictures in a days photoshoot and need to see QC on the fly etc then this app won't be for you - Bridge will suffice - and its a great hub for CS2.

also - its almost half the price of CS2.
 
mdnky said:
Do your really need to spend $3500 though? A camera half (or less) the price of that is more than capable enough for most (note: most, not all) uses.

Personally I'd grab a good one in the lower price range and then keep a 35mm or medium format (or large format) one the side for the really important or "large" stuff. Anything the D50 can't handle is probably outside the use of even today's top digital cameras to begin with...that is until we start to see 30 to 50MP cameras arriving. Of course that depends on the use of the image and other factors...I'm just generalizing here.

I wound up buying a Nikon D50 after a week or so of debating this summer and narrowing it down to three cameras: Nikon D50, Nikon D70s, and Canon Rebel XT. The D50 and D70 shot pretty much the same (couldn't justify the extra $300 difference) and the XT's images were blurry and color wasn't as good, even though it has 2MP more. If it's something I need a lot of info from (which is very rare), then I can always borrow a 120/220 camera my father has (or possibly use a Nikon 35mm SLR) and do a film scan.
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Really the D50 came out better? I have worked with Several Canon Digital's before (Powershots) and was still debating on what Digital SLR i was gonna get, i was thinking either a D50 or a Rebel XT. I can't find too many good package deals on it though...(extra lenses, case, cleaner, memory card, etc)

The 3500 was $1,000 for a Digital SLR and $2500 for a Powermac +Monitor and some RAM :D
 
Just curious, what dSLR did you get and what lens?
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A Pentax *ist DL with a Sigma 18-50 lens. $999 Australian, at least $400 cheaper than an equivalent Canon or Nikon.
It's identical to the *ist DS but a LOT cheaper, uses a Pentamirror viewfinder in place of Pentaprism, and doesn't have TTL (Through The Lens flash metering). It does have a bigger display, though. The viewfinder is great, in spite of being cheaper, and its lighter anyway.
There was a similar kit for $200 more with an 18-125 lens, but it is both bigger, bulkier, and I simply preferred the feel of the 18-50.
All the reviews show it coming up pretty well against the Canon and Nikon's in image quality, and I am on a very tight budget so I'm not spending $500 more for a difference that only a studio photographer would notice. Its auto-mode is friendly and easy. Since I *love* to muck around with camera settings and techniques, and my wife really only wants a camera that can point-and-shoot, the DL should keep us both happy.
 
RGrphc2 said:
Really the D50 came out better?...........The 3500 was $1,000 for a Digital SLR and $2500 for a Powermac +Monitor and some RAM :D
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Oh...ok, well then. That makes a bit more sense...I saw the thing in your sig about wanting a Rebel XT and I was tying to figure that out...figured maybe you decided to go with one of the higher end ones.

The last review I saw on the D50 had it recommended over the XT (by a hair) and the Pentax *ist DS (by alot). Note: The Pentax's quality wasn't on par with the others...even when you took RAW images with the Pentax and JPG ones with the others. Not sure if this DL model symphonix is talking about has had that issue fixed or not.

As far as the Nikon to Canon debate...the images I saw back in July between the two at DPReview and elsewhere showed an advantage to the Nikon. The ones from the Canon seemed blurry...which most people attributed to the lens included in their "kit" being of lesser quality. Since then I've seen more images which show the gap closing a bit, but not enough for me to worry or even consider the Canon if I was buying again. With a 2MP difference I would expect a noticeably better image...which isn't the case right now. Besides...if I bought another digital I'd want to get a top of the line one now...which would probably be a Hasselblad H2D. Advantage: 22MP -- Disadvantage: Cost (I didn't win the $340mil PowerBall...someone in Oregon did)

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After looking at Aperture a bit more...I'm tempted to buy it. Especially considering the Academic version is $249.
 
Just a side note on MP: Some makers are pushing too hard - and 2 MP more can mean actual less image quality. Resolution isn't everything. I'd go by price range first and then by image quality (tests, tests, tests) and then handling. (Some cameras are still simply awful to handle...)
 
I go to this site for ridiculously in-depth camera reviews.

www.dpreview.com

I have a Canon EOS 20D. My colleague has a Nikon D70. I'm not a photographer, so I don't know enough to get into the nitty gritty, but I do know that we did a side by side of both cameras on a shoot. I found the 20D to be considerably more color accurate (just used the room's built-in flourescent lighting) and "cleaner". My colleague's personal photos of macro flower work on the D70 are wonderfull, however. Both are very good cameras, but I would trust dpreview.com more than me.
 
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