aperture review

[Terry Breedlove]

The Apple Aperture non review needs to be taken down and redone. Nothing in the non review is correct anymore. Here is the link to the non review, review.  http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/...ture-none.shtml

[pete_truman]

When first released Aperture did have some serious shortcomings which are commented on in the article. However it has moved on a long long way since this was written to largely become what it promised in that early version. However some of the comments do, to be fair, still hold true. Not many, I agree, but still some of significance in the broader scheme of things - it's Mac only (a good thing in my view!), RAW support for new cameras is still hopeless, metadata support could still be improved (couldn't it always?) and so on.

I remember comparing Aperture and Lightroom not long after this article appeared, used Aperture for a while and got frustrated with its shortcomings, then moved to Lightroom but just couldn't get on with the interface, then moved back to Aperture and have stayed with it ever since. However, given all the obvious effort Adobe have put into continuing Lightroom development I want to be sure Apple will sustain Aperture. I have no real need to upgrade Aperture as it works very well for my purposes, but I wish Apple could be re-assuring about its future.

I know one should never say never, but interested to re-read Michael's final summary paragraph (remember, this was in January 2006):

[blockquote]"But if Apple were to ship a version of Aperture tomorrow that met my needs I'd adopt it in a flash, and given Apple's track record I imagine that that day may well yet come. In the meantime I'm going to keep Aperture on my computer, will buy all of the updates and upgrades as they become available, and will keep you informed of what I discover as time passes. Someday may come sooner than we think."[/blockquote]

I wonder how far away that day is?

[drm]

The more I use Aperture, the less likely I feel I am ever to change. Apart from the fact that the sheer time investment of moving between two non-destructive edit / DAM environments is a massive deterrent, I just find Aperture a delightful experience.  Although I use it every day, I still sometimes stumble upon neat tricks I hadn't found before - the way that the interface is designed is so open to endless combinations of workspace arrangement is just brilliant - although using a dual screen setup is practically a must. For example, using the lightbox to arrange a set of images for display, and still having access to display / compare / edit of individual or multiple images on the second screen.  Unfortunately, the Lightroom marketing steamroller has made it unlikely that many will get to experience Aperture, let alone spend the time to get to grips with it.  I do sometimes revisit Lightroom to verify stuff I've done in the past, but frankly I don't enjoy the experience. It reminds me of the nausea I got when I had to switch to Windows 3.1 from Mac OS 7 :-)

The lack of RAW format support updates is a big negative, but in my case it really doesn't impact at all: I've settled on the cameras I want to use for a while now, and they're all supported by Aperture. I can't imagine any compelling reason to change.

I do hope there will be updates to Aperture, but I have to say even as it is now, I can't find much to complain about.

[Desmond]

I love Aperture but have to admit the noise handling is not as good as other RAW conversion software. Are you using any plugin to do the job? Good news is Aperture is just months away, if the rumor Is real.

[jeremyrh]

Good news is Aperture is just months away, if the rumor Is real.

Or it isn't, if the rumour is not true. And there's no special reason to believe that it is. Aperture has some serious catching up to do, in many areas (not least RAW support for new cameras - by which I mean cameras less than a year old) - or they can just pack up and cede the battle to Lightroom.

[Desmond]

or they can just pack up and cede the battle to Lightroom.

One big reason that Lightroom is much more popular than Aperture, I believe, is  the PC version.  But this doesn't mean Aperture is not worth existing or improving. I am happy it manage my 20000 images well, with a few tweaking of parameter I can see the potential of an image, for output I will do fine tuning in photoshop anyway. Don't tell me with Lightroom I can save the CS.

[996sps]

I have used Aperture from its first launch and I did try out Lightroom but did not like the interface. Aperture does what I need it to do (I shoot MotoGP and birds) and the book interface is what I like most. One stop from RAW to final product and I send it to the printers.

Yes there are some short comings but I have lived with it with workarounds and I can still use the "Edit with" Photoshop if I need to in the interface. Hopefully there will be some improvements for future.

[drm]

I love Aperture but have to admit the noise handling is not as good as other RAW conversion software. Are you using any plugin to do the job? Good news is Aperture is just months away, if the rumor Is real.

Do you mean generally, or the noise reduction tool ?  If the tool, I agree. It doesn't seem to do anything at all. Then again, neither did the one in Lightroom when I last used it.  Actually I have little use for NR.  On the very, very rare case that I need it I have Noise Ninja.  Dfine 2 seems good too. Actually very good.

What I do regret is the lack of hot pixel supression, which, for example, Iridient RAW Developer does very well.  But in general the noise which the cameras I use generate at high ISO doesn't bother me.