With the official announcement of the pending demise of Aperture, over the past day, I was more than a little dismayed, upset and even felt a little betrayed by Apple.
Since then I have had time to reflect, read and ponder further the ramifications of the situation. Additionally, I was reading up on the new features/improvements/updates for Final Cut Pro X 10.1.2 last evening. It resulted in a renewal in my understanding of how Apple implements foundations for the future.
I feel better about the future of utilizing Apple imaging software (under any name) for my needs as a professional going forward. Though I will need to actually see and test the feature set before making a final decision.
I have decided that I am not going to make any hasty decisions or migrate my workflow away from Aperture until I can accurately assess what Apple has in the works.
Here’s why:
1. This announcement has not stopped Aperture from functioning. It works the same today as it did before this announcement so there is no need to panic and flee to a lesser offering. (Hey, the other options must be “lesser” or I would already be using them, right?) Apple clearly stated they will support Aperture for Yosemite so that gives us all about 1.5-2 years to observe before making any decisions detrimental to our workflow needs.
2. Based upon what I have witnessed in the evolution of FCP X … even with it’s rocky start … is a bona fide effort to simplify and master the art of all that is good about a Library/Project/Event workflow and how it’s roots will be based in the OS as now FCP 10.1.2 can take advantage of Labels, tags/keywords applied by OS X Mavericks … I speculate that Yosemite will extend this ability further … so as to simplify the process across all Apple apps and even third party solutions.
3. Joseph’s comment: “Everything could be based on PhotoKit. It is now for iOS, but that same thing could happen in OSX. That would mean seamless integration between iOS and OS X, and unheard of third part developer access. We saw the new raw processing engine with lens correction and phenomenal noise reduction, for example, in WWDC sessions. All the groundwork is in place for an amazing experience.”
4. From Derrick Story: “So, here’s what I think. First, in order to incorporate iCloud, OS X, and iOS, Apple had to build from the bottom up. The evolution might follow what we’ve n seen with Final Cut X - solid, but basic feature set initially that grows in complexity over time. My first option will be to migrate to Photos. If I don’t like it, I hop over to Lightroom. In the meantime, I’m sitting pat.”
5. From Thom Hogan: “So I’m not panicking at all. What Jim posted (reference to a statement by Jim Dalrymple of the Loop) is 100% consistent with the publicly available information about Apple’s next steps, and does not necessarily mean that if you’re using Aperture you’re going to be screwed soon. It very well may mean that we’re getting closer to the workflow that we all want.”
6. If the digital imaging world as we know it does in fact end and I must migrate to another solution, doing so later will likely be easier as I can take advantage of the knowledge of the successes and failures in the process of those who passed before me. So, there really is no rush to venture forth in that respect.
For now, staying the course has no peril of consequence that did not exist prior to yesterday. So, I too am “standing pat.”
I too will stay the course. I spent too much time and energy moving from LR to Aperture to just go back again.
I still firmly believe that Apple should abandon their usual stance of “silence” and answer the many users out there. How is having people upset like this help their business? Would it kill them to open up a little?
Yup, yup, and yup. My highest level plan: recon, assess, then act. Still well within the recon phase, which'll last until Photos materializes. There's no urgency. An easy 24 months before Yosemite starts looking “old”. More thoughts here.
Scott
http://scottdavenportphoto.com/
Butch summarized my reaction well. I was initially disappointed. Odds are we will gain some interesting capabilities and lose some others. Photo.app likely will become the development platform for the future evolution of photo apps. After some thought I’m staying with Aperture and Photo until I can not accomplish what I want to do. My guess that is at least 2 years away. If that day comes, hopefully others will have a chance to develop and share migration strategies.
Guys,
I totally share that view too… and also, we should not panic and make assumptions on a tool that we have not seen even in Beta version :) so let’s stay cool for a bit longer and panic if really V1 seems a no hope :)
Enjoy,
J.
Even though Aperture seems to be crashing more often anymore I will be staying with it for a while anyway. I am also watching tutorials on Capture One which probably be my choice if Photos does not pan out. I started to lose faith in Apple when they dumbed down Aperture with the merge with iPhoto. It has now slipped another BIG notch. I plan on being ready when the other shoe drops.
Milt
I really dislike the term “dumbed down” especially when it is used inaccurately.
To my knowledge, when Apple unified the the iPhoto and Aperture libraries there was not one function, feature or capability that was lost. To the contrary, Aperture gained the ability to open iPhoto Libraries directly which was a boon for users migrating images from iPhoto to Aperture. While not an important feature to many Aperture users, no one should have suffered any repercussions or harm in the process.
In the end … Aperture, nor Aperture users were no more or less “dumb” as a result.
I’ve been a fairly serious Mac owner and user since 1984. I’ve been an avid photographer with a well-equipped darkroom for 57 years. I bought Aperture when it was first released and have updated it immediately almost as soon as each new iteration was available. Now, largely in retirement from my professional career in the Law, I spend a lot of time on my photography, doing work for a number of charitable organizations who can use the help of a good photographer.
My take on the new announcement is that Apple decided that the future for its involvement with photographers is to concentrate on developing a single application which can serve serious professionals and amateurs at the same time. The beginner should be able to access the needed tools quickly and simply and all of the rich possibilities needed by professional photographers would be available to those who want these features, without these features getting in the way of simplicity for the beginner. At the same time, Apple’s photography application has to integrate more fully with the potential of the internet and all the “sharing” and “storage” modes that are available in the Cloud. To accomplish this, it makes things easier if Apple does the overall redesign of a single application from the ground up, but incorporating virtually all the tools that they have developed in iPhoto and Aperture.
My guess is that, once all the dust has settled, Aperture lovers will find the new app will do everything that we’re used to doing, with very little learning curve, but there’ll also be a world of new possibilities that will make photography even more exciting, particularly for photographers who want to share their work with clients, or friends, or the world.
On the matter of storage, I happen to really like the system I have, with a master disk for Aperture files, and a series of back-up disks and a back-up rotation that ensures that I will lose almost nothing if my primary Aperture disk is stolen or dies. I don’t intend to use the Cloud for storage, and I think it is highly unlikely that Apple would design an app where the photographer MUST use the Cloud for storage. There are times when the Cloud is not readily available (such as while we are crossing the Atlantic by ship for seven days and often the Cloud cannot be accessed) and I must have access to my files at all times.
In any event, it is important that Aperture will be supported under Yosemite and this means that we will have plenty of time to make up our minds about a move to Photos for OSX. I plan to create a new library when the new app is ready, and I will transfer over all my image files (around 30,000) but also keep my existing library, in case I decide ultimately to just stay with Aperture or find something else altogether.
jsamu50901
“ but there’ll also be a world of new possibilities that will make photography even more exciting, particularly for photographers who want to share their work with clients, or friends, or the world.”
This is the crux. Not for us poor souls who are loosing one of our primary professional work tools, but for the future. Over the last several years, Apple have been building an armoury of industrial strength tools for developers. Developers are slow to adopt because time investment is so great (maybe photographers should take a leaf out of their book!). But now they are adopting and this could be a killer moment for the Apple platform, because even Adobe are starting to look shaky (because they don’t create/develop. They just maintain to keep the profits high). Check out what is happening with designers and Sketch3. Surprising reading for me today.
“Check out what is happening with designers and Sketch3. Surprising reading for me today.”
Got a link on that you can share?
I just googled it Butch, but this page on their site has some reviews/articles.
http://bohemiancoding.com/sketch/resources/
Ive been using and improving my Aperture skills over the last 18 months. I was just about to purchase NIK plugins for Aperture. Is this going to be a waste of time and money? Im not in a hurry to leave Aperture for LR as Ive never used it and graduating from I photos I feel comfortable in Aperture. Any thoughts?
Hi David,
I made up my mind 6-8 months ago to place a moratorium on purchasing any plugins/presets/extras for Aperture until we heard something more on the matter.
I’m kind of glad I did as this new info about the potential for third party plugins to tap into the RAW image pipeline … potentially avoiding the creation of a TIFF file to employ them sounds awesome.
That said, many of the available plugins for Aperture from Nik, OnOne, Topaz and others will also work with Lr. So as long as the plugins will work in both you may be ok if you find you need to make a move later on.
Thanks Butch - really keen to broaden my horizons with NIK so if I can move over, if thats what I decide to do, then it will probably be worth it still, given that NIK is much more affordable these days as well doesn’t seem like such a risk.
Don’t really follow your point on third parties and TIFF files.
The TIFF files come into play when working with images in the plugins. Aperture and Lightroom must create these new copies of your images so the plugins can work with the images.
In the new offerings from Apple … there may be a way to avoid that step … then we won’t have to deal with all those extra files …
Thanks Butch makes complete sense now.
That in itself sounds like a positive step. I think like most people in this thread ill stay where I am for now and wait and see.
Same here, I will continu to work the way I was working before, nothing has change.
Butch: your stand pat re discontinuation of Aperture ( for now) is quite persuasive.
I look at it this way … I could spend money now to buy/upgrade alternate software … invest valuable time in training or re- learning to use that software … or I could just conduct business as usual for the next year or two and see what transpires.
If after that time, I finally decide that I do really need to make a move, those alternatives will still be there and I’ll have a bit more cash to throw at the effort if need be.
If by chance the Photos app for OS X pans out to be a viable solution … so much the better.
Why all this talk of “Bad News”? Evolution is inevitable.
Apple is in no way abandoning their commitment to photographers.
I don’t care what the name of the application is.
The expansion of the internet and the creation of multi platform applications requires a complete re-write of the software to work across all devices. That sounds good for me and my clients. I refuse to be a doom sayer and write off Apple’s great technology.
Combining iPhoto and Aperture into a single sleek and efficient software make a lot of sense to me. Why write two levels of software.
Final Cut Pro was replaced by Final Cut X and the first version didn’t meet expectations but the subsequent versions are stellar.
If Aperture were to stop development today I would not hesitate to use it as is.
I intend to stay with Aperture through Yosemite OSX and let Photo work the kinks out then make some level of change.
I’ve got better things to do with my time than worry about the unknown.
John Waugh, Photographic Images • Apple Certified Trainer• Sport Action Lifestyle Photography
There is a big difference between what happened with FCP->FCPX and what happens with Aperture->Photos. The former is an app sold in the AppStore which aims to offer a comprehensive video editing workflow. While Apple got many things right to make this task as easy as one could imagine - it is still not for everyone. Photos is for everyone - just like the Finder, Preview, Safari and so on. Why? Because taking photos is by far more common. Managing those thousands of photos is a problem anyone faces. Look at the Finder - it is the generic tool to access and manage your files. There are easy parts of it and there are advanced parts. Photos is similar in that. One step further: files got a lot more metadata in the last releases. Why should there be search and metadata facilities _implemented_ within the Photos App? An enhanced Spotlight is all you would need - actually it already has that functionality and already is extensible. Search for a photo in this new “Alfred-esque” Spotlight dialog and directly find all photos. Klick on it to open it in… Photos. Want to see pictures you did at some location? Find it using this search or within the Maps application. Photos are everywhere. Apple is shifting from “Files” to “Objects”. Be it texts, music, contacts, events… photos.
http://neonsqua.re
I am a professional photographer and rely heavily on aperture for file storage and editing. I am having a hard time with what to believe. I know for my business to function I need a strong editing software. I have LR and do not like it at all so if I had to find a new program I figured I would try capture one…I tried about a year ago because aperture kept freezing on me but I didn’t like capture one much but in desperation I purchased capture one today because it was 50% off for poor ol aperture user. I tried editing photos and I dislike the program very much. So for now i am going to stick with aperture because it’s well worth it…if in a couple years I have to move programs I’ll just worry then…I am confident that from what I am reading photo.apps will suit my needs since I also use photoshop for editing. Please keep posting information going forward about photo.apps I am hopefully for new and improved software
I have been in the recon phase (again!). While there are many good/very good raw convertors out there, I have found nothing that is as easy as Aperture for managing and tagging my images. I find this more of an issue than adjusting images. So, everything at the moment says ‘stand fast’. How the DAM facility in Yosemite/iOS 8/Photos.app will work will be a key issue for me in deciding my forward path. So, time to worry about that down the road.
If I want to use an alternative raw convertor then I can use the Catapult plugin. I quite often use C1 with Aperture in that way. It works quite well. Even if the OS doesn’t support the raw file, provided you send a JPEG+Raw pair out for conversion you should still be able to use Catapult (from memory it sends both files to the other convertor).
Andrew Macnaughton
Well its time to chime in. I need to shoot Tethered for some of my clients. Aperture has been a little buggy there. Im learning Capture One, C1, for a tethered solution. C1 for capture and Photos for DAM? The two programs are quite similar in quality, except for for the learning of where or how to do what I know is capable. I wonder if Apple got some Developers from them, or visa versa.
Anyway I will still be here using Aperture for sometime.
I think that Apple doesn’t know how to Market a software. They should of supported more Professional Phtogs to do videos like PhaseOne. And pumped more money for Joseph to expand Apertureexpert, like funny guy Kelby got with Adobe. If its not a runaway success like the iPhone or iPod or Tablet….they just let it sit there and not promote it. They let you think nothing is happening, and most people who don’t see the true benefits of AP think its slowly dying and don’t what to hitch their wagon to it.
Rant over. Im looking forward to seeing what Photos has to offer and to migrate my Lib over. Just haven’t heard how Photos will handle tethered (wifi) shooting, so I need a backup plan I can jump into.
davidbmoore@mac.com
Twitter= @davidbmoore
Scottsdale AZ
I too am evaluating options…and it’s a tough situation. Capture One, in my view, has a *superb* rendering capability that easily bests LR and Aperture when it comes to color retention and detail recovery in low light/shadow regions of images. The noise suppression and highlight recovery are impressive. I also find C1’s sharpening tools to be excellent, even though it’s really just an unsharp mask type tool. (Aperture’s Edge Sharpen is great when used by deft hands).
Interestingly, for the vast majority of photos that don’t require lots of post or lots of detail recovery, Aperture produces great results in less time than Capture One, which in my opinion has a somewhat clunky clicky interface. One aspect of Capture One that I don’t like is the inability to “turn off” adjustments…there is some ability to do this but only for local adjustments. I also haven’t found a way to view “the original” vs. the edited image which is a big oversight IMO.
I have also used LR recently and there is no question it has some great editing features, but I find the RAW rendering/conversion pretty mediocre. Aperture definitely has a leg up on LR in this regard. On the other hand, the huge user community around LR is a big benefit, since there is always someone that has posted a video about how to do something cool.
Aperture, while lacking some nice features, gets so much “right” that it will be tough to give up. Aperture’s library management, which I believe to be second to none, has so many great little features (Stacks!) that the other tools pale in comparison. In fact I’m now less concerned that the new Photos app will not include local/brushed adjustments…Im sure it will (eventually)…I’m more concerned that many of the great organizational features that Aperture has will be omitted completely.
For now I’ll be using Aperture primarily, and using Capture One on those images that require exceptional reproduction. I’ll still manage all my images in Aperture, and when necessary, will export 16bit TIFFs from C1 and import these back into Aperture to sit right next to the originals (using Stacks of course).
HTH
PP