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Aperture 3 Stacks, Picks and Album Picks

PhotoJoseph's picture
September 29, 2011 - 9:22am

One of Aperture’s more curiously powerful features is Stacks. Unfortunately to the uninitiated, it’s probably just as confusing as it is useful—a point apparently recognized by Apple itself; when Aperture 3 was released, they set the default position of the “Automatically stack new versions” preference to off.

OK, What are Stacks?

Stacks are a collapsible collection of photos. There are two primary uses for stacks:

  1. To collect a series of similar images where you only want one to be prominent. These are usually shot in a sequence, for example the series of shots leading up to the wedding kiss, the series of shots leading to the touchdown, the series of nearly identical shots of a flower. In editing, the idea is that you’d “pick” the best shot, and that would go to the top of the stack. Close the stack, and you only see the best one. Open it, and you see the rest.
  2. To manage a series of Versions of the same image. If you have a photo and create a series of versions (say a B&W one, a cropped one, or just a series of experiments of adjustments), then they can all be kept together in a Stack so you know at a glance that they are in fact the same photo. Ultimately you “pick” the one you like best, and again when you close the stack, you only see the favorite one.

There is no visual differentiation between these two uses, which may be to blame for some of the confusion. And there’s nothing stopping you from combining these two uses either; ten photos in a sequence, plus a handful of versions of those photos, can all be in a single stack.

Then just to add another level of complexity, you have two stack designators; the Stack Pick and the Album Pick. This allows you to have a different pick in an Album than in the Project. You don’t have to, but you can. Confusing, yes, but also dead useful.

So with all that on the table, let’s go through the steps.

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Mac OS X Lion 10.7.1 Released

PhotoJoseph's picture
August 18, 2011 - 4:49am

The first update to the latest big cat is out! Not very many fixes mentioned, and it’s an incredibly light download at just 17.4 MB, and nothing specific to Aperture users listed, BUT of course we want to know if this changes anything for us photographers!

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The Aperture FAQ—It's Time

PhotoJoseph's picture
August 12, 2011 - 7:05am

Hi folks,

I’ve been collecting notes for an Aperture FAQ for over a year now, and it’s high time I get this thing published. It’ll be a lovely source of frequently asked questions for Aperture users of all levels, including topics such as:

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Another Photo Contest

PhotoJoseph's picture
August 5, 2011 - 4:23am

I know, this whole Google+ thing is crazy. I’m clearly having too much fun over there!

I just launched a new contest, and this is definitely one you’ll want to check out. The prizes are pretty fantastic. Details are here. 

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Adjustments; Levels

Live Training Session 010

This is the third video in a long series about Adjustments in Aperture 3. This one's all about Levels… and there's a lot to cover!

Duration: 00:47 hr
Included with membership
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