Apple's Aperture versus Adobe's Lightroom

[top_tech]

I am at present using Adobe's Beta Lightroom and find it very good. But at present can not

afford a copy of Aperture which would also invole me buying a new computer, but I digress,

what I would like to know is, is anyone using both Apple's Aperture and Adobe's Lightroom.

What do you think of these application?

[Uhooru]

They are somewhat similar. Apeture has a great form of the light table that i really like.

UNfortunately Apeture's raw conversion sux a big one and there are numerous problems and

issues. One train of thought is that it has great potential, but it was launched too soon and

that the current users are basically Beta testers.

Light box is only in its 2nd beta version. Will be intersting to see where it goes. One thing

many people don't like about apeture as it put your files in a closed package library and it's

hard to get to them unless you're in apeture. Light box uses the directories you set up. I

think its much more efficiant. They both are aways from being complete.

[patricklavoie]

i think they are both pretty close, and personaly dont really see the point of using them...i

use Bridge and camera raw that those pretty much the same thing for now.

[Ed_Ingold]

Adobe LightRoom will probably be released for both PC and MAC at about the same time, whereas Aperture is a MAC-only application and likely to remain so. I intend to examine it more closely at that time.

 

From what I've seen, neither are likely to appeal to anyone proficient with Photoshop, but are targeted to those who have yet to face that challenge.

[william_john_smith]

"<I>One thing many people don't like about apeture as it put your files in a closed

package

library and it's hard to get to them unless you're in apeture. </I><P>There seems to be a

lot of misinformation about how Aperture stores images - a little deeper investigation into

the .aplibrary reveals that it's not as bad as some are fearing.<BR>

While it is true that Aperture creates its own package with a .aplibrary extension (by

default in your Pictures directory), it is not true that the raw images themselves are stored

in a proprietary format.<BR>

If you use "Show Package Contents" on the .aplibrary, you will find folders and .approject

files which correspond to your library layout. Further examination of the .approject file

reveals that it is also a package.<BR>

Using "Show Package Contents" on the .approject opens a Finder window with a handful of

XML files for the project, along with a folder which contains a subfolder for each Master

Image loaded into that project. Opening the subfolder for an image reveals more XML files

(for versioning information) <B>along with the original, untouched, image imported from

your camera.</B><P>

Bottom line: Aperture does NOT prevent you from retrieving images from it's library

directly from the file system. Aperture does not have to be open to do this!

[william_john_smith]

<I>From what I've seen, neither are likely to appeal to anyone proficient with Photoshop, but

are targeted to those who have yet to face that challenge.</I><P>Neither program is meant

to replace Photoshop but to work with it. In fact if one doesn't know Photoshop one best not

go anywhere near

Aperture. Both programs are designed for the professional level photographer shooting

thoursands of images at a setting and not the

Photo Elements user.<P>As far as which is better, as pointed our elsewhere both are in beta

and it is too early to tell. I have found in both great things but I will have to wait for latter

versions to decide the outcome, at least for me.

[awindsor]

Aperture is not in beta it is in full release. Like Microsoft Apple is now using paying customers as beta testers. This is not cool!

[patricklavoie]

then again...why would you need those software? why dont you just use bridge and ACR? i

think they are great software, but still dont see the point of using them...what can they realy

add to my workflow?

[alfarmer]

While Aperture doesn't (yet) store library images in a non-standard format, their directory

structure is indeed quite proprietary. Navigating it with anything other than Aperture is an

exercise in frustration.

 

The glimmer of hope is that they will change Aperture so it can reference massive

amounts of pictures that span multiple drives. This hope is more likely now that both

Lightroom and even iPhoto can do it -- not to mention iView, Picasa, Photo Mechanic,

Photoshop Elements, etc. If Apple keeps their library structure proprietary they'll be the

only one on the planet doing it that way going forward.

 

ALF

[Uhooru]

WJ as ALF said, yes you can find your files in Apeture, but its a rediculous waste of time. Light table on the other hand lets you maintain your photos in whatever type of heirarchical structure you care to create for them and they are available to photoshop and other programs. These two programs aren't created to replace photoshop at all,they will never be the image editors that it is, the main purpose, is as a workflow tool and editor, to quickly be able to set up a workflow for a large batch of images from a job, a way of quickly sorting them, tagging the metadata, ranking and even sequencing and then the ability to do minor basic adjustments to these raw files. Really, I don't know why there is a need for Lightbox, it seems to me, that Adobe should justevolve Bridge into the sort of capability that Apeture has. For me, the only thing bridge doesn't do for me is have Apeture's very cool lighttable, which allows you to freely move images around, like on a real light table, and thus you can easily compare, sort, and especially for projects, you can sequence them. Also the ability to create "projects" on a light table, so you have a named project light table, and you can go through different folders and drag images into the table, and then save that table as a project or something, kind of what Apeture and Lightbox do now, only in Bridge. That's what I'd like to see out of Bridge. Just some thoughts. I have apeture and it is nice, but the raw conversion sux, but will improve I'm sure, and there's a big problem with exporting metadata out of it when you export images out of the Apeture "library". Maybe they have a handle on that,as I haven't checked back on the Apple Apeture forum lately. I still think Apple rushed it out too fast, especially now with Intel macs, they have to recode it anyways. I do think that within a couple of versions, depending on how people get along with that library structure, it should be a very good tool.

[mark_levison1]

I've got a meta-review on the go at: http://www.notesfromatooluser.com/2007/02/aperture_vs_lig.html

Where I survey and summarize the best of the other reviews.

[hakon_soreide]

I just tried Aperture a bit the last few days, and the one thing that frustrated me the most about it was that it was impossible to really delete an image from within Aperture - at most, it could delete the information about a file that Aperture managed. If I have to go into a different application or a file explorer to delete a picture, then that really messes up the workflow for me, and so I'm now trying a demo version of Lightroom instead, which at least has that one thing in place, making it very convenient since you can flag images as "rejected" then batch delete afterwards - very handy.<p>

Aperture looks way cooler than Lightroom, though, and I liked the viewing interface better, but Apple needs to address the needs of both those who wants to back up their photos and those who wants to tidy out the trash with equal convenience.