Photoshop challenger from Apple?

[ktinkel]

Apple just announced a new product, Aperture: Designed for professional photographers (http://www.apple.com/aperture/) ($499). Are they mad? Photoshop is queen, right?

Well, I do not know how well this will do. The printing industry is still strongly Mac-oriented. But photography? Who knows. Sounds interesting, regardless. (And who knows what could happen once Apple completes the move of the Mac to Intel hardware.)

According to the press release, Aperture is . . .Designed from the ground up for professional photographers, Aperture provides everything you need for after the shoot, delivering the first all-in-one post-production tool for photographers. Featuring a RAW-focused workflow, Aperture makes RAW as easy as JPEG, letting you import, edit, catalog, organize, retouch, publish, and archive your images more effectively and efficiently than ever before. From capture to output, you work directly with your RAW files, never having to first convert them into another format before viewing, adjusting, organizing, or printing them.


And with the most powerful image processing in the world, Aperture is fast — whether you’re working with RAW, JPEG, or TIFF images. It supports the RAW formats from all leading digital camera manufacturers (including Canon and Nikon) and provides optimized support for such market leading cameras as the Canon EOS 1Ds Mark II, Canon EOS 20D, and Nikon D2x as well as the highly popular Canon Digital Rebel and Nikon D50. It also supports the Adobe DNG format.

Whether you’re a fashion, wedding, sports, portrait, fine art, commercial, or editorial photographer, Aperture’s color-managed workflow and flexible design tools will help you easily create stunning prints, customized contact sheets, elegant books, and web pages as beautiful as the images you capture.

[Andrew B.]

So the rumors are turning out to be true. The other part is that Adobe is doing customer research to see how to compete with this. One of their ideas is to have two flavors of Photoshop, with one being for photographers and the other for designers.

[ktinkel]

So the rumors are turning out to be true. The other part is that Adobe is doing customer research to see how to compete with this. One of their ideas is to have two flavors of Photoshop, with one being for photographers and the other for designers.I have been rummaging through a bunch of old trade magazines from the early- to mid-90s, and seeing all the changes of that period in perspective.

So I guess it is not that odd to find that change still occurs. And since we have actually had a fairly stable few years, things may get interesting now.

Of course, “May you live in interesting times” is a well-known Chinese curse!

[Shane Stanley]

It doesn't look like a Photoshop competitor to me; more like something that does some of the things Photoshop hasn't done in terms of workflow.

Shane

[Kelvyn]

The printing industry is still strongly Mac-oriented. But photography?

Around here we have a lot of photgraphers, both professional and keen amateur. Not all use digital, there still being some traditionalists. A poll last year showed that none of them use Macs, and most use Photoshop although almost always in conjunction with one or more alternative image manipulating software.

[ktinkel]

It doesn't look like a Photoshop competitor to me; more like something that does some of the things Photoshop hasn't done in terms of workflow.Sounds likely. This Publish (http://www.publish.com/article2/0,1895,1873789,00.asp) article seems to agree with you.

[John Spragens]

Yeah ... from what they show on the Web site, looks like a handy tool for a Mac-using wedding or party photographer who wants to produce albums quickly.

I'm curious who did the interface design. Reminds me in some vague way of the Kai Krause creations.

[ktinkel]

I'm curious who did the interface design. Reminds me in some vague way of the Kai Krause creations.Oh, no! Not Kai Kause! <g>

A brilliant guy, but kind of esthetically challenged.

[Cristen Gillespie]

It looks interesting, but I think it targets ACR or Phase One (?), not PS itself. Which is a good thing because I'm too old to learn a whole new PS by any other name. Not to mention too poor, what with needing a new computer and wanting a new camera. I'll limp along with PS while I figure out how to get the pictures in the first place, worry about workflow later... <BG>

[ktinkel]

Around here we have a lot of photgraphers, both professional and keen amateur. Not all use digital, there still being some traditionalists. A poll last year showed that none of them use Macs, and most use Photoshop although almost always in conjunction with one or more alternative image manipulating software.Of the photographers I know who cater to the publishing market, most use Macs today (and all did a decade ago).

Of other sorts of photogs who have gotten into digital imagery for one thing or another, I’d say it splits about 65/35 PC/Mac.

Besides budget and availability, it usually depends on what else they do with the computer and who advised them as they were getting set up, I think. And it increasingly matters less and less as far as “the product” goes — it is more of a user preference sort of thing.

[fhaber]

Two doesn't prove the pudding, but Aperture is winning a couple of hearts and minds, for starters.

1. Pro (commercial) photog. friend:

2. Advanced amateur friend and client.

They both were blown away by hands-on time at the NYC Photo Expo. I didn't sit down, but everyone was saying that Aperture is a pretty big leap in workflow convenience. Fast thumbnailing, rigorous preservation of the untouched RAW original, and *convenient* adjustment and group application of the stuff they find themselves doing 80% of the time.

By no means will this replace Photoshop, but it sure sold a brace of G5 duals and quads, and some Mac CS2 licenses.

[Sayling]

As if by magic, Creativepro have run a feature article on Aperture (26oct05):

http://www.creativepro.com:80/story/feature/23554.html

Sayling

[ktinkel]

As if by magic, Creativepro have run a feature article on Aperture (26oct05) …Yeah, without having laid eyes on the software, apparently.

Interview with the product manager. Not that it isn’t interesting, but perhaps a bit shy of substantial! :rolleyes:

[John Spragens]

Right off the top, she says something that just i'n't true for me:

"However, Raw files haven't fit smoothly into photographers' workflows"

With Camera Raw and Photoshop, the workflow flows quite smoothly for me.

And I have no fears of losing master images ... or at least not because of anything I do in Photoshop.

What's fascinating to me is the statement that they're building support for the raw formats into the OS itself.

And what I'm especially curious about: the statements about not changing the underlying files, just applying iinstructions. Are they doing something like the marvelous but departed compositing program LivePicture?

Waiting for the reviews now. Though it's all academic for me, Windows user that I am.

[Andrew B.]

I think this program does compete with Photoshop. It is not just a RAW manager. It has tools for crop, exposure, highlights and shadows, histogram, levels, noise reduction, red-eye correction, RGB channel mixing, sharpen, spot removers and patching, stamping, straighten, and white balance. Not as much as Photoshop can do, but certainly more than most digital photographers do.

The program also helps Apple complete with PCs. I can almost see the copy now: "Apple, built from the ground up with photographers in mind" or "Photographers spoke, we listened."

[ktinkel]

Waiting for the reviews now.Makes sense to me. With luck, some of the reviews will be from people who not only understand RAW and images in general, but who have also taken a good look at Aperture!