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Author Topic: Is Lightroom Inevitable for Aperture Users?  (Read 58416 times)

ButchM

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Re: Is Lightroom Inevitable for Aperture Users?
« Reply #40 on: February 22, 2015, 05:47:11 pm »

Assumption must be your stock in trade. Not playing any 'woe is me card', I was simply describing your post and I certainly am not accepting any status quo sight unseen. I can make my own mind up thank you.

However thinking something as simplistic as Photos has been revealed to be so far will morph into a pro caliber piece of software is simply naive. They are a phone company now and have been for many years. Apple as the provider of kit for graphics professionals is a bit last century. Not to mention that anyone contemplating using any Apple software as an essential part of their business is a bit of an idiot in my view. Ever heard the expression - "Past performance is the best predictor of future behavior" ? Apple will drop any product at any time if it suits their bottom line, no matter the harm to long term users of said product. I avoid the use of anything Apple wherever I can for that very reason, the alternatives are usually better anyway. The only thing I cannot avoid is the extremely clunky iTunes as everything else is dependent on it.
MS for all their faults at least understand that businesses need support for legacy products and do not just cater to this year's fashion or force people to upgrade via a computer that is fractionally smaller because all the insides are now literally outside the box.

It's getting time to replace my desk+laptop and am now seriously wondering about switching to Windows.


So it took this long to reveal, your real purpose for participating in this thread was to facilitate a rant on Apple?

1. How is it that you are carefully crafting the implementation of the thesis of "Past performance is the best predictor of future behavior" only applies itself in a negative fashion? Because I could go into great detail of negative aspects of most any hardware maker and software developer that exists today. None of them are without sin. Even after I offered an example of the success FCP X has achieved? Although many dubbed it iMovie+ when it was introduced ... (Not saying that attitude was not warranted) But things change ... as did FCP X. When FCP X v1 was released, I too, was not impressed. Fortunately, I was patient and rewarded for not entering into panic mode.

2. Yes, Apple has had great success with smartphones, tablets and digital music players ... in fact they created a whole multi-billion dollar cottage industry in that sector for apps and accessories. Shame on them for sure. But ... how do you explain the growth in unit sales for desktop and laptop computers every quarter for the past 4-6 years while the rest of the industry is losing ground at a steady pace?  You may not like the new Mac Pro because it is no longer offered in a "traditional" form factor, however, Apple can just barely keep up with demand for the new model. Things change and evolve. Humans naturally resist change. I, for one, am very glad I didn't panic when Apple dropped support for floppy drives, SCSI interfaces, optical drives and such ... I realized quite quickly, they were right on each and every step. With little inconvenience, the marketplace evolved to offer more efficient options. I don't share your sentiment in light of the facts. I don't like the reality they dropped the ball on Aperture either. But life goes on.

3. I am very aware that the Photos app will likely never be a "professional" solution ... but it could be the hub for a personally tailored workflow that could use custom extended parts that make my tasks easier. Not saying it's going to happen ... just saying, I'm willing to wait and see what happens because the concept is intriguing, albeit untraditional. It costs me nothing to observe it's progress and make a determination later. Nor should it be worrisome or disconcerting to others that I choose to wait and see what transpires.

Additionally - I don't have an opinion on MS in general or Windows specifically ... never owned anything they offered except an upgrade to Expressions Media because they bought out iView Media Pro and let it languish in obscurity for years. On this issue I am agnostic. If you choose to venture forth, it matters not to anyone but yourself. Good fortune.
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CatOne

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Re: Is Lightroom Inevitable for Aperture Users?
« Reply #41 on: February 22, 2015, 10:53:49 pm »

Lots of spirited dialog here  ;)

I think, when it comes down to it, Photos is the best application for about 98% of photographers. If you store photos in iCloud, then everything you have is synced across all your Apple devices, immediately, and everything is backed up. And the editing tools are fairly good -- if you consider the magic wand "great." It actually does a fantastic job like 90% of the time. Sharing photos and albums is finally easy, and sensible.

So Photos is really, really great for how the vast majority of people take and use photos.

For professional photographers, however, it's lacking. No local adjustments, inferior sharpening tools, and it's a huge regression in organization over Aperture. If you're a professional, Photos is no Aperture substitute.
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ButchM

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Re: Is Lightroom Inevitable for Aperture Users?
« Reply #42 on: February 23, 2015, 01:48:16 am »


If you're a professional, Photos is no Aperture substitute.

Agreed. That point was never in dispute as far as I am concerned. Though, it is far to easy to proclaim that Photos is lacking as it exists ... especially when it is only available in a very early beta form and has only been used by a very limited group. I would seriously doubt any first version beta from any developer could replace Aperture.

My point of thinking outside the box is two-fold, based upon what was offered and discussed at the 2014 WWDC. 1. Don't ever expect Photos to replace Aperture because that is not what it is designed to do. 2. It is the extensibility of Photos that is the new concept that must be proven and has great potential.

Think about it. If Photos was actually thought to be a replacement for iPhoto and/or Aperture ... Why would Apple first present it to a developer conference and not end users? Maybe they did this because they wish to pursue a pathway for third parties to pick up the mantle and extend the capabilities of Photos for the end user ... tailored to each end user's desires and requirements.

If this was not the intent, why did't Apple wait to show off the app at another time? Why did they first show it to folks who crunch code and not the end users? If the intent was not to offer extensibility, why bother showing the app to developers at all? Apple only makes money from developers if there is pathway for the developers to offer users a solution.

It is this extensibility I find intriguing. What if you could move seamlessly (or near seamlessly) in a parametric style from selecting an image in the Photos Library to further processing and working with the image in Nik/Google, onOne, Topaz, Pixelmator, Affinity Photo, Acorn 4 ... or even Ps. The offerings already have many of the missing features in Photos for local adjustments, sharpening, etc. As for lacking in organization features, that will come. Even novice longtime iPhoto users/iPhoneographers  won't stay quiet long if Apple doesn't beef up this area. What good is it to have all your images on all your devices if you can't quickly find the specific image you are seeking? I don't think Apple is going to miss that point.

All I am saying, I'm willing to keep an open mind and see if Apple can actually pull it off.  I'm not going to bet the farm on the prospect or stick with Aperture past the point of no return. It is possible this concept may come to fruition and still not be up to par for professional use. But to proclaim the concept as dead in the water before it has even seen the light of day is a bit premature ... even for so many professionally minded folk.
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BobShaw

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Re: Is Lightroom Inevitable for Aperture Users?
« Reply #43 on: February 24, 2015, 12:04:19 am »

I guess you get to have 3800 posts by analysing and quoting every phase of everyone else's post. Shame about the question.
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David Mantripp

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Re: Is Lightroom Inevitable for Aperture Users?
« Reply #44 on: March 22, 2015, 04:01:51 pm »

Coming back to the original question, I'd say the answer is "no".

I've experimented with a mix of applications: on the DAM side, PhaseOne Media Pro, which anyway I've been using for a decade and a half, and IDImager Photo Supreme. And on the processing side, Iridient Developer - which again I'm pretty familiar with - and Capture One, which I last used seriously a v3.8 before moving first to Iridient, then Lr 1.0, then Ap 2.0.

I like Photo Supreme a lot. It is the only DAM which seems to have realised that we're not in the late 90s any more.  It has support for versions (and quite advanced too), it has a very novel and powerful interface, although it has a steep learning curve. It imports Aperture libraries quite smoothly. But it is a little sluggish compared to MediaPro, and the UI is a bit graceless (nowhere near as ugly as Lr though...). Photo Supreme also attempts, quite successfully, to apply edits from some RAW converters to it's previews. But it lacks the automation of MediaPro (auto updates etc).

On the RAW side, Iridient is just fabulous. However, it does lack any kind of healing / retouching / local adjustment feature, so basically it's a front end to Photoshop. CaptureOne 8 does have a rich feature set, although some of those features are surprisingly weak (no Luminance mode for curves ? In 2015??). But C1's Library tools, basically a clone of a subset of MediaPro, are much, much better than in v7. I've successfully imported a 50'000 photo Aperture library, and C1's attempt at match a subset of Aperture's corrections is pretty successful.  The GUI can be heavily customised, and with some work can approximate Aperture. Of course, I'm actually very familiar with MediaPro, so I'm actually happy enough with much of it as it is.

The interaction between MediaPro and CaptureOne is more conceptual than factual, but there are some very useful workflows involving both applications, for example large scale key wording in MediaPro, and initial sort/editing before exporting a Catalog to C1.  It's a new way of working, it's poorly documented by PhaseOne, but it is worth exploring, imho. MediaPro can also handle a wider range of file types (e.g PSD!)

So basically I've ended up with a system where my "hub" is MediaPro, both for digital and film scan work, my primary workflow is through CaptureOne, but often cross-checking with Iridient, or using Iridient when I need more flexibility.  PhotoSupreme could replace MediaPro, and from a feature point of view is better, but switching between it's metaphors and PhaseOne's is just too much trouble.

It's not Aperture, but then again it's also not a one-stop, lock-in shop where you're at risk of having years of work junked on the whim of some suit in Silicon Valley.

Is my approach better than Lr ? Well for me, yes.  Clearly when it gets down to ultimate results, the differences between all these applications are trivial to 99% of the potential audience. But to me, Lr still looks like a cobbled together mess of various unsynchronised experiments that was rushed out, supported by a massive, and massively successful marketing campaign, playing to various "star" photographers egos, in reaction to the shock release of Aperture 1.0.  Unfortunately, Adobe never saw any reason to do a proper job of things once they'd grabbed the market. Which makes perfect bean counter sense.

But "inevitable" ? No.  Valid? Certainly.  Probably even very sensible.
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David Mantripp

jjj

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Re: Is Lightroom Inevitable for Aperture Users?
« Reply #45 on: March 23, 2015, 04:09:33 pm »

I guess you get to have 3800 posts by analysing and quoting every phase of everyone else's post. Shame about the question.
If you weren't so busy being snarky and a smart arse, you'd probably realise I got to that no. of posts by simply being part of this forum for a long time. I don't think my average of 1.2 posts a day is anywhere near many other regular members here.
By the way quoting posts you answering makes for a much easier read. I had to go back to previous pages to see that it was me you were insulting, because you didn't bother to give your post any context.
« Last Edit: March 23, 2015, 04:20:49 pm by jjj »
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jjj

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Re: Is Lightroom Inevitable for Aperture Users?
« Reply #46 on: March 23, 2015, 04:10:44 pm »

So it took this long to reveal, your real purpose for participating in this thread was to facilitate a rant on Apple?
More ignorant and inaccurate assumptions.
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jjj

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Re: Is Lightroom Inevitable for Aperture Users?
« Reply #47 on: March 23, 2015, 04:18:59 pm »

Not wanting to get in between you and Butch, but I find you comment interesting.  I liked MS for its support of software, which prevented users from needing to update software.  However, in 2007, my opinion changed and I moved to Apple.  IMO, MS support of legacy software required the creation of a bloated OS that hampered performance and continued to created security risks.  I like that Apple keeps its OS clean and doesn't try to be everything to everybody.  Personally, I keep my software updated, but understand that others might not be able to afford this policy.  

What does bother me is Apple not working with Wacom (per the Wacom rep) to make its OS usable on the Wacom Companion or Cintiq.  But that just me being me.
The biggest reason why MS has big problem with security compared to Apple is mostly down to the fact that Apple was such a small part of the desktop market so it was...
1. less worthwhile attacking
2. much harder for viruses to spread as there were so few 'carriers'.

Apple are a premium brand. One not affordable by most people or indeed many companies in the world.
As for Wacom, Apple do their own thing and other companies simply have to put up with it.
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jrp

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Re: Is Lightroom Inevitable for Aperture Users?
« Reply #48 on: April 04, 2015, 12:07:25 pm »

So why did Apple drop Aperture?  ...  Aperture was never going to be profitable. 

Because it is not cross-Apple platform. 
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trichardlin

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Re: Is Lightroom Inevitable for Aperture Users?
« Reply #49 on: April 14, 2015, 02:19:03 am »

Because it is not cross-Apple platform. 

No one outside of Apple really knows. But I doubt that was the reason. I suspect that the market is just too small for Apple.

What would you do if you see a rapidly shrinking market? Would you put more money into it?

It was estimated that Apple sold about a million Apple Watch last Friday. In comparison, worldwide interchangeable lens digital camera sales for the entire month of Dec 2014 was only about 950 thousand. 
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