Apple Releases Aperture 2.0

[Furrybeagle]

No, you don't NEED one [discrete graphics], but Aperture never ran great on a MacBook. They lowered the minimum specs and eventually made it run on a MacBook, but it was never really designed to do so.

But hey, the loupe was slow even for some users with a Quad Core, so....

Just to clear this up (if it hasn’t been already):

You need a Core Image compatible graphics card, which is one that supports “Open GL Shader (GLSL) commands” [Wikipedia:Core Image] (ie, Shader Model 2.0, or in the Windows world, DirectX 9). This includes pretty much all recent graphics chips: the Radeon 9000 cards, Radeon X*** cards, GeForce FX/6/7/8 cards, Quadro 4000 cards, recent Intel GMA chips, etc.

Despite that the Intel GMA 950 and GMA X3100 are integrated graphics chips and vastly underpowered (compared to discrete graphics), they still support the necessary shader instructions. Thus, there's no reason for them to not be on the list of supported graphics cards.

I kind of don’t feel like they “lowered the minimum specs” for it to run on the MacBook. The rest of the MacBook hardware is more than enough to run Aperture (if my G4 can run it, an Intel Core processor can easily run it), and it has always had a compatible graphics card. I have to wonder if Aperture even pushes the graphics card that much beyond the fact that it needs Core Image capabilities (but I’ve never used Aperture on a MacBook, so I wouldn’t really know).

 

[lloydh]

I wish I could get a Mac Pro but I've got a rev. A MBP @ 2.16 and aperture 1.5.x is sloooow

Snap (well, about the machine at least).

Are you running 2GB RAM? If not that makes a huge difference. Everyone knows that Aperture isn't exactly a 'snappy' app but I've found that my MBP runs it pretty well. I did go for the 7200RPM drive but that's not going to speed up exports too much...

If you haven't tried 2.0 yet you're in for a pleasant surprise.

 

[eyecool]

Is Aperture $200 better than iPhoto? My wife is the photo nut of the house. I just got us CS3 Web Premium, plus a MP for me, plus a 1TB Time Capsule, plus Mac Office 2008, oh, plus the ram and HD upgrades for the MP.... I feel burned out, considering the MP ordered in Jan still hasn't shipped.

She loves how iPhoto catalogs pics and integrates with .mac. If she's going to use PS CS3, is Aperture really worth the $200? Neither of us have any experience with it.

 

[supercooled]

Is Aperture $200 better than iPhoto? My wife is the photo nut of the house. I just got us CS3 Web Premium, plus a MP for me, plus a 1TB Time Capsule, plus Mac Office 2008, oh, plus the ram and HD upgrades for the MP.... I feel burned out, considering the MP ordered in Jan still hasn't shipped.

She loves how iPhoto catalogs pics and integrates with .mac. If she's going to use PS CS3, is Aperture really worth the $200? Neither of us have any experience with it.

Sorry for sounding haughty about this but that's why they have trial versions. It's more than iPhoto but less than Photoshop.

 

[drackett]

Earlier this a.m. ordered upgrade to version 2.0. Tried the upgrade via the website route and stopped as there was no download option. Downloaded the trial version and after starting the trial, an option appears allowing you to buy the software. You select that option and it takes you to Apple site.

After clicking on upgrade you are presented with upgrade checkbox with software Key only. When you select that you buy the upgrade key (no download necessary) and receive a purchase Order Confirmation. You should receive, with the confirmation email (according to Apple's own site) an upgrade key to enter into the trial. There was no key. After contacting support they said I should wait up to 24 hours for key to be generated and emailed to me. The Order Status page at Apple tells me that the order has been 'shipped' via electronic delivery.

Anybody else experience this?

You did better than me. Mine looks like a regular physical order. that I won't get for 7 days. I can't find anyone who can help, and they all just tell me that the only way to get aperture 2 right now is to order the physical box (I find this hard to believe, and think their is just a bug on the website)

 

[ocbo41]

Umm...I ran Aperture 1.5 on my Macbook, which doesn't have a graphics card.
Just checked, and Aperture 2 doesn't require one either.

I do believe having Aperture supports GPU acceleration so if you have a higher power GPU you can gain some more speed. Aperture 1.5 with 10mp raw's ran great on my 2ghz MBP 2GB ram....can't wait to try out 2.0

 

[~David]

Is nobody else having the same problem as me?

Ever since I installed Aperture, I now have two "Aperture Projects" folders in my Wallpaper settings and all my custom folders are gone (and I can't add any new ones or remove the Aperture Projects. See the attachment)

Any help?

 

[eyecool]

Sorry for sounding haughty about this but that's why they have trial versions. It's more than iPhoto but less than Photoshop.

PERFECT! Thats the ticket right there!

 

[kdb31]

Is Aperture $200 better than iPhoto? My wife is the photo nut of the house. I just got us CS3 Web Premium, plus a MP for me, plus a 1TB Time Capsule, plus Mac Office 2008, oh, plus the ram and HD upgrades for the MP.... I feel burned out, considering the MP ordered in Jan still hasn't shipped.

She loves how iPhoto catalogs pics and integrates with .mac. If she's going to use PS CS3, is Aperture really worth the $200? Neither of us have any experience with it.

First, I havent used aperture 2.0 or the new iphoto nor have I really tried using CS3 as a primary photo editor (just a few raws here and there)... That said, I think the premise of Aperture (and lightroom) are completely different from Photoshop because they're designed specifically to cover the entire digital photo workflow. In photoshop when you open up some raw files you get a sort of dialogue to make some quick adjustments and then bring the photos into the main program, but its not really an integrated process imo. Aperture on the other hand attempts to cover all of your photographic needs, from the import, sortation, cataloging, mass editing, comparisons, output (printing, web galleries, books, etc). Aperture will allow you to do all of typical photo adjustments (white balance, exposure, contrast, colour, etc) efficiently which makes it great for professionals. Photoshop on the other hand is the tool you need to do the fine detailed editing like complex dodging and burning, anything with layers, or any sort of artificial manipulation (removing/adding/changing things). If you take a peek at the aperture tutorials theyll do a really nice job explaining the program and how it works (at least the old ones did). Hope this helps

 

[ariel]

You did better than me. Mine looks like a regular physical order. that I won't get for 7 days. I can't find anyone who can help, and they all just tell me that the only way to get aperture 2 right now is to order the physical box (I find this hard to believe, and think their is just a bug on the website)

I found the serial purchase by clicking on the "mac software" link on the left navigation of the store and then by clickin on the "new releases" tab on the page that came up... the upgrade and full purchase key only links are there.

and YES - the serial numbers are massively delayed - try reading the aperture forum on discussions.apple.com for more info

 

[kdb31]

I do believe having Aperture supports GPU acceleration so if you have a higher power GPU you can gain some more speed. Aperture 1.5 with 10mp raw's ran great on my 2ghz MBP 2GB ram....can't wait to try out 2.0

Yeah its heavily gpu dependant. On the mac mini vs the macbook pro I remember seeing a huge speed improvement when they were only a few hundred mhz apart (processor), same for the previous gen mac pro with the 7300 vs the x1900 on the 30" cinema display at the apple store. The gpu is what'll give you snappy performance when doing your adjustments in the program, the cpu will give you the fast render/export times.

 

[eyecool]

Yeah, I know they are different beasts, but the adobe suite I ordered comes with Bridge and a few other programs I've never heard of that are supposed to manage assets. I asked her if she had heard of Aperture and she knew about 2's release before I did. Thinks it would be easier for her to put her mind around than PS. I think trial version is the way to go for now.

 

[ChrisA]

Is Aperture $200 better than iPhoto?

Aperture will do the same raw image processing as iPhoto but I think Aperture has far better facilities for adding meta-data and for comparing and sorting images. One of the biggest jobs is always right after you've downloaded 200 images and now you need to organize it. Aperture is better at that. Is it $200 better? Don't know.

PS CS3 is for making detailed edits to images, one image at a time.

 

[ChrisA]

Yeah, I know they are different beasts, but the adobe suite I ordered comes with Bridge and a few other programs I've never heard of that are supposed to manage assets.

"Bridge" is the basic building block of the Adobe suite. It is more general than Aperture because it is intended to also hold Acrobat .pdf files, Illustrator files and to sync color spaces between Adobe apps.. Aperture is about "photography" while Bridge is about "Graphic Arts" Photoshop is used by a lot more people than just photographers.

 

[ocbo41]

Aperture will do the same raw image processing as iPhoto but I think Aperture has far better facilities for adding meta-data and for comparing and sorting images. One of the biggest jobs is always right after you've downloaded 200 images and now you need to organize it. Aperture is better at that. Is it $200 better? Don't know.

PS CS3 is for making detailed edits to images, one image at a time.

I agree 100% Aperture is geared towards speeding up workflow and organizing things, I could never stay organized in iPhoto, I have over a hundred folders and subfolders that are categorized by Types, dates , shoots, etc... Variations is a godsend for multiple versions. Editing gets more detailed as well as (i think at least) color managment and printing.


making more complex edit with curves, masks and channels is made by sending the file to cs2 and making the change, then aperture keeps that file cataloged as a version automatically.

Being able to store my old pictures on DVD is great, can mark a DVD in my folder as 1-23-06 and when I see the preview in aperture it says, hey go get that cd named 1-23-06 and I will load up your file....saving hard drive space on rarely used files. Backing up to disk is so simple too.

I would say if she's upgrading to heavier artillery like the 40D then likely it will be worthwhile to organize and edit those photo's in a better editor. The best way is to take your collection and try out Aperture 2.0 watch the tutorials and you should be able to make a great decision on if it's worth the money.

 

[EagerDragon]

Wow, you're wife is lucky.

I have the Rebel right now and I just tried Aperture. For some reason, my Canon raw files show up with a pretty nasty yellow tinge. You might want to have your wife try it out first.

If this is an issue that happens all the time you need to adjust the default RAW processing. Under the Aperture Tutorials select the "Using RAW Fine Tuning" video and I think you will be very happy.

 

[beatzfreak]

If this is an issue that happens all the time you need to adjust the default RAW processing. Under the Aperture Tutorials select the "Using RAW Fine Tuning" video and I think you will be very happy.

Thank you so much!!!

I'll check it out.

 

[shadowfax]

this is what I found:

To answer my own question--It appears that in the trial version, you will not be able to import your 1.x libraries en masse into Aperture 2. You will have to pull individual projects out of your old library and import them into the trial library. You need the full version to actually update your library to version 2.0. Kind of stupid, IMHO, as I have a full backup of my 1.x library. But whatever, my full version will be in the mail soon...

You can navigate to your aperture library and then right click (ctrl-click) on it, and select "show package contents." There is a bunch of crazy stuff in there, but you should see the project folders there. You can import some or all of these into the trial library to mess around.

Man, it is truly, truly retarded of them not to offer to send you your activation key electronically as well as sending you the box. How aggravating. I guess I can wait a few days, though.

 

[EagerDragon]

This Baby is Sweet

I checked most of the tutorial videos and this can do most everything I would want.
About the only exception would be replacing backgrounds and large objects from the pictures but for that there is PhotoShop Elements.

Will download trial this weekend when I have time to play with it.

Very excited with what it can do.

Question for those familiar with Aperture and any of the PhotoShops ..... If I decide to edit the photo using photoshop, what happens to the original image when I end the photoshop editing (remove background, multiple layers for masking etc) and in what format are the results imported back into Aperture?

 

[ariel]

Question for those familiar with Aperture and any of the PhotoShops ..... If I decide to edit the photo using photoshop, what happens to the original image when I end the photoshop editing (remove background, multiple layers for masking etc) and in what format are the results imported back into Aperture?

usually, when you use aperture, you use "edit with photoshop" - and aperture makes a copy of the original, exports that as .psd to PS where you edit... when closing and saving in PS, aperture picks up the changes. So you have a complete round trip and all images are still managed by Aperture. Perfect solution

 

[itou]

I checked most of the tutorial videos and this can do most everything I would want.
About the only exception would be replacing backgrounds and large objects from the pictures but for that there is PhotoShop Elements.

Will download trial this weekend when I have time to play with it.

Very excited with what it can do.

Question for those familiar with Aperture and any of the PhotoShops ..... If I decide to edit the photo using photoshop, what happens to the original image when I end the photoshop editing (remove background, multiple layers for masking etc) and in what format are the results imported back into Aperture?

not sure i understand your question correctly, but if i do, photoshop treats documents the say manner in which all other documents are treated. if you edit the original image and click SAVE, then your original document is replaced. if you choose SAVE AS, then you'll be asked to create a new file with a new file name thus preserving the old file. you'll of course have the option to save (within photoshop) to a variety of different formats which aperture can recognize and import.

 

[ifonline]

Question for those familiar with Aperture and any of the PhotoShops ..... If I decide to edit the photo using photoshop, what happens to the original image when I end the photoshop editing (remove background, multiple layers for masking etc) and in what format are the results imported back into Aperture?

not sure i understand your question correctly, but if i do, photoshop treats documents the say manner in which all other documents are treated. if you edit the original image and click SAVE, then your original document is replaced. if you choose SAVE AS, then you'll be asked to create a new file with a new file name thus preserving the old file. you'll of course have the option to save (within photoshop) to a variety of different formats which aperture can recognize and import.

Actually, Ariel had it correct. Within Aperture, you can set what file type (PSD, TIFF, etc.) is sent to Photoshop for editing. So, in Aperture, you select an image to send to Photoshop, and when you send that image, Aperture first creates a version (copy) of the image and then sends that copy to Photoshop. Once you save the image in Photoshop after editing it, the copy (that still resides in Aperture) is updated to reflect the changes. You do not edit the original (master) file. The master file remains safe within Aperture so if anything disastrous happens, you can always reclaim the original photograph.

 

[UMHurricanes34]

Glad they released this, I'm interested in giving it a shot.

Hopefully my iMac can handle it alright...

 

[JAT]

Still no Foveon support. God forbid they support another company that has small market share, but is better.

Lightroom is still my choice.

 

[ifonline]

I have a year's worth of experience with Lightroom and love it. I tried Aperture at 1.5 or so a little while back, but just didn't get into it. As time passed, I got into Final Cut Studio 2. Then Logic Studio. Now with Aperture 2 out, I have downloaded it and am trying it out.

I still love Lightroom, but I am beginning to feel like I love it because of some sort of loyalty to Adobe. Aperture 2 may be very much the same old hat for seasoned Aperture 1 users, but for me, enough has changed from what I can recall that it just seems to fit me now. It might be because I am used to Apple's pro application layouts, etc., but I am really excited to be trying Aperture 2. I have had several moments where I said out loud "Ah ha! That really makes sense!"

Oh, and I am running Aperture 2 on my MacBook Black C2D (not the new ones) with 2GB of memory with no issues, per se. Sure, it could be faster, and when I decide if I want to buy Aperture 2, I will install it on my Mac Pro for the speed and efficiency that machine offers. But even with some pauses in operation on the MacBook, I find it pleasantly, and surprisingly, fast.