First Impressions of Photos for OS X: 'Vast Improvement' Over iPhoto

[johngordon]

Has anyone else noticed slightly different numbers of photos everywhere?

Everything has finally finished uploading / downloading / syncing for me, and I have the following:

Mac - 15853 photos
iCloud - 15878
iPhone - 15848
iPad - 15848

If so, any pointers as to where to look to iron out those inconsistencies?

 

[talmy]

So it sounds like Apple has really abandoned true RAW editing. This should have been touched on in the preview reviews - no one mentioned this though. This is a serious problem.

You lose the Raw Fine Tuning adjustments of Aperture, just like you don't have them in iPhoto or Preview. The preview reviews aren't aimed at Aperture users but at iPhoto and iOS users.

One of the things I thought Photos would get me is the retention of all previous adjustments, but it really doesn't do this any better than LR does if you import the preview files and stack them.

Not true! Photos does retain all previous adjustments (and at full resolution, not like preview files which are lossy JPEGs usually resized smaller). You just cannot change them other than removing them all. (One exception, mentioned below).

However, it could be that it is using the RAW file and applying the Aperture adjustments (meaning the legacy Aperture code would have to be built-in to Photos) but simply doesn't display them anywhere because Photos uses a whole new adjustment architecture that is not compatible (e.g. +0.5 exposure in Aperture is not identical to +0.5 exposure in Photos).

This does seem to be the case, as I discovered with my testing.

I have an idea of how to test this for anyone who is willing. In Aperture, take a RAW photo with good exposure and way over-expose it to +2.0 so much of the photo is blown out. Then, import that library to Photos, and see if giving in a negative exposure brings back any details. If it does, it means Photos is probably working off the RAW file.

I tried this and I do get recovery of details. But I don't think it is correct to say it is "working off the RAW file". It is working off of the processed file from Apertures adjustment stack. It's probably better to think of this as internally a 16 bit TIFF rather than a lossy 8 bit JPEG, but it's not really the RAW. Furthermore it looks like until you enter edit mode (why can't it be modeless like Aperture -- that was one of its best features!) you are viewing the JPEG preview, probably for performance reasons.

Also, it would be good to know exactly how Photos is processing new RAW files. I know at one point iPhoto did make a jpg and work off that after the first edit, but I think that was changed with more recent versions.

I'm not an iPhoto users, but I can certainly imagine that would be the case when the unified the iPhoto and Aperture library formats. They had to be made compatible behind the scenes.

So my point is just because Photos doesn't have a RAW Brick anymore it doesn't mean that RAW adjustments aren't being made. I'm not sure how we'd verify this though.

The exception I found to immutable Aperture pre-processing is that if the image from Aperture is old and uses the older RAW processing (they changed somewhere between 3.0 and 3.6) you are given the option when you are editing in Photos to upgrade to the new RAW processing. You still don't get to adjust the fine tuning, but the RAW adjustments are certainly being made, and every time you enter edit mode.

 

[skaeight]

Not true! Photos does retain all previous adjustments (and at full resolution, not like preview files which are lossy JPEGs usually resized smaller). You just cannot change them other than removing them all. (One exception, mentioned below).


I tried this and I do get recovery of details. But I don't think it is correct to say it is "working off the RAW file". It is working off of the processed file from Apertures adjustment stack. It's probably better to think of this as internally a 16 bit TIFF rather than a lossy 8 bit JPEG, but it's not really the RAW. Furthermore it looks like until you enter edit mode (why can't it be modeless like Aperture -- that was one of its best features!) you are viewing the JPEG preview, probably for performance reasons.

By default, yes the previews are of lower quality, but all of the guides on transitioning to LR from Aperture include a step of increasing your previews in Aperture to full resolution / full quality before the migration so that edited versions of your photos can be maintained. The previews have any adjustments you've made baked in, so this would be equivalent to what Photos has done. I also do have the option to edit the original RAW file in LR, which would be he equivalent of reverting to the original in Photos. So from what I can see Photos doesn't have an advantage here.

Regarding my thinking about whether it's a lossy JPEG or TIFF that your working off of, this doesn't really matter much. In both cases you are working off a high quality JPEG (which are still compressed). Even if it were working off a TIFF (which I can almost gurentee Photos isn't doing - it would require a ton of storage), adjustments are still baked into the tiff, so there isn't extra data to pull from for things like adjusting exposure, highlights / shadows, or white balance. It can make these adjustments, it's just that with jpg or tiff it's working with the data it has, which isn't much so the results aren't going to be as good as if you were truly working off of the RAW file.

I still think though that Photos is actually making raw adjustments at least for non migrated files. After I posted last night I was reading over at thephotosexpert.com and they again referenced extensions being able to work in RAW space. If theyre offering this to developers, surely their own built in adjustments are also able to do this.

(Read the comments on this post):
https://thephotosexpert.com/tips/2015/2/5/photos-os-x-beta-os-x-10103-developer-release#.VNeihYY8KnM

I believe this is in reference to the WWDC session referenced here:

https://thephotosexpert.com/tips/2014/6/6/wwdc-session-shows-lens-correction-and-noise-reduction-os-x-mentions-iphoto-and#.VNejcoY8KnM


Watch the video he references. They've changed the way RAW processing is done, essentially something like NIK could work on images in RAW space, creating non destructive edits instead of working off of a baked TIFF like happened previously. I'm guessing that's why the "open in" feature isn't there. That would actually be worse than what they're planning.

This possibility is the only thing that really has me still considering Photos. As an example, I want lens correction, today PTLens can do that, but it works off of a baked TIFF, so today I have to get the image just right before I do the correction, because I can't really make adjustments after correction because I lose lots of data in the process (this even has its problems because images usually lighten due to removal of lens vignetting). With the extensions being talked about here, PTLens could make non-destructive changes to the raw file, leaving me free to make any additional adjustments I need to after lens correction (PTLens has said they'll be implementing the solution in Photos as soon as they can).

So that is where I'm coming from when when I'm asking about how RAW adjustments are made. I think more is going on than what we're seeing, even though the RAW fine tuning adjustments are gone. Those may no longer be necessary because all of the adjustments work in RAW space.

I'm hoping well see a John Siracusa level technical deep dive on how RAW processing is being done in Photos sometime soon.

 

[jnpy!$4g3cwk]

You're much more likely to lose your photos kept on your own computer at home than to lose them on iCloud because you likely don't have the capabilities for redundant backups and protection from fire, flood, theft, drive failure, and other circumstances. In any case, the new Photos app for Mac stores all of your photos on your Mac as well so if you have Time Machine turned on, you get local backups in addition to iCloud. Pretty much a perfect scenario.

10 GB here, 10 GB there. Pretty soon it adds up to a TeraByte. I can buy another 1-2 TB disk for $100-$200, round numbers, any time I feel like it. How much does it cost to rent another TB from the cloud, iCloud or Amazon or Google?

 

[carlgo]

By default, yes the previews are of lower quality, but all of the guides on transitioning to LR from Aperture include a step of increasing your previews in Aperture to full resolution / full quality before the migration so that edited versions of your photos .............

..........So that is where I'm coming from when when I'm asking about how RAW adjustments are made. I think more is going on than what we're seeing, even though the RAW fine tuning adjustments are gone. Those may no longer be necessary because all of the adjustments work in RAW space.

I'm hoping well see a John Siracusa level technical deep dive on how RAW processing is being done in Photos sometime soon.

Nice explanation. Gives me hope. Migrations of any sort always seem like a mess is created for me, so I would like the option of importing Aperture, iPhoto, all photos without any folders or anything. Start new on the filing system part and delete all old photo programs and start new. Would be clean and probably remove a ton of ca ca from my hard drive.

And then elements of Aperture and independent programs like PtLens, Adobe products, etc could then all be external editors designed as seamless round trip resources.

 

[talmy]

Regarding my thinking about whether it's a lossy JPEG or TIFF that your working off of, this doesn't really matter much. In both cases you are working off a high quality JPEG (which are still compressed). Even if it were working off a TIFF (which I can almost gurentee Photos isn't doing - it would require a ton of storage), adjustments are still baked into the tiff, so there isn't extra data to pull from for things like adjusting exposure, highlights / shadows, or white balance. It can make these adjustments, it's just that with jpg or tiff it's working with the data it has, which isn't much so the results aren't going to be as good as if you were truly working off of the RAW file.

In a way, it is working off the RAW. This is how I see it (from experimenting around). When you aren't in edit mode you are looking at the preview image, which is a JPEG. When you enter edit mode it takes the raw image, applies the Aperture settings (transformations), and you are editing that bitmap. It isn't compressed so it's like a TIFF. And since you can only edit one image at a time the program only needs room for one of these large bitmaps. When you leave edit mode, the changes are stored in the library and a new preview image is made, replacing the old.

I know it uses the preview when not in edit mode because I see the reduced resolution. I know that when in edit mode it processes from the raw because the resolution returns, you can switch to the new RAW processor if your Aperture image was using the old RAW processor, and you can revert out of all the Aperture settings, going back to the original RAW source.

The same thing basically happens in Aperture, which is always in edit mode. When you switch to a new image you see the preview, but the full processed image is re-rendered in the background and the image pops into high resolution.

I still think though that Photos is actually making raw adjustments at least for non migrated files. After I posted last night I was reading over at thephotosexpert.com and they again referenced extensions being able to work in RAW space. If theyre offering this to developers, surely their own built in adjustments are also able to do this.

The problem at the moment is that there are no extensions or plug-ins available. While having them built-in is nicer than the roundtripping needed now for external editing and plugins (like NIK), which effectively makes adjustments prior to the roundtrip non-reversible, there might end up being a big performance hit when everything must be rerendered when entering edit mode. Maybe that's why they added an edit mode. The other issue is will the existing plugin manufacturers buy into the Photos system or will they just be Instagram-like filters? Will we ever get roundtrip editing for when only it will do?

(This possibility is the only thing that really has me still considering Photos. As an example, I want lens correction, today PTLens can do that, but it works off of a baked TIFF, so today I have to get the image just right before I do the correction, because I can't really make adjustments after correction because I lose lots of data in the process (this even has its problems because images usually lighten due to removal of lens vignetting). With the extensions being talked about here, PTLens could make non-destructive changes to the raw file, leaving me free to make any additional adjustments I need to after lens correction (PTLens has said they'll be implementing the solution in Photos as soon as they can).

Me too, but what do I do in the meantime? I guess keep using Aperture. But Photos heavily modal operation bothers me and I see it as a major hindrance to productivity, not that Lightroom doesn't suffer as well.

 

[skaeight]

In a way, it is working off the RAW. This is how I see it (from experimenting around). When you aren't in edit mode you are looking at the preview image, which is a JPEG. When you enter edit mode it takes the raw image, applies the Aperture settings (transformations), and you are editing that bitmap. It isn't compressed so it's like a TIFF. And since you can only edit one image at a time the program only needs room for one of these large bitmaps. When you leave edit mode, the changes are stored in the library and a new preview image is made, replacing the old.

I know it uses the preview when not in edit mode because I see the reduced resolution. I know that when in edit mode it processes from the raw because the resolution returns, you can switch to the new RAW processor if your Aperture image was using the old RAW processor, and you can revert out of all the Aperture settings, going back to the original RAW source.

The same thing basically happens in Aperture, which is always in edit mode. When you switch to a new image you see the preview, but the full processed image is re-rendered in the background and the image pops into high resolution.



The problem at the moment is that there are no extensions or plug-ins available. While having them built-in is nicer than the roundtripping needed now for external editing and plugins (like NIK), which effectively makes adjustments prior to the roundtrip non-reversible, there might end up being a big performance hit when everything must be rerendered when entering edit mode. Maybe that's why they added an edit mode. The other issue is will the existing plugin manufacturers buy into the Photos system or will they just be Instagram-like filters? Will we ever get roundtrip editing for when only it will do?



Me too, but what do I do in the meantime? I guess keep using Aperture. But Photos heavily modal operation bothers me and I see it as a major hindrance to productivity, not that Lightroom doesn't suffer as well.

Ok that makes sense, sorry I wasn't fully understanding what you were saying originally. So it sounds like it is taking the Aperture adjustments into account, applying them non-destructively to render a jpg (they just aren't being translated to the new Photos adjustment sliders). When you go into edit mode, it renders this in realtime off of the RAW (which is what Aperture does all the time). Lightroom works the way Photos does, and I never realized why until now. It has a Library Module, which uses previews, and the Develop module, where you make changes and it renders off of the RAW. I would guess it's highly resource intensive to do the render, so both Photos and LR have chosen only to do this when necessary.

I'm with you about what to do in the meantime. Photos has the potential to be great, but there are too many unknowns. I'm willing to bet if Apple follows what they have done in the past with things like this, Photos extensions won't be available until the final app is released, which is likely 2 months away.

At the moment, I'm leaning towards going with the known quantity of LR which does everything I need with the exception of OS level DAM integration (which can be worked around). I love the technology under the hood in Photos and the potential of Photos + extensions, but I'm really sick of thinking about this and spending energy on it.

It's good to see that I'm not alone in this conundrum. It's really a shame that Apple is making photo enthusiasts / pros make this decision. If they hadn't let Aperture deteriorate for 5 years, they wouldn't be in the situation where they had to start over completely.

 

[jnpy!$4g3cwk]

Ya I don't like the answers. It almost sounds like Photos imports the preview jpg file that was generated off the RAw adjustments.

So it sounds like Apple has really abandoned true RAW editing. This should have been touched on in the preview reviews - no one mentioned this though. This is a serious problem.

One of the things I thought Photos would get me is the retention of all previous adjustments, but it really doesn't do this any better than LR does if you import the preview files and stack them.

This is really disappointing. If something doesn't change on this I think this will seal it for me, I'll be using Lightroom.

I'm not a professional, although I did get into Photoshop and the professional suite about 7-6 years ago or so. I take quite a few photos, but, don't do much editing. What I like/use in iPhoto/Aperture is the organization by date and event, and, yes, faces and location. Once in a while I like to work on a particular picture. I just export and edit from there. Apple's new imap-like cloud-based system doesn't seem like a good fit for me, but, I don't want to spend money every month on Adobe features that as a non-professional I will never use.

I'm not sure I am going to have a good alternative in the future.

 

[j-a-x]

Here are my two cents after installing the beta.

The app is great, it makes an excellent way to edit your iCloud Photo Library on your iPhone. IF I do a photo shoot on my iPhone, I can use the app to quickly browse through the photos on my Mac and do minor edits, deletions, and crops before I transfer the photos i want to keep to Aperture for archiving.

Will it replace Aperture, no. But it will provide quick access to my iCloud photo library after an iPhone photo shoot (much better than the web interface imho).

I don't see how I would ever merge my 100GB aperture library with this app unless there was a way to keep it separate from the iCloud Photo Library photos, and even then I'm not sure I would want to because of lack of organizing and editing features.

 

[Jcubed]

I'm with you about what to do in the meantime. Photos has the potential to be great, but there are too many unknowns. I'm willing to bet if Apple follows what they have done in the past with things like this, Photos extensions won't be available until the final app is released, which is likely 2 months away.

At the moment, I'm leaning towards going with the known quantity of LR which does everything I need with the exception of OS level DAM integration (which can be worked around). I love the technology under the hood in Photos and the potential of Photos + extensions, but I'm really sick of thinking about this and spending energy on it.

It's good to see that I'm not alone in this conundrum. It's really a shame that Apple is making photo enthusiasts / pros make this decision. If they hadn't let Aperture deteriorate for 5 years, they wouldn't be in the situation where they had to start over completely.

If I was a full-time pro that shot a lot of events (e.g. weddings), I would probably go to LR right now, because I don't think Photos will ever offer a streamlined pro workflow.

However, as a hobbyist/enthusiast (500+ stock images with Getty Images and 50+ photos on Flickr Explore), here is my plan.

I will continue using Aperture (while playing with Photos using a small test library) until around the end of 2015. By the end of 2015, OSX 10.11 and iOS9 should be out, and most plugin developers that want to offer plugins for Photos will have done so. So at that point, I will decide whether to transition to Photos or LR.

 

[Boomish69]

I'm sorry but that looks awful, maybe I'm used to iPhoto, but I'm not interested in uploading all my family history to iCloud and paying for it!! Just looks like a white box with pics in..is it fast on a Mac more than a year old I bet it isn't...Apple's normal let make it run slower on so the suckers upgrade...

 

[pmd]

I'm sorry but that looks awful, maybe I'm used to iPhoto, but I'm not interested in uploading all my family history to iCloud and paying for it!!

Don't then. As has been mentioned about a dozen times in this thread, you don't have to use iCloud at all if you don't want to sync the photos between your devices. Then it's just like iPhoto in the way it operates.

 

[rcha101]

Hi,

Thanks for the screenshot. I see a reference to Events but I also saw a comment in the original article that said events, ratings etc had not made this version?

I also see faces (which I hate) made it but events and places (which I use constantly) did not?

R

QUESTION:

I did not see this in the video. Concerning file management, will there be a sidebar on the left/right side like there currently is so I can create folders, drag, drop, and rearrange photos and projects, etc. or will everything be automated and forced like the current iOS photos?

*EDIT* Thank you for sending me this photo. Yes it does have a sidebar and a listing of all projects and folders for management.

 

[Crzyrio]

iPhoto recognizes my rescued Rabbit's face!

Really! I don't use Faces, but was on my iPad and notified a Faces album and it was only of my rabbit. Okay...

Haha tha is awesome! To be completely honest, I only want it to recognize my GF's dog . I could care less about all the people lol.

Who wouldn't want all adorable dog pictures in one place?!

 

[megalaser]

I uploaded almost 40,000 photos from the Mac (took a couple of days) and it says they are all up there but the downloading to iPhone keeps stopping, it says I have 34,000 on the phone but I can see loads missing in my albums . . . . . . I also have an iPad and another iPhone and they both have stopped downloading but have a much lower amount on each . . . .

Has anyone else noticed slightly different numbers of photos everywhere?

Everything has finally finished uploading / downloading / syncing for me, and I have the following:

Mac - 15853 photos
iCloud - 15878
iPhone - 15848
iPad - 15848

If so, any pointers as to where to look to iron out those inconsistencies?

 

[Drag'nGT]

My iPhoto issue has long been its inability to organize by year. I don't like seeing an overwhelming collection of photos. I want to lump my photos in folders of separate years and I want to keep the albums view within that collection. It's annoying as hell to see Christmas 07, Christmas 08, Christmas 09, Christmas 10 and so forth for the next 50 years...

If Lightroom has this then I'm probably gone from Apple's photography suites.

 

[Tumbleweed666]

My iPhoto issue has long been its inability to organize by year. I don't like seeing an overwhelming collection of photos. I want to lump my photos in folders of separate years and I want to keep the albums view within that collection. It's annoying as hell to see Christmas 07, Christmas 08, Christmas 09, Christmas 10 and so forth for the next 50 years...

If Lightroom has this then I'm probably gone from Apple's photography suites.

Unless I'm mistaking what you want, you could do this now in iPhoto. Just create an event for each year, say Year2005, Year2006 etc, and put your photos in those events as you take them (eg the stuff you are taking now goes in year2015) and then create albums for any specific things you wish to access directly, lets say "Hawaii vacation 07-08" or "Photos of GF's dog" or whatever, those would cover pictures in multiple years.

 

[JoEw]

10 GB here, 10 GB there. Pretty soon it adds up to a TeraByte. I can buy another 1-2 TB disk for $100-$200, round numbers, any time I feel like it. How much does it cost to rent another TB from the cloud, iCloud or Amazon or Google?

Amazon gives me unlimited photo with prime /100 year
Onedrive unlimited for 10 a month or 100 a year

 

[rexone]

Ummm... I'm sorry, did I read right? Photos doesn't have 'Events'?
Seriously? W...T...F...???
My 944GB, 36,459 image library is organised by Events. 1,703 of them to be exact.
Events are critical for my photo management.
Why would they dump them & in favour of what?
I am just so over this push towards iCloud. I do not have any reason to need to use iCloud, I do not want to use iCloud yet Apple is assuming that all users number one priority is shareable cloud access.
I still use iPhoto '09 (8.1.2) because of the features removed from the following versions of iPhoto.
I haven't been able to upgrade to Mavericks because of this as iPhoto '09 is not Mavericks compatible so I really had high hopes for Photos as it would have allowed me to migrate & update.
I in-fact had been planning on blowing a small fortune on a new souped-up 27" 5K Retina iMac but if that means I loose what I need then it won't be happening...

 

[cinealta]

Sounds like I should get Aperture before its removed from the App store? I really only need good DAM (digital asset management) for now.

 

[johngordon]

I uploaded almost 40,000 photos from the Mac (took a couple of days) and it says they are all up there but the downloading to iPhone keeps stopping, it says I have 34,000 on the phone but I can see loads missing in my albums . . . . . . I also have an iPad and another iPhone and they both have stopped downloading but have a much lower amount on each . . . .

I figured out what it was. the larger discrepancy between iCloud and the other was because it just gives a total figure for photos and videos, whereas the devices break it down into photos and videos.

And the small discrepancy between the Mac and the iPhone / iPad was down to a few bursts of images where I hadn't made a selection. When I did that on the Mac, it all tallied correctly. That might be a little bug, as presumably yu should see the same across all devices.

It took ages for everything to work itself out - almost as though it does some uploading, before doing more downloading. So stick with it and it'll get there eventually.

----------

Ummm... I'm sorry, did I read right? Photos doesn't have 'Events'?
Seriously? W...T...F...???
My 944GB, 36,459 image library is organised by Events. 1,703 of them to be exact.
Events are critical for my photo management.
Why would they dump them & in favour of what?
I am just so over this push towards iCloud. I do not have any reason to need to use iCloud, I do not want to use iCloud yet Apple is assuming that all users number one priority is shareable cloud access.
I still use iPhoto '09 (8.1.2) because of the features removed from the following versions of iPhoto.
I haven't been able to upgrade to Mavericks because of this as iPhoto '09 is not Mavericks compatible so I really had high hopes for Photos as it would have allowed me to migrate & update.
I in-fact had been planning on blowing a small fortune on a new souped-up 27" 5K Retina iMac but if that means I loose what I need then it won't be happening...

It does have events, they are just called albums instead.

The cloud syncing is definitely a good thing in my eyes.

Instead of conversations that go like this:

My wife: Are the photos of such and such on the iPad?

Me: Um, not sure - let me have a look, and copy them over if they're not.

They go like this:

My wife: Are the photos of such and such on the iPad?

Me: Yup - here you go.

 

[BJMRamage]

Slightly disappointed in the reviews so far.

I switched from iPhotos to Aperture a couple years back when I was tired of the "one-touch" editing that just could't get things "right". I also began shooting in RAW and Aperture has been a big help with editing. I now use Photoshop 0.05% of the time making edits within Aperture.

I see Photos like how iTunes is presented...rather than have "folder-like" organization easily at hand, they are switching to a MASS Dump of photos (like albums/art in iTunes). I understand I can make Albums (like Events or whatever Aperture calls them) but I truly wanted to see Star Ratings. That was a great system to cull photos on import, then i could edit 3 Stars and Up. then Upload only the 4-5 Stars. Dumping the 1 Star photos. I do not like Favorites, and rarely use it on the iPhone. Favorites are so Black & White. but Ratings makes it easier to use and sort/organize. I could also just make a Smart Album/Folder with 4-5 Stars and my son (or daughter) and make their yearly Video.

All that said, I expected Photos to start out like it has. I can see the Quick Edit from iOS and also the breakdowns for more in-depth editing. I also LOVED how I could create a series of Edits for a quick touchup on many photos or COPY and Edit Adjustment and paste onto a whole slew of photos from a session. I really feel that Apple is giving Photos away free and then letting developers have extensions as In-App purchases to make this a more thorough photo management/editing App. It would make sense...people love buying Photo Apps for iOS and Apple still make a 30% cut. They could probably provide Apple's own "Aperture-style" In-App purchases to extend Photos like Aperture.

As for iCloud...seems too expensive for me at this time. I Love the idea though. I remember accidentally pushing photos from the iMac to my iPhone after a trip with the DLSR and the photos looked incredible on the small iPhone screen and nice to look through but they were large files. I have wanted a quick way to rate photos and possibly add Meta Data on my iOS devices for Photos on the Mac. With Photos and iCloud that seems to be closer (though not happening at this time).

For now, I will stay with Aperture. Photos looks like it could be a good app in the future, but not right now for me.

 

[maflynn]

Sounds like I should get Aperture before its removed from the App store? I really only need good DAM (digital asset management) for now.

I think that will be a waste of money. At some point it won't work because apple will not update it, so the next OS upgrade may break it. I recommend looking at other DAM products that will be supported by companies.

Spending money on a product that apple is killing off may not be the best use of your funds imo

 

[manu chao]

Sure but I don't think they announced the retirement of Aperture at WWDC. If I remember correctly it was reported on Dalrymple's site about a month later.

Their precise quote [provided to Dalrymple from Apple about three weeks after WWDC] was:

"With the introduction of the new Photos app and iCloud Photo Library, [...] there will be no new development of Aperture. [...] When Photos for OS X ships next year, users will be able to migrate their existing Aperture libraries to Photos for OS X. [...] The new Photos app will also replace iPhoto."​

 

[jnpy!$4g3cwk]

I think that will be a waste of money. At some point it won't work because apple will not update it, so the next OS upgrade may break it. I recommend looking at other DAM products that will be supported by companies.

Such as? Seriously, I could use a few suggestions myself. Most "DAM" software seems to be oriented towards the commercial web/magazine world.