Aperture is dead

[Artemus]

I think each Dec/Jan for the last two years, but this time is unique as Aperture wasn't dead then!
Sorry, I meant 2015 Library. Aperture's performance degrades when your library gets too big, so I split mine out by year. Since it's time to start my 2015 Library, it seems an appropriate time whether to make the switch now.

I leave mine all together in one big library of 70K images. Seems to work fine for me.

 

[Nick]

70k RAW or mostly JPEG? What is the actual size of that library? Each year for me has usually been around 500GB. My 2014 Library is 581GB with 22k photos. I started to have serious problems the with even two that size put together.

 

[Artemus]

The library is 363 Gb.

I just checked and I have 60,178 lifetime digital photos.

The pictures are 50% raw and there are hardly any movies.

What are your stats over the years? What do you see that makes you want to start a new library each year?

 

[Nick]

2014: 581 GB and 22k
2013: 430 GB
2012: 548 GB
2011: 475 GB
2005-2010: 417 GB
Client-specific work library #1: 161 GB
Client-specific work library #2: 111 GB
Misc clients work library: 185 GB

If that was all together, that would be a 2.9 terrabyte library! Yikes! When I was pushing 1TB all in one, I started to have major lag and it would crash on me. Did a bit of research and learned it just can't hold up to that very well, especially after you start doing lots of edits back to back. Plus this makes it easier to manage storage and backups. Aside from my 12TB Drobo, 4TB Time Machine, 3TB Fusion Drive and Crashplan, I also keep loose hard drives off-site with 1 or 2 libraries on each one in case of catastrophic loss. I try to not put any videos into Aperture, but sometimes I have some mixed in and forget.

 

[Artemus]

Wild. A professional for sure...

 

[Nick]

Or just really bad at throwing stuff away. Photo hoarder.

 

[Nick]

Well, I did it. I started my 2015 Library in Lightroom with the photos from the trip I just went on. Sucks trying to figure everything out, but so far videos online have helped to connect the dots adequately. Loving all the cool features Lightroom has added in the years that Apple has let Aperture stagnate. Wish I'd switched 2 years ago when I first thought I should.

 

[Artemus]

Loving all the cool features Lightroom has added in the years that Apple has let Aperture stagnate.

Can you elucidate your favorites?

 

[Nick]

Can you elucidate your favorites?

I'm just scratching the surface, but here are some things:

The Clarity tool in LR kicks the crap out of the Definition tool in Aperture. Hard to explain, it just looks so much better.

The brushes in general in LR offer far superior control than those in Ap, particularly when it comes to things like exposure, white balance, etc. You could use brushes to do all that in Ap, but it was a lot harder than it is in LR. I really like the post adjustment capability of a specific brush set after you have done it. I need to learn it more though.

The lens correction toolset is fantastic. I particularly like being able to control how much correction happens with sliders for distortion and vignetting.

Somehow I am getting much nicer dynamic range when playing with shadows and highlights in LR. The same image in Ap with what I consider to be the most acceptable amount of Shadow/Highlight adjustments still has nearly black areas while in LR I can make it look great and realistic and bring out the detail without using a brush.

Import/Export functions are vastly superior in LR. Just so much more control and easy presets coming in and out. Easy to add metadata on the import like default copyright info, keywords, etc.

One area where I am not enjoying LR is the clone/repair brush. It works totally different than it does in Aperture or even Photoshop. I need to go watch a video or two on it now, because I'm losing my shiz trying to clone out a hot tub cover frame from a house I just shot.

Right now I'm processing two projects in LR and I also have them both in Aperture. It's nice to kind of play with them in both and see how they come out side by side. With the exception of the damn clone tool, I am far more satisfied with my results in Lightroom.

 

[Nick]

It's gotten to the point now that when I go back into aperture to fiddle with photos from past libraries, I get frustrated that they aren't in Lightroom. Might try importing a library soon...

 

[Artemus]

Might try importing a library soon

Waiting with bated breath...

 

[Nick]

First impressions of the new Photos for OS X:

http://www.macrumors.com/2015/02/05/photos-for-os-x-first-impressions/

A lot of positive, but consensus seems to be that it still lacks functionality that Aperture had. Considering how much more Lightroom 5 has over Aperture 3, LR still seems like the right choice.

 

[Artemus]

Very interesting.... Have you tried a massive import from Aperture to LR yet?

 

[Nick]

Not yet, Art. It's on my to-do list though. I'm afraid to even start, but I really want to. I am really loving Lightroom.

 

[Artemus]

Just trying to digest the Photos preview information but it is not yet ready for my primetime. No star or color ratings sinks me..

 

[heronwheels]

This thread forced me to take the inevitable leap. I've used Aperture for quite a while and every time I tried new trial versions of Lightroom I just ended up frustrated. Aperture seems to be running slower and slower and locking up on my machine so I signed up for the trial of Lightroom Creative Cloud. After forcing myself to spend time on it, I gotta say there are a lot of things that are better than Aperture. I'm still struggling with a few things and find Aperture more intuitive but all-in-allI think I'll end up preferring it. I do find the Mobile version on iPad a little frustrating considering all the limitation, I think I'll stick to Photogene for editing while mobile.