Apple Releases Aperture

[Rower_CPU]

That's done with the ISO settings on your digital camera. On my Canon Rebel, to soften the background and leave the main object in focus I use a 400 ISO setting.

The effect you're referring to is controlled by your aperture setting which increases or decreases the depth of field of the shot.

 

[mlrproducts]

That's done with the ISO settings on your digital camera. On my Canon Rebel, to soften the background and leave the main object in focus I use a 400 ISO setting.

Please see here.

Understanding Exposure by Bryan Peterson. Enjoy!

 

[vmardian]

That's done with the ISO settings on your digital camera. On my Canon Rebel, to soften the background and leave the main object in focus I use a 400 ISO setting.

ISO, in the digital domain, is the sensitivity of your CCD. Increasing ISO increases sensitity which reduces the amount of time that's needed for proper exposure. The side-effect of this is that it increases noise. Lowering the ISO reduces CCD sensity, lengthens shutter speed, thus causing less noise.

A blurry background (or foreground) is created by narrowing the depth of focus. To do this, either increase your zoom, decrease your aperture size, or do some combination of both.

 

[kiwi-in-uk]

decrease your aperture size

no ... decrease the f/stop number (which increases the size of the aperture) to decrease the depth of field.

Have a look here for a very brief but clear explanation.

 

[vmardian]

no ... decrease the f/stop number (which increases the size of the aperture) to decrease the depth of field.

You're right. I was just thinking 'make the number smaller'.

Funny thing is I almost made the mistake twice when writing about shutter speed. I was going to say "decrease shutter speed" when what I really wanted to say was "decrease the amount of time the shutter is open."

 

[MontyZ]

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[MontyZ]

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[kiwi-in-uk]

You're right. I was just thinking 'make the number smaller'.

Funny thing is I almost made the mistake twice when writing about shutter speed. I was going to say "decrease shutter speed" when what I really wanted to say was "decrease the amount of time the shutter is open."

Yeah - obviously the original camera mechanisms and terminologies were developed by left handed people like me.
Revenge for all the scissors, can openers, MS "ergonomic" (ho ho ho!) mice, and so on ...

 

[efoto]

I finally finished looking at all the "quick tour" movies about Aperture, and the photographer profiles. It took a few days because every time I watched one of the quick tours I nearly had an orgasm.

I think Aperture is going to drastically change things in digital photography they way iTunes changed the way we buy and listen to music. This is truly one killer app. When I first heard about it, I thought $499 was too much. But, now that I've seen the depth of the program and the incredible features it will offer, it's well worth the money.

But I don't think it's going to be a Photoshop killer. Photoshop has lots of features Aperture doesn't, and vice-versa. There is some overlap in features, but, all the airbrushing, photo-correction and retouching tools are still needed. Plus, PS has become an important tool for creating web graphics, with tools for scaling, sharpening, saving in various formats and combining vector graphics with bitmap graphics in layered documents. So, I don't think PS is in any danger of being shoved aside by Aperture. You can't use Aperture to design a website interface.

But for digital photography, I think Aperture will set the new standard and become the tool digital photographers have been waiting for for years.

I just finished watching (and downloading ) all of the quick tours as well and I love the program even more. I liked the idea simply after reading around on the site but being at work I couldn't really justify the movies (not like I could the reading either....but it was less obvious I suppose). So finally having seen this I have vowed to save up to get an upgraded system that can actually run Aperture. I realize Apple's reasoning for releasing it with such high specs but it would have been nice to have it work on my PowerBook Oh well, I realize that my little 12" sacrifices some things, but I guess the upside of this situation is I now have a great reason/excuse to add a new PowerMac to my lineup Now if I can only convince the las....oh wait

Yeah - obviously the original camera mechanisms and terminologies were developed by left handed people like me.
Revenge for all the scissors, can openers, MS "ergonomic" (ho ho ho!) mice, and so on ...

Funny look at it, but I guess that makes more sense than a lot of other arguments I hear....damn you lefties!

 

[johngordon]

This is exactly the point. Holy cow, don't some folks realize how great Apple has been with their backward-compatible software? On the PC side it's "tough-luck" with tons of software updates or (heaven-forfend) games.

This app will probably "run" on the iBook, but photo manipulation is completely hands-on except for a few batch processes. With a video render the extended time issues may not matter since you can just leave it running and go elsewhere, thus, the slow performance is not as big a deal. Working with a photo manipulation program on minimal hardware would be unpleasant.

The people that this App is designed for need speed (less post-production = more shooting time) so Apple pushed the specs to deliver the goods to the targeted individuals. And they don't use iBooks.

agree completely - the fact that you can run some pro software is really more of a bonus than not being able to run the latest, greatest pro software.

i love the look of it -as an amateur photographer who would like to do more, i've never really felt any urge to go down the PS route - as its seems mre aimed at graphic design really.

but aperture is all about the photos, working with them in a pro iPhoto / lab / light table environment. and the new book design looks just incredible, the WYSIWYG web gallery design, with smart galleries looks fantastic.

the whole look and feel of the thing really makes me want to get it and do more with my photos. its a cliche - but once again its a case of apple software inspiring people to greater things. yes - its for the pro - but it inspires the amateur to become as pro as they can.

maybe one day...

Iain

 

[johngordon]

Did anyone else notice the UI sound effects?

i did.

always watch csi, and it always seems a bit unrealistic / artistic licence the UI sound effects all their hi tech software uses - but here it was for real!

Iain

 

[johngordon]

I see, it makes sense though. Maybe they will see how well Aperture sells before releasing an Express version. Would be nice though, or iPhoto 6 will more editing tools built in.

i think this has to either lead to something like aperture express, or open up major new possibilities for iPhoto 6+.

i'm sure there are many of us that aren't anything like pro photographers, but would happily trade up to something like aperture - but maybe not at that price. but something like aperture express with the features that would most obviously appeal to the prosumer like the book layouts and WYSIWIG web galleries, throw inb some of the better organisation stuff, the great UI, and how many sales from to non pros who have had their appetites whetted by iPhoto the way home movie makers were from iMovie and had the natural path up to FCE? quite a few i'd say - i know i'd certainly be there.

Iain

 

[slick316]

seems as though I need to learn to use my camera better. I should probably buy a "Dummies Guide" book or something.

 

[movabi]

New IVMP & Portfolio

They announced a new IVMP 3 & Portfolio 8. While I'm sure they won't be as sweet as Apeture, i'm glad to see updates to these two programs for us users that don't have G5s. I think Apeture motivated them.

http://www.iview-multimedia.com/
http://www.extensis.com

 

[efoto]

i think this has to either lead to something like aperture express, or open up major new possibilities for iPhoto 6+.

i'm sure there are many of us that aren't anything like pro photographers, but would happily trade up to something like aperture - but maybe not at that price. but something like aperture express with the features that would most obviously appeal to the prosumer like the book layouts and WYSIWIG web galleries, throw inb some of the better organisation stuff, the great UI, and how many sales from to non pros who have had their appetites whetted by iPhoto the way home movie makers were from iMovie and had the natural path up to FCE? quite a few i'd say - i know i'd certainly be there.

Iain

The only thing holding me back is the steep system requirements, not the non-pro status or the price. I think a lot of users are put off by the un-normally high requirements for this program. While I see Apple's reasoning for doing so, I still wish I could run it....plus since I cannot afford a new computer right now, it just means no-go My hope is that an 'express version' would have slightly lower requirements to allow more users as well as a lower price.

 

[drlunanerd]

Anyone know if Aperture will be compiled as a Universal Binary? I've got a copy on order but don't want to have to shell out again if I want to run it on a MacIntel natively.

 

[jimbo0270]

I bought it about a week ago and I find the program to be pretty bad. I am a pro and need pro results though. I expected more from Apple, a lot more. The raw conversions from my Canon are quite noisy. The program hangs for 5 minutes at a time frequiently. And I am running a new dual core 2.3 G5 with 2.5 gigs of ram.
Yes, I am a bit ticked of at apple at this point, The noise reduction tool is virtually useless. This is a list of some of my biggest issues with it:

Need improvement of sharpening and noise reduction (it currently has tools but they work for $h!t)
no support for curves
Need improvement of raw conversions - produces artifacts, inaccurately reads camera WB
no support for camera calibration
no support for vignetting control
no support for CA control
Need improvement of TIFF and JPEG export (dpi and compression settings)
Need improvement of stability
Dual monitor support has limited capabilities
non-destructive editing? corrupting layered PSD files and stripping meta data is not completely non destructive.

 

[quidire]

non-destructive editing? corrupting layered PSD files and stripping meta data is not completely non destructive.

That's not what they mean; what they mean is that for the jpg or raw file, any color correction or transformation is stored as an instruction, rather than the finished result. The actual image is never changed, and you can "rewind" to any point in the chain of transformations. Believe it or not, this is a huge benefit for some of us; otherwise old copies and intermediate versions of photos spam our photo libraries.

They don't claim to have support for PSD files where the layers haven't been merged.

 

[jimbo0270]

I know what they "mean" but it is not what they "say". Not supporting and corrupting a file as to make it unreadable by it's original program is two different things and it is a problem... it should not let you import a layered file if it is going to trash it!
The other problem lies with the intent of the program. Apple claims this is "Everything you need after the shoot". If you are using Aperture for it's Digital asset management and compare and select features you would like to get away from Iview Media Pro (or portfolio) and your current Raw converter (like Capture One) to use one program you cannot. As pro's use layers in Photoshop and many of us want to store our PSD file unflattened this program should not ruin your work (it should just reject it). Later I will post the difference between a Aperture RAW conversion and a Phase One RAW conversion and you will understand why I am bent about spending $500 on software that is no better than a Beta!

 

[iGary]

*shrug*

I'm getting much better RAW images out of Aperture than I ever did in Photoshop.

 

[jimbo0270]

As promised

if you would like to see the biggest problem that I have with aperture please follow the link.

http://homepage.mac.com/jimbo0270/Aperture%20vs.%20Capture%20One

 

[amin]

if you would like to see the biggest problem that I have with aperture please follow the link.

http://homepage.mac.com/jimbo0270/Aperture%20vs.%20Capture%20One

C1 is awesome, and unlike PS, C1 directly competes w/ Aperture. It's going to take a lot to get me to change from C1 LE to Aperture, not the least of which is a cheaper version for us non pros.

For the record, I also get better resullts in C1 than I get staying in PS for RAW conversion.

 

[Peterkro]

Aperture 1.01 in software update now.

Aperture 1.0.1 Update addresses a number of issues related to reliability and performance. It also delivers improved image export quality and metadata handling. Among the key areas addressed are:

White balance adjustment accuracy and performance
Image export quality
Book and print ordering reliability
Auto-stacking performance
Custom paper size handling
This update is recommended for all Aperture users.