I’ve been processing & editing photos from our Victoria, B.C. trip this last week. I’m not terribly happy with the results. Below, I’m going to rant about my imaging software, but that’s not really the problem.

I was in a new and exciting place for a week, and don’t have many decent shots to show for it. I’ll post a few that have potential, but I don’t think I have anything stellar. I think I was just too tired most of the time (Fi kept us up a lot - this has got to stop!). I just didn’t have the mental focus necessary for proper planning and execution. I did grab a few fun snaps on the spur of the moment; some of these have potential, I think.

My own creative challenges aside, I’ve been thinking acutely about whether or not I continue to use Apple’s pro photo management solution - Aperture - or not. I currently have 14,645 images in my Aperture library, the sum total of nearly all images Kristi and I have shot since we went digital in 2002. As you can imagine, even the thought of transitioning to another software package isn’t going to be trivial. Before Aperture, it was managed in parts by Adobe Elements and iView Media Pro (now Microsoft Expression). Once I started shooting higher-quality RAW images, it was time for serious RAW workflow software.

There’s really only one competitor, in the one-app-does-it-all category: Adobe Lightroom. With such a big investment in Aperture, why would I even consider changing platforms?

In development long before Apple started Aperture (Apple was first to market), Adobe Lightroom was built from the ground up to manage, edit, color-correct, print and create slideshows for pro and semi-pro photographers. The two applications are nearly identical in purpose, price point, and target market (though Aperture is Mac-only). There is still ongoing debate about which app is better; while I think there is no definitive answer for all users and workflows, there are certain aspects of each app that are important to me, and I’ll be looking at in the coming days and weeks.

They’re both mature enough to do the job, for the most part. What started this whole train of thought was my frustration with Apertures’ RAW rendering engine, and the lack of fine control over certain color correcting elements. This sounds kinda stupid when I say it out loud, but I am flabbergasted by the lack of any vignetting control over images in Aperture. I like my bacon crispy and my images with dark edges; it’s a “look” that people respond to and controls the focus of almost any image. Lightroom (and by extension, Adobe’s quite mature Camera RAW engine) has this as a part of the Lens Corrections section of the RAW converter (which, in my opinion, is an odd place for it). Lightroom also, in my experienced opinion, has far smoother and higher quality rendering of RAW imagery. Apple’s [system-level RAW engine] has made great strides is not as high-quality as ACR/Lightroom.

I’m also frustrated by Aperture’s incredible interface slowness. I have a late-model iMac (Core 2 Duo 2GHz, 2 GB RAM) which should run Aperture just fine; most of the time it’s ok, but when you start working with RAW images (which have to render), things start to slow down - heaven forbid you start adding effects. Then, we’re talking some real molasses. I thought I left the RenderWander™ back in the 1990’s, thank you very much!

Sidebar: I suspect it’s really Apple’s Pro Apps UI Framework. DVD Studio Pro, Motion, and Aperture all get slow in the same spots, and it’s frustrating as heck. It’s a blight on otherwise excellent apps that needs remedy.

To Aperture’s credit, there’s lots to like, still: the organization capabilities are excellent (though again, slow to execute); there’s integration with other apps like FotoMagico, Pages, and Keynote; and on proper hardware it flies. At work, I’ve tried it on a 3Ghz Mac Pro (quad-core, 10GB RAM - that’s right!, ATI X1900 card) with two 23” Cinema Displays and it’s a superior photo editing environment bar none. Which… I don’t have at home, and won’t likely ever, unless I return to freelancing, as my work system approaches $9,000 to build. Still, it sure is fun to drive Aperture at work occasionally - so there’s lots of potential. BTW - throwing your images up on a large Cinema Display is shockingly gorgeous. I’d probably feel better if I had one here, even a 20”.

I feel like I need more creative visual control over my images, especially to get good prints and books (another post - I love those one-off books!). Lightroom has the edge, and I can always take them to Photoshop. But, I shouldn’t have to drive each image through Photoshop just to get the look I want - it should happen all under one roof.

Macworld 2008 is next week. I’m holding off on doing anything stupid until after then, as there may be announcements from Apple regarding Aperture 2.0. I’m wishing for an imaging plug-in architecture (there’s a great export API already, for both apps), so I can get my lush, Lomography-like vignetting.

Any thoughts, wishes, or frustrations with your current photo-management software? Am I nuts to contemplate it? I’m eternally restless when it comes to this stuff, so it may just be that 24-month itch.

Posted in Photography, Tools, Toys, and Geekery, Work