Aperture vs. Lightroom.......

[BiikeMike]

I searched, and didn't find any threads on this. I'm looking to get one of these programs, since Lightroom is in beta, and a free DL, I have tried it. Aperture, I have not. I find lightroom to be slow in transitioning from one photo to another, needless zooming, and just a bit sluggish. I understand its still in beta mode, and figure the final release will be a bit better.

So what does aperture do that lightroom doesnt?

what does lightroom do that aperture doesn't?

Those of you that have used both, which do you prefer?

 

[Clix Pix]

One important factor is the user's computer system, specifically RAM and graphics card. If you're trying to run Lightroom on a G4 with 512 MB RAM or even 1 GB RAM, this could account for your problems and why Lightroom feels "sluggish" to you.

I have both Lightroom and Aperture installed in this computer (G5 rev b iMac) but to be honest, have used Aperture pretty much exclusively and have not taken the time to poke around much in Lightroom. I can tell you that if you invest in Aperture you will need to have enough RAM and a good graphics card to run it.....

 

[BiikeMike]

I'm on an MBP, 2.16, OS 10.4.7, 1 gig ram, with the RadeonX1600

That should be enough to push either one, no?

 

[milozauckerman]

Lightroom was sluggish on my G5/2GHz tower (4GB RAM) and it's basically the same on this Core Duo iMac (2GB). It's a beta, I expect the release version to be quicker.

All in all, if performance were equal, I'd probably prefer Lightroom, but I haven't done any real output tests to see which looks better on paper.

 

[Abstract]

I run Lightroom Beta 3 on my 1.83 GHz Core Duo MacBook with 1.5 GB of RAM, and don't find it sluggish. However, there have been times when it slowed down because I don't have enough RAM for it, Firefox and 3-10 tabs, iTunes, Mail, MS Office (under Rosetta), aMSN, and a few other programs open.

I tried Aperture for like 10 minutes at the Mac1 store near my home on an iMac 2GHz Core Duo with 2 GB of RAM, and it was slower than Lightroom on my MacBook, which isn't a good sign if you have a lesser system.

I also don't like the requirement of a system with a high resolution than my MacBook. I understand that Apple is aiming Aperture at professionals, but just because they're aiming Aperture at pros doesn't mean they should actually prevent my ability to install it on a lesser system (officially). I shoot RAW, and iPhoto doesn't cut it. I also wish it didn't require a higher-end system to run well. Lightroom is a lot less resource hungry.

When it came to usability, the way Aperture lets you stack things is great. However, it's not necessary for me since I don't take 500 photos at a time or whatever. I find Lightroom's editing features much better than Aperture, and if system spec limitation wasn't a factor, I'd still likely choose Lightroom. It'll only get better from here as well. I can't wait to buy it.

 

[pdxflint]

here's a link...

Here's an article discussing Lightroom vs. Aperture.

 

[BiikeMike]

Abstract, did you mean you would still likely choose lightroom?

PDX, thanks for the link

 

[BiikeMike]

So I just got back from the Apple store to play with aperture, and I must say....... I am definantly not impressed. They only had it loaded on 2 MBP 2.16 with 1 gig of ram, which is what I have, and it was SLOOOOOOOOOW. I wanted to ply with it on the Mac Pro, just to see what it could do, but they didn't have it loaded on there

I take back everything I said about Lightroom being slow, in its Beta Stages, its faster than Aperture. Granted, the test photos they had in aperture were RAW images taken with a Canon Mark 1Ds Mark II, and I only have Canon 10D, but still, Aperture should not have brought up beach balls, especially on the Apple store computers!

The guy assured me that it didn't act like that when they were learning aperture, and that if I put another gig of ram in my computer that it would make a world of difference, but..... i'm not so sure. I'm definantly holding off on aperture for awhile, too bad there is no type of trial I can install to try Aperture on my personal computer........

 

[FleurDuMal]

So I just got back from the Apple store to play with aperture, and I must say....... I am definantly not impressed. They only had it loaded on 2 MBP 2.16 with 1 gig of ram, which is what I have, and it was SLOOOOOOOOOW. I wanted to ply with it on the Mac Pro, just to see what it could do, but they didn't have it loaded on there

I take back everything I said about Lightroom being slow, in its Beta Stages, its faster than Aperture. Granted, the test photos they had in aperture were RAW images taken with a Canon Mark 1Ds Mark II, and I only have Canon 10D, but still, Aperture should not have brought up beach balls, especially on the Apple store computers!

The guy assured me that it didn't act like that when they were learning aperture, and that if I put another gig of ram in my computer that it would make a world of difference, but..... i'm not so sure. I'm definantly holding off on aperture for awhile, too bad there is no type of trial I can install to try Aperture on my personal computer........

I tried Aperture on a Mac Pro at the Regent Street, London Apple Store the other day, and I echo your sentiments. It felt very slow, considering that the Mac Pro is supposed to be the absolute pinnacle of Apple hardware (however, it was by no means unusable...just not as silky as it really should be). Not a good showcase at all. I never checked what configuration it was - if it only had 1GB of RAM inside, then I can understand for the slow feel.

On the other hand, from what I've heard, Aperture gets speedier with every update. The fact that it is sluggish on the flagship hardware just exposes how poorly coded 1.x must've been. The very first release must've been awful. I'm 100% sure however that by the time they release 2.0, it will run flawlessly on any recently purchased system (minus the non-pro machines).

Aperture - great potential not yet exploited.

 

[BiikeMike]

I tried Aperture on a Mac Pro at the Regent Street, London Apple Store the other day, and I echo your sentiments. It felt very slow, considering that the Mac Pro is supposed to be the absolute pinnacle of Apple hardware (however, it was by no means unusable...just not as silky as it really should be). Not a good showcase at all. I never checked what configuration it was - if it only had 1GB of RAM inside, then I can understand for the slow feel.

On the other hand, from what I've heard, Aperture gets speedier with every update. The fact that it is sluggish on the flagship hardware just exposes how poorly coded 1.x must've been. The very first release must've been awful. I'm 100% sure however that by the time they release 2.0, it will run flawlessly on any recently purchased system (minus the non-pro machines).

Aperture - great potential not yet exploited.

I guess it is the first universal release, but still. I couldn't believe they didn't have it on the Mac Pro!

 

[milozauckerman]

Memory matters - Aperture runs fine on this Core Duo iMac that has 2GB of RAM. I'd consider that the minimum to run Aperture well.

 

[Abstract]

Problem is that this is a high "minimum" spec recommendation. If it doesn't run smoothly in a Mac Pro, the program should be written again.

Abstract, did you mean you would still likely choose lightroom?

PDX, thanks for the link

Sorry, I meant that I'd get Lightroom if machine specs weren't an issue. I corrected my previous post.

The "Develop" editing in Lightroom is just too good. It's good enough for most people and like 95% of images. If there are specific changes to make on only parts of an image, that's where Photoshop comes in. However, I'm not big on editing and like to leave photos as they were taken from my camera, but if I'm taking photos in RAW, of course I'm gonna edit a little bit! The ability to stack and sort that way in Aperture is great, and is the only thing in Aperture I really admire.

Lightroom has some annoying points, but by the time it's released, I really can't imagine having much interest in Aperture. I just want Lightroom to offer freedom to stack and sort rather than through the rigid system it's using now. I'd also like some of the side panels to be editable. There are also some quirks in the UI that I really don't like. I also don't like the crop mode, where dragging something to the left moves the cropped frame to the right. I'm not driving an airplane!

 

[timnosenzo]

I'm on an MBP, 2.16, OS 10.4.7, 1 gig ram, with the RadeonX1600

That should be enough to push either one, no?

I have the same computer as your, although I did upgrade the RAM to 2GB. I purchased Aperture a few weeks ago and I love it! It runs better than I thought it would, and it really helps speed up my workflow.

I tried Lightroom once when it first came out--I personally wasn't really impressed, and I never tried it again, so I can't make an accurate comparison.

If you live near an Apple store, go down and ask someone to show you how it runs on a MBP. Thats what I did, because I was pretty hesitant about dropping that much money on it before seeing it in action.

 

[BiikeMike]

If you live near an Apple store, go down and ask someone to show you how it runs on a MBP. Thats what I did, because I was pretty hesitant about dropping that much money on it before seeing it in action.

I went in, and their "creative" guy wan't there, but I played with it with another employee, and WHEEEE!!! spinning color wheel!

 

[FleurDuMal]

I went in, and their "creative" guy wan't there, but I played with it with another employee, and WHEEEE!!! spinning color wheel!

How much RAM was in it? It sounds like having at least 2GB of RAM is an absolute must (and there was me thinking that I was going overboard by putting 2GB in my Macbook ).

 

[timnosenzo]

I went in, and their "creative" guy wan't there, but I played with it with another employee, and WHEEEE!!! spinning color wheel!

Hmm, I don't really get the beach ball much. Sometimes it can take a second to load settings or apply changes depending on what they are. FWIW I'm working with RAW files out of a Canon 20D (8 mpix).

 

[relimw]

I can't comment on Aperture, as I have no machine that can even attempt to install it yet. Lightroom works well for me, and isn't resource hungry. I can run it on a 1GB mac mini!

Mine you, it's no speed demon on that hardware, and importing 100 photos takes awhile. Beta 3 was at least a 2x-3x performance increase, very few beach balls anymore. Also, beta3 gave more output options, including the Flash output, for when you just want to shove a preview out the door. It does lack Aperture's helpful stacking/sorting feature.

 

[BiikeMike]

How much RAM was in it? It sounds like having at least 2GB of RAM is an absolute must (and there was me thinking that I was going overboard by putting 2GB in my Macbook ).

it had 1 gig.....

i'll have 2 gigs soon!

 

[hqsbud]

I've been using Lightroom since Beta 2 came out, and I've tried Aperture many times extensively in my local Apple store. If things don't change significantly before Lightroom's 1.0 release, I see myself a Lightroom user.

The things I like most about Aperture are:

1. Clean, mature interface which is a bit difficult at first, but you get used to it.
2. Versioning, versioning, versioning. Works well for me.
3. Good, formalized back-up mechanism.

The things I don't like about Aperture are:

1. The filmstrip and little toolbar often cover exactly what I want to see in full-screen mode. This is especially bad if I'm trying to sample a white-point spot right where the top toolbar pops down. Same things for the filmstrip which frequently gets in the way no matter where I put it.
2. Rotate and crop are not intuitive to use, and rotating a photo even a little bit slows it down tremendously.
3. The Levels method is hard to use to optimize exposure the way I want. That might be a matter of getting used to.

What Lightroom does better is:

1. Rotate and crop are easy and intuitive.
2. I'm much more comfortable with its Curves method of optimizing exposure. Might be just me.

What I miss in Aperture when using Lightroom:

1. No formal back-up method, though I can just back the library up myself.
2. No versioning. Might be coming.

I wasn't able to figure out the spot edits in Aperture, but I think I just didn't figure it out. Seems people who are experienced with Aperture have no problem with it. Its performance on the MBP 2.16GHz at the store seemed quite good to me, until you rotated an image as I mentioned.

I find I can get to my goals with Lightroom much faster than with Aperture, and that's with me running a 1.5GHz PowerBook G4. Not that Lightroom performs much faster, but it's more intuitive to me.

 

[Abstract]

I wasn't able to figure out the spot edits in Aperture, but I think I just didn't figure it out. Seems people who are experienced with Aperture have no problem with it. Its performance on the MBP 2.16GHz at the store seemed quite good to me, until you rotated an image as I mentioned.

Yeah, I found that Aperture ran at a decent speed until you started trying to actually do stuff. Rotate shouldn't slow your computer down.

The jump from Lightroom Beta 2 to Beta 3 increased performance dramatically (although Beta 3 for WinXP is still as slow as Beta 1, or even slower, but maybe it's because Beta 3 is the first version compatible with Windows). I expect Lightroom to get faster.

But by the time Lightroom is released in retail form (Jan 2007?), Aperture 2 may be released, and maybe I'll have to reevaluate the situation again.

 

[bearbo]

this might be a stupid question...
so aperture and lightroom are similar application (but more powerful) as iPhoto? aka photo managing and slight editing program, and photoshop on the other end is a extensive photo editing program?

the reason i asked is that for so long i thought aperture (as much as i never used it ) is also a photo editing program to compete with photoshop... but this is not true right? i mean, photoshop is still The ONE for actual editing?

also, is lightroom gonna be free (i dont konw where i heard this...) or just the beta...?

 

[Yakamoto]

I went to the Apple store to play with Apeture, and it was slow too.
The genius said that it normaly does'nt run that slow and more Ram should help . But, after looking under "About Apeture" it said Ver. 1.01
now is'nt 1.5 supposed to be a true universal app, and thus perform better?
My friend has the newest version installed on a mini, and has had no problems with it. By the way the Apple store gave me no reason why Apeture on the MBP's haven't been upgraded.

 

[Yakamoto]

this might be a stupid question...
so aperture and lightroom are similar application (but more powerful) as iPhoto? aka photo managing and slight editing program, and photoshop on the other end is a extensive photo editing program?

the reason i asked is that for so long i thought aperture (as much as i never used it ) is also a photo editing program to compete with photoshop... but this is not true right? i mean, photoshop is still The ONE for actual editing?

also, is lightroom gonna be free (i dont konw where i heard this...) or just the beta...?

When the newest version of PS comes then Lightroom will most likely be part of a suite (ie bridge). Both Lightroom and Apeture are Pro Photo Managment
App's. Apeture has some very nice editing tools built in, but they don't come close to PS. So if you need to Manage and catalog your photos, and do some quick editing then Apeture is great, but I'd highly recommend using PS
with it to get the best results. Photoshop is still the King.

 

[ChrisA]

...
so aperture and lightroom are similar application (but more powerful) as iPhoto? aka photo managing and slight editing program, and photoshop on the other end is a extensive photo editing program?... but this is not true right? i mean, photoshop is still The ONE for actual editing?

You got it right. Except for the part about PS being the ONE. Most people who buy PS (actually CS2 now) don't need it and don't use even 10% of it's functions. I would recommend that most users use either Adobe "Elements" or "Gimp".

 

[FleurDuMal]

I went to the Apple store to play with Apeture, and it was slow too.
The genius said that it normaly does'nt run that slow and more Ram should help . But, after looking under "About Apeture" it said Ver. 1.01
now is'nt 1.5 supposed to be a true universal app, and thus perform better?
My friend has the newest version installed on a mini, and has had no problems with it. By the way the Apple store gave me no reason why Apeture on the MBP's haven't been upgraded.

I went to the Apple Store on London's Regent Street yesterday and none of the Macs had Aperture 1.5 on them. They were still 1.2 or something. Also, given that it's now supposed to work on Macbooks (it always did, just now it's officially supported), they should surely install it on those? I wanted to see who well it worked on a Macbook before buying Aperture.

Infact, if you click on Software Update on any of the computers in the Regent Street Apple Store, you'll see there are dozens of programmes that need updating.

Pretty shoddy for a supposed 'flagship' store if you ask me. Surely one of the 'genius' should have noticed this