Cool new features in Aperture 3

[Grimace]

Hey all, many of you have tried out the download of Aperture 3 - post new features that you like! I'd rather not have this thread devolve into a discussion of AP vs. LR so try to stay on target!

Focus point display

I love this feature! Very educational for refining technique and seeing how you approached photos from the past.

 

[sth]

Tone curves and customizable CA correction (under adjustments) - Finally!

In fullscreen mode you can finally "pin" the inspector to the side of the screen so it doesn't overlap your image.

 

[Edge100]

I love this feature! Very educational for refining technique and seeing how you approached photos from the past.

This is a FANTASTIC feature, and one that I've always wanted.

 

[flosseR]

This is a FANTASTIC feature, and one that I've always wanted.

fully agreed, there are a lot of features that i wanted in A3, BUT Faces????? arghh.. now its starting to look like iphoto...

 

[romanaz]

fully agreed, there are a lot of features that i wanted in A3, BUT Faces????? arghh.. now its starting to look like iphoto...

its not quite a bad thing... for my weightlifting photography, which every picture I take shows the face, and are totally jumbled because of non-consecutive attempts... this will make my life so much easier to organize quicker. Also, for some of my event photography, which generally deals with the same group(s) of people, this will allow me to organize and get the photos back out to them so much faster. I welcome it, been lusting for it for a while.

 

[spice weasel]

fully agreed, there are a lot of features that i wanted in A3, BUT Faces????? arghh.. now its starting to look like iphoto...

If it has a bunch of good new features that you like but one that you don't have to use if you don't want to, what's the big deal? I've been reading a lot of grumbling about Faces in Aperture 3. Who cares? Don't use it if you don't like it.

I think the real reason behind the grumbling is elitism: those who fashion themselves as serious photographers don't want anything associated with the common riffraff picture snappers.

Give me a break.

 

[Westside guy]

fully agreed, there are a lot of features that i wanted in A3, BUT Faces????? arghh.. now its starting to look like iphoto...

I pretty much already said this in the flame-filled main "news" thread, but...

I really don't want to have to think about "this is a serious photo, so it goes in Aperture" versus "this is just a fun family get-together photo, so I'll manage it in iPhoto". I want to use Aperture for all my photos, serious or not. Consumer-level tools like Faces will make managing photos from family birthday parties etc. much easier. Also, a tool like Places may seem consumer-level at first, but geo-tagging can be useful for most every photo.

Besides, both Aperture and Lightroom have had features like "red eye reduction" since they were first released - it's pretty obvious they are targeted at a broader audience than just serious professionals.

 

[Keebler]

integration of slideshows looks very promising

better library management and organization. This means I can manage my family photos and client photos with the ability to delete the latter once done instead of using iphoto. love it.

the additional editing enhancements looks promising as well.

i have to return something to the apple store by this weekend so I hope they have some upgrades in stock

 

[flosseR]

If it has a bunch of good new features that you like but one that you don't have to use if you don't want to, what's the big deal? I've been reading a lot of grumbling about Faces in Aperture 3. Who cares? Don't use it if you don't like it.

I think the real reason behind the grumbling is elitism: those who fashion themselves as serious photographers don't want anything associated with the common riffraff picture snappers.

Give me a break.

Ok then why does it not work like it does in iphoto 09? Just for kicks I imported a folder into both (clean libraries) which had a ton of pictures of my kids.
iPhoto found the right kid and grouped them.. Aperture didn't.. as a matter of fact even after i labeled my son and daughter and scanned again it still couldn't match them.. bear in mind that some of the pictures were sequences...

Oh and it has nothing to do with elitism. I just separate my libraries iphoto for the snaps, aperture for seriousness...
Not trying to start a flamewar so lets jump over this already..



//F

 

[Ruahrc]

As a LR user, there are 2 things I see that I would like to appear in LR3. more control over the tone curve, and dodge/burn tools. The tone curve wrangling in LR is more limited than what is shown here, and I would like to have a little more control. It's possible to kludge in dodge/burn tools via the local adjustments brush, but a more streamlined way to get it to work would be welcome.

Ruahrc

 

[firestarter]

I can't see anything that would persuade me to switch away from Lightroom (and I'm still on 2.5), but it's good to see Apple raise their game and give Adobe some competition.

I think faces could be a really useful pro feature. What about wedding photography? If you shot a wedding and were able to tag all the images with 'bride', 'groom', 'bride's mother' etc. I'm sure it would be awesome!

 

[marioman38]

I love LR, but wouldn't mind switching to Aperture at all (the interface looks SLEEK!), however there's just NO easy way to! If apple were to make a LR-->Aperture app, like they do with the PC-->Mac migration assistant...

Anyway, this is great for us all! I'm glad Apple is releasing updates to keep adobe's slow a** in line! Adobe will be forced to update LR

 

[Phrasikleia]

I haven't had a chance to try out the new version yet, but just glancing over the new features, I'm very happy to see an adjustment for correcting chromatic aberration at long last! I know LR has had that forever, and it was a glaring omission in Aperture.

 

[TuffLuffJimmy]

My favorite new features:

Focus Point Display - Actually pretty useful as I can look at my framing issues in Aperture and know what to fix on my next shoot.

The new parts of Full Screen mode - When I don't have an external display hooked up I work exclusively in full screen mode, so this will really be a big benefit, since I always felt I needed those features when working.

Project Info - I think I can actually find some pretty good uses for that.

The improved searching is pretty nice too.

Curves - Need I say more? I'm too used to using curves, and it takes me too long to do what I want with Apple's levels implementation.

Chromatic Aberration Filter.

Nondestructive Doge and Burn.

 

[Phrasikleia]

A note about the Focus Point Display, before people start using it and wondering if their camera or lens is front/back focusing:

Keep in mind that all the camera knows is which point was active at the time you locked focus. If you subsequently recomposed a little bit or even a lot after locking focus, the camera has no way of knowing what you did. So there is no guaranteed correspondence between the highlighted focus point and the part of the image that it overlays.

 

[TuffLuffJimmy]

A note about the Focus Point Display, before people start using it and wondering if their camera or lens is front/back focusing:

Keep in mind that all the camera knows is which point was active at the time you locked focus. If you subsequently recomposed a little bit or even a lot after locking focus, the camera has no way of knowing what you did. So there is no guaranteed correspondence between the highlighted focus point and the part of the image that it overlays.

That's an extremely good point. Often when photographing birds or other quick moving wildlife I'll center the camera on the animal, focus, then turn the camera slightly to compose a better shot.

 

[tdmac]

I love LR, but wouldn't mind switching to Aperture at all (the interface looks SLEEK!), however there's just NO easy way to! If apple were to make a LR-->Aperture app, like they do with the PC-->Mac migration assistant...

If I am reading this correct then they do

http://aperture.maccreate.com/2010/02/09/aperture-3-overview/

Scroll down to:

XMP IN AND OUT

 

[Grimace]

Presets!

Making your own presets -- love it!

 

[Digital Skunk]

I love the book ordering from Coutour, and the much improved book design features.

The library management, which now puts it a clear step above the rest. Organization is a big thing for me, and even after working with some other photogs, it's something that not many understand. Many just make up some garbage method of organization and stick to it even if it's awful. Aperture may help many of them get their acts together.

I am glad everyone's raving about the adjustments, I haven't the time to dig deep into them, but I am crossing my fingers for them being as good as everyone says they are. The less I have to go into the Photoshop the better.

Now, if LR3 has InDesign features for book editing..... maybe I'll take more time to think on it.

 

[Grimace]

Previews of adjustments!

This is fantastic! For example, you can see what applying a red, yellow, blue, etc. filter on a b&w photo will look like before making the change! This lets you compare to the original at the same time!

 

[John.B]

Aperture still won't read linear DNGs, which creates havoc with my DxO-based workflow.

 

[John.B]

If I am reading this correct then they do

http://aperture.maccreate.com/2010/02/09/aperture-3-overview/

Scroll down to:

XMP IN AND OUT

You'd still have to redo your adjustments. This just allows you to bring over the metadata, keywords, ratings, etc. But a nice feature, nonetheless.

My biggest initial complaint was the lack of layers and masks, but I'm giving that a pass until I can invest the time to give the new adjustment brushes a real workout.

 

[Grimace]

Video management

For those of us with SLRs that record video, this is actually pretty dang handy. I don't plan on dumping my [occasional] footage into iMovie or FCP - most of the time I just want to crop it down and then maybe add in some audio.

Doing this in the same program/context as the other photos that were taken on the same trip makes a lot of sense. When I think "XYZ event" I can grab all related files.

 

[wheelhot]

I LOVE THE NEW FULLSCREEN FEATURES IN APERTURE 3!!!!

Alright, now I'm happy

Oh and is it me or almost everything in Aperture 3 (icons, font sizes and etc) looks bigger then Aperture 2?

and dammit, now I feel like I need to upgrade to more RAM. Anyone know what's the RAM max size does the first multitouch MBP 15" support. If I'm not mistaken, the tech spec mentions 4GB but I heard that you can actually run 6GB and btw, since Snow Leopard supports huge amount of RAM, but if the motherboard doesn't support the extra RAM, what will happen to the extra RAM? Will the software able to take leverage of the extra RAM?

 

[NathanCH]

I personally don't see how adding faces is a bad thing. It's not as if it's taking away from anything. Perhaps the UI makes it seem too similar to iPhoto, but it's actually a decent feature.

But I haven't bothered to read the arguments against it, so I could be missing something.