What is the best way to combine Aperture and Photoshop workflow?

[wgilles]

Hi everyone,
I am really stuck between Aperture and Lightroom 2 at the moment, but I feel that I will be sticking with Aperture, mainly because I love the way it catalogues and displays (ie full screen edit) my images.

If I do decide to stick with Aperture I am wondering what the best workflow will be to work with Aperture and Photoshop. I plan to do some basic edits in Aperture but then switch to CS3 to do Levels, masking, etc adjustments. I know I can export PSD files direct to Photoshop, but is there a way to export TIFF files to give me a little more control (something closer to a RAW file) to Photoshop since there isn't a way to open up Smart Objects from Aperture?

 

[bashveank]

Yeah, just go into the preferences and choose tiff as your default export for external editing.

 

[odinsride]

in preferences set Photoshop as your external editor...then when you right click an image in your library and you can go to Edit With > Photoshop

This will duplicate the current version (creates a stack) in aperture and open the image in photoshop, and you can do your edits, upon saving in photoshop it will pick the edited image as the stack default

 

[onomatopoeia]

Can Aperture convert to DNG? It would be ideal to be able to convert the RAW to DNG and export to Photoshop in one step. If this isn't currently possible, why not? Might a plug-in be written to do this?

 

[OreoCookie]

No, currently it can't.

 

[kitmos]

Can Aperture convert to DNG? It would be ideal to be able to convert the RAW to DNG and export to Photoshop in one step.

yes that would be nice

 

[MaddMacs]

What is your guys work flow getting the Photoshop image back into Aperture? I have been saving it in a random folder, then importing it from there. Is there a way to save it in the Aperture .img bundle, or export it from Photoshop back into Aperture with out having to import it again?

 

[OreoCookie]

What is your guys work flow getting the Photoshop image back into Aperture? I have been saving it in a random folder, then importing it from there. Is there a way to save it in the Aperture .img bundle, or export it from Photoshop back into Aperture with out having to import it again?

You just select Save in the File menu. Aperture automatically updates the preview within a second or so. Do not save it in a file under a different name in a different folder.

 

[ChrisA]

Can Aperture convert to DNG? It would be ideal to be able to convert the RAW to DNG and export to Photoshop in one step. If this isn't currently possible, why not? Might a plug-in be written to do this?

No it wouldn't be ideal. You'd loose whatever work you did in Aperture. DNG is a raw format. Are you asking for "non-raw" DNG files. Let's hope that never happens.

In preferences I think you get to specify the file format that is passed. Both TIFF and PSD can handle 16-bit per channel images. Nothing is lost. These 16 bit per channel files preserve not only all the color depth that was in the raw camera file but also any edits you did in Aperture.

What is your guys work flow getting the Photoshop image back into Aperture? I have been saving it in a random folder,

You are making more work for yourself. Just click "Save". Not "Save As.." Aperture looks for the edited result inside the same file it created and passed the Photoshop.

Also, if you do a "Save As.." and re-import then Aperture will think you have two photos, not two version of the same photo. It is best to let Aperture keep track of the versions for you.

If you work this way you are going to need to have a large disk. Those files are huge. And then you will need a few other disks to keep Aperture "vaults" on plus maybe a Time machine drive.

 

[wgilles]

Yeah I wish Aperture could export to DNG because that is what I really want. I want my edits saved but I also want the ability to go back to the original without having to have 2 copies.

 

[wgilles]

Just an update. I found a plug in for Aperture which allows you to export your files as DNG files, however, it does not save any adjustments...

 

[HoleInTheHead]

This thread fixed my problem, but I'd still like to know how I wasted 2 hours of my life:

I was originally clicking and dragging a photo I wanted to edit from my viewer to the photoshop icon in the dock. Then I'd do all my edits and save a new version. When I did it this way, the dimensions of my photo would be cut in about half. I only noticed that after I had done a lot of edits. If I do the above technique and edit via the option-click method, the dimensions stay the same.

I guess I'm just curious why I got hosed doing it my first way, anyone else notice that?

 

[HoleInTheHead]

You just select Save in the File menu. Aperture automatically updates the preview within a second or so. Do not save it in a file under a different name in a different folder.

At what point do you save a .psd version? As soon as I do that it wont auto-update into aperture anymore

 

[OreoCookie]

At what point do you save a .psd version? As soon as I do that it wont auto-update into aperture anymore

Creating previews from psds is a big flaky, but in my experience, it's not the auto-update, in my case, not all layers are rendered somehow. If I view them full screen, they show up fine, though.