Apple Aperture

Okay, new question. I've got the RAW thing on the go, I'm going through some photographs I took on Sun. There are about 12 different ways to do the picture I'm interested in, and I'd pretty much like to do them all and compare them. So do I just do whatever I want, then hit new version from master? Is that a limitless opportunity? And do the adjustments happen in series - as well as rather than instead of, so if I hit a preset then pick another do I get both (and do they change depending on which is first) or do they both work from original?

You're right, I do need to go through a load of the videos, don't I. But the accents are so grating! I shall steel myself and soldier on. Oh - also, can you get those overlaid texture things and borders and stuff or is that all plug ins, snapseed, flare etc?

I'm really excited about one of the photos I took, in itself it's nothing, but with processing it's awesome!
 
Okay, new question. I've got the RAW thing on the go, I'm going through some photographs I took on Sun. There are about 12 different ways to do the picture I'm interested in, and I'd pretty much like to do them all and compare them. So do I just do whatever I want, then hit new version from master? Is that a limitless opportunity? And do the adjustments happen in series - as well as rather than instead of, so if I hit a preset then pick another do I get both (and do they change depending on which is first) or do they both work from original?

Hi Heather
you can either say 'new version from master' - which means that you've started from scratch again . . . . or you can say 'duplicate version' in which case you're using your current version as a jumping off point. What I would normally do is to make basic exposure levels adjustments to the image, then duplicate THAT version as a jumping off point. Remember, you're shooting RAW - so that multiple versions don't degrade (as they would, for instance, if you were re-saving jpg files in elements).

Does that help? I hope so!
 
Got it, did it one happy bunny. I quite like this one....
6050062937_7b36bcd135_b.jpg
[/url] DSC01652 - Version 3 by heather_t_vet, on Flickr[/IMG]
 
I bit the bullet and coughed up. I now own Aperture. I was so annoyed by it's r e a l l y s l o w n e s s earlier on that I haven't done anything with it yet. I think what I need to do is back up my files, then delete the iphoto library as I don't need a squillion versions of each photo and they'll just slow me down. I mean, I can't have my tetris playing slowed down, that would be a terrible position to find myself in.
 
I bit the bullet and coughed up. I now own Aperture. I was so annoyed by it's r e a l l y s l o w n e s s earlier on that I haven't done anything with it yet. I think what I need to do is back up my files, then delete the iphoto library as I don't need a squillion versions of each photo and they'll just slow me down. I mean, I can't have my tetris playing slowed down, that would be a terrible position to find myself in.

A couple things you might consider changing in your preferences could help out on speed is to turn off Faces and Places. Since Aperture is new on your machine and if you've imported a bunch of photos into Aperture, its going through all of those checking for Faces and Places. You can also speed it up by turning off sharing to your iLife and iWork apps in the Preferences under Preview. Also, Aperture is creating Previews for all of these "new" images you're importing. Once that's done you'll see some speed up.

Also you may have noticed a spinning wheel just under your viewer window just to the right of you quick editing tools. If you click on the spinning wheel a new window will open with the current processes Aperture is working on. When this wheel is spinning and things have slowed down its cause Aperture is multi-tasking.

Hope this helps.
 
I am a long time Aperture user. The only gripe I have is the noise reduction - close to useless. I use the nik plug-ins, but as noted previously, this creates a whole new file, which I prefer to avoid in favor of non-destructive approach. i'm hoping the Apple addresses this in Ap4 - LR is lightyears ahead in this area. The other area I hope they add is Lens or Perspective adjustment.

Aperture does have quirks...even more so under Lion (I have in mind the anomalies with multiple desktops). Aperture can slow down for seemingly odd reasons. For example, some have found that deleting and reinstalling presets can have a big effect on speed.

Having played with LR RC, I still much prefer Aperture...
 
I agree with you Tom. I keep thinking I should migrate to LR, but every time I download the demo and start poking around I get lost. This past week on the road with my down time in the hotel, I've been reorganizing my library as I've recently gotten a firm handle on how the different "container" really behave. Especially "Projects" which had not realized was the "master" container.

I've been shoving everything in a Project labeled by year and then making "Albums" inside the Project to gather like images. I realized my error now and have begun my new organization with a "Folder" at top of the structure named for the Year the images are captured and then inside the folder I'm making "Projects" labeled to the specific shoot. I'm then putting those projects in a folder by "Family", "Travel", etc.

Any new upload goes into it owns new "Project" now and that project nested in the appropriate Folder.

From everything I've read Aperture still has the best file structure system with a lot of power that does take a little reading to understand the different relationships between the file structure and how the "Master" file itself is handled.
 
Cheers for the help guys, I'll let you know how it's going. Dorf's filing system is of particular interest as I've never managed to find a good way of storing things properly. I've finished the last nasty paperwork job so my patience level is a bit higher today. I spend so long at work being kind and gentle that by the time I get home I have all my grumpiness stored up, ready to be unleashed upon whatever computer programme or misbehaving bathmat I find.

So here goes another learning curve!
 
Good point, Dorf.

Projects are where the photos reside (from a database point of view). I have yearly Folders with monthly Projects, which reflects the fact that I usually take about 200 'keepers'/month. Within the months I have Albums based on topic or event. Since Albums are just indexes a given picture can be shown in more than one. I then use Smart Albums to reflect certain interesting (to me!) categories, such as all photos taken at < f2. Finally, I keep recent masters within Aperture, but files over about 6 months old are moved to Referenced status so that my Aperture library remains small, speedy and portable. The Referenced files are stored in a year/month folder structure. But I digress....
 
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