Mac - what software for editing and organising?

Just bought my first DSLR and figured I might as well go with some new software for both editing and organising my images. Will likely mostly be shooting in RAW, so speed needs to be fairly decent. Up to now I've been using CS for editing and simply organised everything in folders on the hard drive, but I would much prefer to use one single application for importing, editing and organising the images from now on. Also, I would like it to be fairly simple and intuitive. CS is really way too powerful and complex in terms of editing capability for my needs.

I'm on a Mac and have an EOS400D. The options as far as I can tell are:

- iPhoto (well, it's free...)

- Aperture

- Lightroom

- Canon's own software (again, it's free, but doesn't seem very good and also consists of several different applications rather than one)

Any opinions?

I use Aperture, and like it very much. If Lightroom had come out first I might just have easily been using it. Both can be downloaded as free trials.

The definitive software to download, preview, organize and tag is Photo Mechanic.

You will find this in virtualy every daily newspaper's photo staffroom, where everything is done in volume and against a deadline.

I've tried Lightroom and Aperture, and when they grow up they'll want to be just like Photo Mechanic.

All the best, James

I searched around a lot for the same ? ktwse,

I'd definitely trust fdog (James) advice about Photo Mechanic. He is a pro and knows!

Also loftus seems to have a fair bit of experience with Aperture and I read a lot about it - the interface is really cool but Aperture takes a lot of system resources, i.e., latest mac hardware, lots of memory, etc. to run well. Still it is probably the "coolest" WTG. B)

I don't think you could go wrong with either of their suggestions - just stick with it and learn the pluses and minuses of the programs.

BUT after much deliberation I recently went with Adobe Lightroom. There are features I really like and am used to that the Lightroom interface has (like chromatic aberration correction) and if you quickly join NAPP (National Assoc of Photoshop Professionals) before Friday, you can get a code and use it before the end of Friday to get Lightroom 1.1 at $199.00 (instead of $299.00). Now it costs $99 to join NAPP but you get lots of perks and discounts. Better than just paying $299 for Lightroom.

I also suspect that Lightroom will allow 3rd party plugins like Noise Ninja, etc in the Lightroom interface in future updates. This would be great as noise reduction is best done at the beginning of RAW processing and the usual supplied RAW noise processors are very lame. Anyway I suspect the "plug-in" future of Lightroom might be an actual asset.

I'm a "mac" person and it was hard for me not to go with Aperture, but I think I'll be happy w/my decision for the future.

But of course fdog (James) will always run rings around me with his Photo Mechanic - but then I'll never be just like him will I?

Best, Carol

PS oh I didn't answer your ? on iPhoto. I've used it (but not the new iLife '08 version) and it is fine for hobbyists but awful for lots of large raw files etc. I always get strange color shifts when I use iPhoto even when I told the program to use my embedded color profiles and just "point to" the files, not import them. Very strange.

I've tried aperture, photomechanic, and extensis portfolio, as well as iphoto and just plain folders.

They all have a long learning curve. You need to give the free trials a fair chance, read the manual, spend a lot of time in each program with a small project and get a feel for them.

That said, photomechanic just wasn't the tool for me. Nothing against it, it just doesn't work the way I want to. Aperture does, I love it.

That's a lot of good input, thanks!

I tried to find out as much as possible about Aperture vs Lightroom which seemed like the two obvious choices, but it all seems to boil down to preference in the end.

O'Reilly had an interesting "test" of the two applications that very much supports the preference thing. One person, used to Aperture, prefers that based on his needs and experience, the other prefers Lightroom...

Thing for me is the computer processing power will be a limiting issue. I'm on a MacBook (not Pro) with 1 gig RAM. Have a feeling that Lightroom will run faster based on what I've read.

Photo Mechanic seems very interesting, however I can't figure out if it has image editing (as I've learned it is called...) or not. Since I don't want to shell out $650 for CS (currently using my wife's computer - even slower) I would very much like to be able to everything in one application.

iPhoto is more or less an outsider. It does seem very restrictive and not at all good for either organising or editing. Not a single comment about Canon's Photo Professional application. Guess that means it's out of the question then...

Going to download trials of all three applications and play around with them, another very good advice.

Thing for me is the computer processing power will be a limiting issue. I'm on a MacBook (not Pro) with 1 gig RAM. Have a feeling that Lightroom will run faster based on what I've read.

Yes I've read the comparison you referred to ktwse, it really comes down to what you want to do, how you want to work and what features you want.

I think you need to add some more RAM. You can correct? You will need at least 2GB for both Aperture and Lightroom for them to run well - I don't know how much RAM you need for Photo Mechanic? I have 4 GB in my new MacBook Pro.

Best, Carol

PS I think you are right that Lightroom will run a bit faster vs Aperture. But if you get 2GB it might be more even, I'm not sure? Depends on processor, free disk space too, etc.

PhotoMechanic is quite likely the fastest at loading (ingesting) RAW files but is probably not as good an editing tool as Aperture or Lightroom.Aperture really shines in it's use of stacks for sorting etc I think. I love the way Aperure keeps all my different versions of an image neatly in a stack. Editing is pretty good in both Lightroom and Aperture, both allow easy editing back and forth in CS as well. Lightroom looks and feels more like what you are used to in CS in editing mode.

My apologies ktwse, I missed the part where you were looking for an all-in-one software solution.

Photo Mechanic wouldn't be what you're looking for, there are practically zero tools for image manipulation. It's purely for:

>pouring the images off the card and renaming them

>sorting them into assignments

>sorting out ("editing") the image to be published

>storing in the appropriate locations by assignment, shooter, etc and IPTC tagging

Rarely, maybe once in 5 assignments will I crop using Photo Mechanic, that's when a miracle happens and it comes out of the camera just right, and it's spot news. Otherwise everything is done in PS.

I can't imagine life with Lightroom or Aperture, I would be sitting in front of the computer for 4 times as long sorting, storing, stamping and captioning. But that's just me, and my needs are assuredly not the mainstream on this forum!

BTW, there's a good impartial review on Luminous Landscape on Photo Mechanic.

All the best, James

I can't imagine life with Lightroom or Aperture, I would be sitting in front of the computer for 4 times as long sorting, storing, stamping and captioning. But that's just me, and my needs are assuredly not the mainstream on this forum!

 

BTW, there's a good impartial review on Luminous Landscape on Photo Mechanic.

Thanks! Another good read, and helps clear up my mind about Photo Mechanic vs the others.

I think the difference is that you (and other pros) manage a lot of images... I imagine I might be work with fairly small batches a couple of times a week given that it's only a hobby (so far...). That's also the reason why I would like to streamline everything into one application. For me it would be much easier to just learn one application well and be able to do it all with that.

Carol, 2 gig is definitely possible, will pick up on that advice.

Lightroom vs Aperture then... Yes, Lightroom will probably feel more like what I'm used to. However, gotta say that what I've seen of Aperture I like a lot. Trials will have to be downloaded and used extensively before final verdict can be passed.

Cheers,

Thomas

One more vote for PhotoMechanic for organizing. For editing I use Photoshop CS3; I tried aperture but could never find the tools I am used to in Photoshop. Now, the CS package comes with Bridge as an organizer. I found it too slow and processor intensive, so I am sticking with PhotoMechanic for now...

Luiz

One more vote for PhotoMechanic for organizing. For editing I use Photoshop CS3; I tried aperture but could never find the tools I am used to in Photoshop. Now, the CS package comes with Bridge as an organizer. I found it too slow and processor intensive, so I am sticking with PhotoMechanic for now...

 

Luiz

I agree Luiz that Bridge CS3 is too slow, they made that all things to all Photoshop Creative Suite applications and I think it is just trying to do too much.

You and James are probably right to go with Photo Mechanic. I'm used to a folder based orgainizing/not-so-organizing system and I may regret going with Lightroom - but then I suspect I might not regret it. From what I understand the RAW converter is supposed to be better in Lightroom than in CS3 (that's what Scott Kelby says but then he does have a vested interest in developing Lightroom.....!). We will see. I'll let you know when I learn it. The importing/deleting and keywording/renaming function can all be done all in one quick screen upon import and the importing is pretty fast so it will remain to be seen how fast the workflow really is.

Best, Carol

Thought I'd update this to say I have downloaded and played around with the Aperture trial for a couple of weeks. Very happy with the performance on my Macbook, even though it's only got one gig RAM. The software is quite intuitive and seems to handle all of my needs very well. Granted, I don't shuffle around extreme amounts of image files and I only really use basic image editing, but for that Aperture certainly delivers and in an interface that feels intuitive and fun to work with.

I'm glad it works for you. I think as you get to use it more, you will really become sold on some of it's features, like stacks etc.