Aperture to What?

I know this is an old post but after all this time and with Lightroom CC I still use Aperture. Photoshop CC is my external editor and I shoot up to 4 events a week including private and commercial shoots. I've got over 8 Tb of photos that grows every week and all of them in Aperture. I've got lots of great plug-ins for both Aperture and Photoshop which makes my work really pop. Every time I put a job in LR CC I marvel at how less ergonomic it is than Aperture. I have had every copy of LR since it first came out just in case it jumps ahead of Apple but so far, no cigar! There is some very cool functionality in LR but I can get the same results with Aperture and PS CC.

I keep close track of how Aperture functions in Apple's OS and it works great with High Sierra.

The problem with that is it's a dead end street. Sooner or later Aperture will stop working. Something in the OS will change and that will be that. Already, Aperture no longer supports the Raw from newer cameras.

If you select an alternative now you can migrate now while Aperture still works, which will make things easier, although a PITA.

Wait until it stops working and then what? It's gone from PITA to crisis.

There is no alternative to Aperture, from my perspective. I only use it for keeping all photos together. I do not like to have them in folders.

For all key adjustments I used an external editor (Affinity Photo), a sort of PS. For anything "dramatic" I use the Nik Collection add-ins, still from inside Aperture. Aperture is much better than Photos for basic adjustments.

When Aperture will stop working on a new OS, then I will need to export ALL my photos (>100,000) into folders which, for sure, will drive me crazy 🙂

Apple, please maintain Aperture.

Apple, please maintain Aperture

They won't. It will get no more updates. So, like I said, it's a dead end street.

So now you have your choice: migrate to something different now, while it's only a pain in the rear, or, wait until it stops working (and you are unable to export your 100,000 photos). Then what? Think of all the added metadata and organisation you are going to lose.

You've been warned, and now you've had almost three years to do it.

It is not the end of the world. I can always import the libraries into Photos and then export all the photos from there. Or I can just do the export before upgrading to a new OS.

I still prefer Aperture to anything else on the market.

But yes, you have a valid point: I need a robust back-up plan.

Here is my solution. I apologize in advance for being long winded.

After looking and trialing some of the alternatives (C1, LR, After Effects) to Aperture I've come to the following conclusion. There are no DAMs as good as Aperture. Lightroom may be good replacement but I will not buy into any subscription model that makes my work inaccessible the day I stop the subscription. Just to be clear, I have no relationship to ON1 other than as a customer.

My Aperture replacement of choice is ON1 Photo RAW 2018. I've been using ON1 products for a few years to do selective enhancements to a few images. The down side here is ON1 Photo RAW is a new product, just over a year old and is missing features found in more mature products. It has bugs and some rough edges. It does not have an automated conversion tool. It is not a DAM but a Browser with some DAM features. Organization is done using the host OS file system. Adjustments are stored in a side car file in the same folder as the image. Metadata goes into another side car file. Optionally you can enable a cataloging function that also stores the adjustments, metadata and previews. I like this redundancy. Loose your catalog and the side car files have your adjustments and metadata. Lose your image and the side car files, restore the image and the catalog will be used to automatically recreate them. The catalog is also used for faster preview display and searching. It also allows cross folder search smart albums across multiple folders.

Currently compared to Aperture ON1 RAW has only basic keyword and search features. It does not currently have a Stack feature. However, using the Browser to move items in the file system automatically handles the side car files. ON1 works on a Mac or Win system.

Since its introduction in late 2017 major progress has been made. After multiple releases in the past year it is close to what I need with fewer bugs and better stability. This program has a lot of potential and I am confidant it will continue to get better. Future features are user driven. It already has features Aperture lacks such as Pano, HDR, and Lens Correction. It is fast! Drag a slider and the results are reflected on screen immediately. It has all the adjustment capability that most people could ask for. It has presets that allow for rapid experimentation, and saving your favorite looks. It has great masking features, syncing, and one of the best resize functions in the industry.

I do not have as big a library as some but migrating 30,000 plus images is a non trivial task. Right now my migration is being held up by a metadata bug that affects only the migration. This is giving me time to get my Aperture Library in order. That means deleting unacceptable images (out of focus, duplicates, just don't like them), review star ratings, and keyword clean up, by eliminating synonyms, words I'll never search for, etc. Additionally I'm making sure all my Projects are well named, organized in Year folders and using Relocate to get the Finder folder names in sync with the projects. The clean up is one Project at a time. When everything is ready and tested I will go Project by Project telling Aperture to Write Metadata to the Orignal. I will also Export full sized Tiff files with the Aperture changes baked in. Last I will open those files in ON1, beginning with my highly rated and adjust them.

Until ON1 improves its metadata features use Aperture to input metadata (location info, keywords and copyright) because it is so much more robust. I'll Write Metadata to Original and do the rest in ON1.

Here is one excellent write up with some tools to help the conversion from Aperture to Lightroom. I read this one and others and changed as needed. It will cost you an email address. It looks like you are buying it but the price is zero. The store is just the delivery vehicle.

https://www.scottdavenportphoto.com/products/migrating-from-aperture-to-lightroo m

Couple of things:

1. That's not long-winded, that's a pretty good write up.

2. To be fair:

Lightroom may be good replacement but I will not buy into any subscription model that makes my work inaccessible the day I stop the subscription

That does not happen. You lose the use of the Develop module (so no new work), map module and the mobile app. You can still manage and export existing work. LR has issues but that's not the main one.

3. Using ON1 I find it very slow when switching between modules. The browser is good, though.

4. FWIW I'm using DXO PhotoLab1 now. The raw processor is very good, the management is almost zero but I can use it in conjunction with ON1 and Mylio. One of these days I'll pic between the two - or wait and see what Luminar offers when it arrives.

Thanks for correcting me on point 2. I'm not sure where I read that information, but may have misinterpreted what was said, or perhaps my source was wrong.

Regarding Point 3. Some people are reporting that issue. I have not experienced it.

Regarding Point 4. I glad you found a solution that works for you.

I will also clarify that with ON1 RAW if you do not renew your subscription or do not to occasionally upgrade you still get to keep a fully operational version as it was at that point. Of course if you don't upgrade or renew you will eventually find yourself in the same place we are with Aperture and it will not work due to OS upgrades or failing hardware.

Lightroom may be good replacement but I will not buy into any subscription model that makes my work inaccessible the day I stop the subscription.

Lightroom can still be purchased as a stand-alone application.

https://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Photoshop-Lightroom-Mac-Download/dp/B00W5W7TIW/ref= sr_1_1_twi_sof_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1515692195&sr=8-1&keywords=adobe+lightroom+6+softwa re

True, but for how long. Will the stand alone LR updated further? Maybe, maybe not. I do expect if you want the latest features of future LR releases you will eventually need to go subscription or find yourself in the same place Aperture users are right now. On the other hand I could be totality wrong. As I'm currently doing a migration from Aperture and realizing how much work is involved, it makes me not want to do it again too soon. Of course any company could go choose not to support a product, or they could fail. Large established companies like Adobe and Apple are not likely to fail although both were a bit on the edge in the past. A smaller established company company with only a small number of products makes the dropping support less likely, and while failure is a larger possibility the product could be sold or go open source. I also think smaller companies can be more nimble in the market and will listen and respond to their customers needs better.

I'm merely explaining my thought process and certainly not faulting anyone for their choice. I would always recommend you buy the product that makes the most sense to you and then buy the platform that runs it best.

I don't know it like Peter Griffin would say: "It grinds my gears!" Because I have tried other software and they all suck, the only one that works for me now of course is photoshop and lightroom but I hate their monthly system and I cannot install aperture in a brand new mbp that I got because it doesn't have a bloody cd reader…

I cannot install aperture in a brand new mbp that I got because it doesn't have a bloody cd reader…

Do you still have the previous Mac with the CD reader? Then use Disk Utility on that Mac to burn disk images of all your installer CDs.

That is what I did with all my old installer CDs.

You can also share the optical drive from an older Mac on your network.

Or get yourself an external optical drive. I bought one for the MacBook Retina and the new iMac.

If your older Mac is running Aperture 3., you can simply copy the Aperture application to your new Mac. Or download Aperture 3.6 from the Purchases tab of the App Store to the new mac. Only Aperture 3.6 will run on a new Mac with El Capitan. It cannot be installed from CD anyway. It is APpSTore only.

I went the Adobe route and believe it or not. didn't worry about the subscription. That's about $120 per year for apps that cost much more together, and which I would be updating more or less yearly anyway. I know lots of folks have some sort of ethical issues with it but to me it's just good value. As for a subscription lapsing... just be sure you export your images first... - and of course, your originals are always available anyway.

On the upside, the LR importer did a pretty good job of bringing over my Aperture Library, but yes there were tidy ups to do. Given that Aperture - which I loved - had seen no significant development in the last 3 or 4 years, it's no surprise that LR is more powerful and has quite a few more bells and whistles. On the downside: the interface, of dear lord the interface. Intrusive, crowded, ugly and not very intuitive. Basics like searching... But you learn it eventually.

One nice thing about all the alternatives is that you can try them.

Lightroom and Photoshop have a 30 day trial period. While the Aperture importer can work well for some, it does have issues. In part because Lr and Aperture just do some things differently. It can help if you have a referenced Aperture library rather than a managed one. And if you have exported the images you adjusted in Aperture; Lr cannot read the adjustments like contrast, WB, etc. Another good option IMHO is Aperture Exporter, which helps you export into a setup for Lr that may be more to your liking, and gives control over exporting full versions of adjusted images.

Other candidates are Capture One, Photos Supreme, Dark Table, Aftershot Pro, Mylio, Emulsion, Lyn, etc etc. Some more like browsers; some more like Aperture.

If your older Mac is running Aperture 3., you can simply copy the Aperture application to your new Mac. Or download Aperture 3.6 from the Purchases tab of the App Store to the new mac. Only Aperture 3.6 will run on a new Mac with El Capitan. It cannot be installed from CD anyway. It is APpSTore only.

Hi Léonie! Well this is what I get when I tried that:

And when I tried with the image disk I got this:

Which basically says that if I run the installation it might do something to the hard drive and even corrupt something, and here's the funny thing when I went to my app store account to download the installation drive I could't because is no longer in it, I called support and some nice chap told me that he knew exactly what had to be done, but he couldn't help me because I am brown… LOL! No, but he couldn't help me because I live in Mexico. But thanx anyway brother!