Apple Aperture 2 Review

User_Removed

3

19 Apr 2009 - 11:41 AM

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Not entirely sure why LR is considered 'easier to use' as I found it to be the opposite. I don't think the review covers many of the features in Aperture which I find to be very useful. The stack, auto stack and compare modes are great time savers. The Digital Asset Management is pretty powerful and betters alternatives like Adobe Bridge. The Vault back up feature is a nice way of backing up your image libraries without having to leave the program. The interface is very easy to use and adjustments are rarely more than one or two clicks away. I find the shadows and highlights adjustment tool is better in Aperture than in both LR and even Photoshop! However, I do find I do round trip image sharpening in Photoshop as well as any selective adjustments needed.

The area of Aperture which does need improving is the way plugins are managed and handled which will create a copy of your master image and not provide a non-destructive mode of making alterations. This means that once you save after editing with a plugin you cannot undo without recreating the copy and starting from scratch. This isn't the case with Apertures own adjustments which are all non-destructive. I would also like to see some better controls for zooming in and out or allowing edits while leaving the loupe in place. And of course selective adjustments would be most welcomed as presently I do those through my NIK plugins or round-tripping to Photoshop.

All in all Aperture is a very capable image processor - especially in studios where you may want to use the tethered shooting mode. My personal review score would be 8.5/10