Apple Releases Aperture 3
CUPERTINO, California—February 9, 2010—Apple® today introduced Aperture™ 3, the next major release of its powerful photo editing and management software, with over 200 new features including Faces, Places and Brushes. Building on the innovative Faces and Places features introduced in iPhoto® ’09, Aperture 3 makes it even easier and faster to organize large photo libraries. Aperture 3 introduces new tools to refine your photos including Brushes for painting image adjustments onto parts of your photo, and Adjustment Presets for applying professional photo effects with just one click. Stunning new slideshows let you share your work by weaving together photos, audio, text and HD video.
“Millions of people love using iPhoto to organize, edit and share their digital photos,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. “Aperture 3 is designed for both professionals who edit and manage massive libraries of photos and iPhoto users who want to take their photos further with easy-to-use tools such as Brushes and Adjustment Presets.”
“Aperture 3 gets it right,” said National Geographic photographer, Jim Richardson. “The image editing tools are exactly what I have been asking for, they’re so easy to use and give me a level of control that I never even thought possible.
“I chose Aperture because it was the most powerful archiving application around, but it’s now an unbelievable imaging tool as well,” said Bill Frakes, Sports Illustrated staff photographer. “I am beyond impressed with the massive changes made in Aperture 3.”
Aperture 3 allows you to organize large photo libraries with even more flexibility using Projects and the new Faces and Places. Faces uses face detection and recognition to find and organize your photos by the people in them. You can view faces across your entire photo library or view just the faces that appear in selected projects. In a new view that speeds up the organization process, Aperture 3 displays faces that have been detected but haven’t yet been named. Places lets you explore your photos based on where they were taken, and like in iPhoto, Places automatically reverse geocodes GPS data into user-friendly locations. In Aperture 3, you can assign locations by dragging-and-dropping photos onto a map or by using location information from GPS enabled cameras, tracking devices or your iPhone® photos.
The new Brushes feature allows you to add professional touches to your photos by simply painting effects onto the image. Aperture 3 includes 15 Quick Brushes that perform the most popular tasks like Dodge, Burn, Polarize and Blur, without the complexity of layers or masks. Brushes can automatically detect edges in your images to let you apply or remove effects exactly where you want them. Aperture 3 includes dozens of Adjustment Presets that apply a specific style or look to the entire image with just a click. You can create your own custom presets or explore the techniques of other photographers by importing theirs.
Aperture 3 makes it easy to share your work with stunning slideshows that weave together photos, audio, text and HD video. You can select one of six Apple designed themes or choose your own transitions, background, borders and titles, and even add your own soundtrack. You can export your slideshows directly to iTunes® to take with you on your iPhone or iPod touch®. You can also share photographs as beautiful prints, create custom-designed hardcover books and publish to online photo sharing sites like Facebook and Flickr, right from Aperture 3.
Pricing & Availability
Aperture 3 is available through the Apple Store® (www.apple.com), Apple’s retail stores and Apple Authorized Resellers for a suggested retail price of $199 (US) and existing Aperture users can upgrade for a suggested retail price of $99 (US). A downloadable 30-day trial version is available at www.apple.com/aperture/trial. Aperture 3 runs as a 64-bit application on Mac OS® X Snow Leopard® on Macs with Intel Core 2 Duo processors. Full system requirements, online tutorials and more information on Aperture 3 can be found at www.apple.com/aperture.
cr
February 9th, 2010 at 11:20 am
Way to go Apple!
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February 9th, 2010 at 11:21 am
I wish I owned an Apple, they’re so much better than PCs…
(Blue touch paper lit…STAND BACK!)
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Canon Rumors Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 11:27 am
I was about to buy a 27″ i7 iMac… then the screen issues. I will wait until Gizmodo is happy. :)
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john Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 5:00 pm
Is Gizmodo ever happy?
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matthewbmedia Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 5:04 pm
What John said.
Unofficial surveys show a 10-20% rate of screen issues. It’s worth the risk IMHO
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February 9th, 2010 at 11:30 am
I have the 27 nothing is wrong with it.
Get it.
Aperture is amazing.
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Canon Rumors Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 11:33 am
http://gizmodo.com/tag/imac/
=D
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February 9th, 2010 at 11:34 am
Its ABOUT ****** TIME! Wow, this has been #1 on my wishlist this year… #2 is the 24-70 IS…commmme onnn canon!
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February 9th, 2010 at 11:36 am
Have you seen the spec form this software ? The EOS 1Ds Mark IV is listed in the raw compatibility list http://www.apple.com/fr/aperture/specs/raw.html?aosid=p204&siteid=403761&program_id=2701&cid=OAS-EMEA-AFF&tduid=7fd7eade7931d26a97e556b29b83a412
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GoHike Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 1:00 pm
I don’t see it :(
They must have updated the list.
Canon
EOS 1D – EOS 1D Mark II – EOS 1D Mark IIN – EOS 1D Mark III – EOS 1D Mark IV* – EOS 1Ds – EOS 1Ds Mark II – EOS 1Ds Mark III* – EOS 5D – EOS 5D Mark II* – EOS 7D – EOS 10D – EOS 20D – EOS 30D – EOS 40D – EOS 50D* – EOS 500D* – EOS D30 – EOS D60 – EOS Digital Rebel XS/Kiss Digital F2/1000D* – EOS Digital Rebel/Kiss Digital/300D – EOS Digital Rebel XT/Kiss Digital N/350D – EOS Digital Rebel XTi/Kiss Digital X/400D – EOS Digital Rebel XSi/Kiss Digital X2/450D – EOS Kiss Digital X3* – EOS Rebel T1i* – PowerShot G5 – PowerShot G6 – PowerShot G9* – PowerShot G10* – PowerShot G11* – PowerShot Pro 1 – PowerShot S60 – PowerShot S70 – PowerShot S90** – sRAW – mRAW
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GoHike Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 1:02 pm
Yet the US English Pages does still have it :)
Canon
EOS 1D – EOS 1D Mark II – EOS 1D Mark IIN – EOS 1D Mark III – EOS 1Ds – EOS 1Ds Mark II – EOS 1Ds Mark III* – EOS 1Ds Mark IV* – EOS 5D – EOS 5D Mark II*
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GoHike Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 1:03 pm
Here is the link:
http://www.apple.com/aperture/specs/raw.html
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Son of Daguerre Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 5:19 pm
Mistake. In that version there’s no EOS-1D Mark IV.
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February 9th, 2010 at 11:47 am
Very interesting. I look forward to seeing what Adobe come up with in their next release of Lightroom.
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GoHike Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 1:04 pm
LR3 has been in Public Beta for months… You can download and play with it now… for FREE.
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Robert Green Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 4:54 pm
I know, but Adobe have stated its not feature complete so I wonder what they will add, especially regarding video and slideshows.
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February 9th, 2010 at 11:52 am
what about the canon announcement today???
who cares abuot gay apple?
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chedd Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 12:06 pm
there’s no announcement today… i thought we were done here? is there?
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FFS Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 12:06 pm
You really are a ray of sunshine aren’t you?
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traveller Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 12:58 pm
+1 -this guy never has anything good to say!
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Son of Daguerre Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 5:23 pm
You guys (FFS, traveller) get the chloroform. I’ll get the Uzi.
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February 9th, 2010 at 11:54 am
It looks like sRAW and mRAW are now supported!
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ppdix Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 11:57 am
who would actually use sRaw or mRaw anyway? If u shoot Raw is because you want the very best quality, why use a half ass Raw?
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eh Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 12:07 pm
Alternative to JPG I guess..
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afrank99 Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 12:14 pm
Fewer Megapixels means lower noise :-)
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GoHike Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 12:53 pm
You would think; but it does not currently work that way…
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flybynight Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 12:20 pm
For some images, you don’t need all of that rez, but you still want the flexibility of RAW. I am very glad that sRAW if finally supported!
Think about it – on a 5D mkii sRAW1 is still 10mpx. It’s very close to the resolution of images from the 40D. If you know that you are going to need the huge files, this can really speed up your transfers, processing, etc.
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matthewbmedia Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 5:05 pm
If you have a 5d2, an sRaw file is still 11Megapixels. This is plenty good for many many things.
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February 9th, 2010 at 11:55 am
About f(*&^&K time!
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February 9th, 2010 at 12:00 pm
I paid $499 for Aperture 1 in 2005…
Then $199 in 2008 for 2.0
I can’t believe they ripped us off over $300 for 3 years.
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Xto Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 12:05 pm
Then buy the upgrade instead of the whole software.
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matthewbmedia Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 5:06 pm
LOL so true. funniest thing I’ve ever read.
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Bob Reply:
February 10th, 2010 at 6:42 am
What’s your point? That they should put the price back up to $499 so that you don’t feel ripped off any more? You paid $499 because you figured it was worth it at the time. Has it suddenly become not worth it back then? Can I come around to your place and play with your time machine?
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February 9th, 2010 at 12:05 pm
Aperture 2 application weights 315MB
Aperture 3 weights 717MB!
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Jeffrey Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 12:11 pm
And a bunch of RAW photos is easily larger than that.
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afrank99 Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 12:15 pm
Nobody cares. Really.
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matthewbmedia Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 5:07 pm
Version 3 has some of the tutorial videos embedded. If you really care, use monolingual to strip unused languages out…
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February 9th, 2010 at 1:32 pm
What a shame Aperture 3 doesn’t have layers and masks; I was hoping to get off the Adobe upgrade train.
It also looks like linear DNG isn’t supported… so much for a workflow using DxO for optical corrections and Aperture for everything else.
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matthewbmedia Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 5:10 pm
IT DOES HAVE LAYERS AND MASKS!!!
Sorry for the capitalization… But this is my favorite new feature after trying it out. And the way it is implemented is so much better than the way we’ve done it in PS for so long.
You make an adjustment with a brick, and then you click on the gear for the brick and choose to “brush the adjustment on”, up comes the adjustment brush with options for painting and you mask away.
The killer feature is the ability to use Detect edges while doing this to knock a foreground out of a background easily, and then use the feather brush to soften your mask.
You can do this on most of the stock adjustments in the sidebar – (watch the video on the apple site under “highlights and shadows” to see how it works).
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El Aura Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 6:12 pm
Linear DNG is the same as a tiff (resulting from a very neutral raw conversion). A linear DNG has nothing that could not be save in a tiff as well.
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February 9th, 2010 at 2:14 pm
I’ve been very disappointed at the noise levels in my Canon 7D files when RAW processed in LR2.6. I’ve just spent the morning playing with the Aperture 3 trial. This software is a game changer vs. Lightroom.
The noise levels at 6400 and 12800 are all of a sudden COMPLETELY ACCEPTABLE.
I tested with many different shots — low ISO and high ISO — Aperture 3 is delivering a TWO stop improvement over Lightroom 2.6.
ISO 12800 files in Aperture are looking very much like ISO 3200 files in Lightroom.
It’s like I have a new camera.
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Really? Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 4:04 pm
How much detail is being smeared?
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Evert Reply:
February 10th, 2010 at 3:18 am
Interesting! I bet LR3 will see big improvements in this field as well, so can’t wait to see the shootout when the final version of LR 3 is released.
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February 9th, 2010 at 4:18 pm
The detail is as good (I think better) with A3 than with DPP. Bonus — you can ditch the dreadful DPP workflow and interface.
Chroma noise is TOTALLY gone, any noise that is left looks much more film like than with LR2.6 or DPP.
I just imported all my 2009 and 2010 files into A3 and will report back.
Minor glitch: A3 doesn’t like 7D files that were created in the MRAW format and then converted to DNG. Full res (18 MP) files are fine, but the smaller RAW formats is giving it heartburn.
Also, it’s not able to convert to DNG while importing files, which is a nice feature of LR. I usually save 15% in file size with the DNG format. I’ll trade marginally bigger files for higher quality in a minute.
I literally thought something was wrong with my 7D before trying A3 this morning.
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Gamble Reply:
February 11th, 2010 at 9:11 am
Robert – have you compared it to Capture One? There’s a free trial. I still find Capture One blows away even Aperture 3 at noise control with 7D RAWs… but perhaps I’m not doing the right tests.
I’d love to see some comparison shots if you have any.
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February 9th, 2010 at 8:18 pm
no search across libraries! since Mac OS is very good at handling larger images (even raw files) what’s the point of having another file system within the app? The photos in the Aperture Lib can’t be searched by their own Spotlight.
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February 9th, 2010 at 9:01 pm
Apple’s subliminally endorsing Nikon…
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February 9th, 2010 at 9:13 pm
This is even better than getting my 1D Mk IV.
That is saying a lot!! Absolutely love Aperture!
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February 9th, 2010 at 11:53 pm
It’s too soft at larger apertures and surely Apple squeezed in too many pixels for its own good.
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Robert T Reply:
February 10th, 2010 at 8:03 am
Huh?
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ace Reply:
February 14th, 2010 at 2:22 am
It’s a DSLR joke. Har har.
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February 10th, 2010 at 12:05 am
just down loaded aperture 3, wow.
6 hours to update my aperture2 photos ( migrate from aperture2 to aperture3 ).
$99 not bad for upgrade.
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February 10th, 2010 at 6:31 pm
I was wondering when Aperture was going to get updated.
Now, if they would upgrade the CPUs to i7’s, I will be able to upgrade my 6 year old laptop. I can’t wait.
I need to be able to process all of these pictures that I have taken with the 5DM2 so far. And I hope that their newer laptops will be able to keep up with me.
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matthewbmedia Reply:
February 12th, 2010 at 1:12 pm
My 1 yr old macbook pro 2.4 with 4gb of ram is Flying with aperture 3, snow leopard booting into 64 bit, and my 5d2 files.
I’m sure the “newer laptops” will be fine ;-)
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February 11th, 2010 at 1:31 pm
awesome, I was wondering when Aperture was going to get updated, because the crop and many other tools were not that good.
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February 14th, 2010 at 11:38 am
Not very happy with the performance at all…
After waiting 6 hours to upgrade the library from V2.0, Aperture 3 was painfully slow. So slow I had to force quit the application. After that, it wouldn’t open any more.
I had a back up of the 2.0 library but it had to be upgraded to work with v3.0. Once it is upgraded it cannot be used with 2.0 any longer.
Finally, it upgraded but I read in a few places that the previews needed to be re-generated to speed things up.
My library is 450GB and has 78,625 photos in it. I left my studio at 9PM last night and the preview regeneration started. I came back today, after 13 hours and only 56,000 of the previews have been done…
It pisses me off that I haven’t been able to work for 2 days waiting for updates and upgrades and all this crap about 64-bit processing doesn’t seem real.
I have an 8-core 2.66Ghz Mac Pro with 16GB of RAM, an NVidia GTX 285 1GB Video Card hooked up to a Vizio 32″ 120HZ LCD and over 9TB of HD space running Mac OS X 10.6.2. This thing should be screaming fast.
:^(
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Jared Reply:
February 14th, 2010 at 1:22 pm
I’m also already having problems with Aperture 3. Surprise, Surprise. I have several partially converted libraries on external hard drives which keep making Aperture become nonresponsive. I found part of the problem when I ran disk utility. I had a couple of disk permissions that were not correct, which the computer was able to correct. I also made the cardinal sin of not rebooting and unplugging the computer after installing a major program. So now, I have multiple partially corrupted Aperture libraries. I also now have three copies of the same library at varies stages of conversion.
Take a look at the progress on your update, my guess is it won’t change if you watch it for a while. It’s probably toast like mine :-(
Were to go from here? Luckily I don’t trust Aperture further than I can throw the computer it is installed in. I store all my raw files in an non-aperture format. So worse comes to worse, I can start over. I’ll probably try to restart the programs and see if they will finish up. I doubt it. I may have to purchase MacScan to fish out the corrupted pictures, if they have upgraded it to run on Snow Leopard. MacScan found several corrupted pictures in an old vault that I crashed and burned.
Good luck.
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ppdix Reply:
February 14th, 2010 at 2:56 pm
Since I wrote my previous comment at 11:38am, over 3 hours have past and only 13,000 previews have been processed. After almost 16 hours, I still have 8,000 to go…
This sucks!
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Si Guy Reply:
February 14th, 2010 at 8:28 pm
i only use aperture to edit, not hold libraries of all the pics ive taken.. iphoto is a sufficient library system for me.. when it comes to indepth apps like aperture handing large volumes of simple tasks its always gonna be bad news..
hope your back on track soon.
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February 15th, 2010 at 9:12 am
DPP is still a superior RAW developer. I develop all my final images in DPP.
Anything else aint as good. Pitty DPP has a rubbish p.o.s. interface.
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