Just to let you guys know I’ve solved the RAW Fine Tuning bug I was having.

After hearing about several users who didn’t have this problem on their machine, I decided to create a new OS X user and run Aperture from there: lo and behold, the problem was gone!

So it had to be something in my specific user folder. I took everything out of User/Library/Application Support/Aperture and started adding files back one by one. The culprit? A plist file called Raw Decode Presets.plist. What’s odd is that this plist contains specific information on every camera I’ve used since Aperture 1.5 but does not contain my RAW presets. It’s also not part of the new user’s folder so it’s either something that’s no longer used in AP3 or it’s created when importing with a camera for the first time.

Anyway, trashing this has solved the problem with zero ill effects; I even still have all my presets.

I think this version of Aperture might have a few issues with legacy files. It would certainly explain a lot of the seemingly random problems we’ve been seeing.

But after two pretty swift updates, things were starting to settle. I still had crashes here and there but they were becoming less and less frequent. I was slowly beginning to see light at the end of the Aperture 3 tunnel/mess.

Until yesterday.
Now, I just don’t know what to say anymore.

The latest chapter in the saga? With the 10.6.3 update Raw Fine Tuning no longer saves my changes between restarts. Sometimes. On some pictures. We’re talking same camera, same memory card, same lens (!!!!). Here’s a video of the  bug in action:

This is pretty huge. Especially when combined with another post-update incident where certain files from yesterday morning’s import session lost ALL adjustments I had made – brushes, crop, curves, everything. And they hadn’t just reverted back to their RAW state: the contrast slider had been set at -0.1, making the pictures completely washed out.

I have no words. I’m now scared and having serious trust issues with Aperture. And don’t get me started on print presets… I’m just too tired to get into that right now.

Anyone else seeing this bug? Or am I one of the lucky random few?

UPDATE: Another video trying to make sense of it all:

1. Current 32 bit plugins don’t run in 64 bit: this was to be expected but it’s a pain. Aperture needs to be opened in 32 bit mode to use the current crop of plugins. So if you use any sort of plugin on a day to day basis this means no 64 bit for you (me). It probably also means we’re going to need to buy new versions of every plugin we own.
2. Faces: I was never excited about this feature and I’m still not convinced. First, it needs to scan the entire library. This,  my friends, takes a looong time on a large library. After three hours it had gone through 4000 pics (from 65000) and had made some pretty odd choices. It also crashed my iMac to the point where my main library would no longer open and had to be rebuilt. Some 30 sweat-filled minutes later, I decided to disable it altogether. Not sure it’ll come back on.
3. Flickr: this is the exact same export module you get in iPhoto 09. I was hoping to at least be able to choose from my own custom export presets (size, watermark) but  can’t. This may be fine for a consumer product but I’d expect more from a pro app. And yes, I know Flickr isn’t geared towards pros. But these days social sites are a big part of marketing  - like it or not.
4. Web Pages: no change from version 2. Same templates and layouts. Not too hot.
5. Export: no sharpening on export. I was really hoping for this one.
6. Help: the user manual is no longer a pdf but a Help Viewer (html) doc. And for some reason it’s incredibly slow. Not only am I not a fan of the help viewer, but this means I can’t put the manual on my iPod for some night reading (tried: doesn’t work).
7. Skin Retouching: most brushes and bricks are smooth as silk but this one runs like molasses. It also tends to make the skin look like chalk. Maybe I haven’t found the right settings yet but the slow speed makes it hard to experiment with.
8. On the bug front: the Blank setting on my second display doesn’t stick. It keeps reverting back to Alternate even though the menu still says Blank. Annoying.

As I said, Aperture 3 is still a stellar upgrade and an absolute no brainer. There are tons of enhancements that are truly worth the price of entry. But as expected a 3.0.1 version will be needed.

It’s been a verrrrry long time coming. But having spent the past hour playing around with the new version of Aperture, all I can say is: thank you. My stubbornness feels completely repaid.

This upgrade adresses everything that was lacking and adds a ton of features, big and small. It’s as though Apple actually read every article, blog and  forum post about Aperture 2, made a checklist of everyone’s wishes and added them one by one. But the amazing thing about this new release is they’ve managed to add all these while keeping the UI just as streamlined and refined as before – in fact it’s cleaner and easier to read.

I’m not going to go through everything so I strongly encourage you to look at the new online tutorials and extensive feature list. But here’s a quick rundown of my favorite new stuff.

destruction be gone

Ok, name the key feature every Aperture user has been asking for since Lightroom 2′s release?  Yup: non-destructive local editing.

Well, every single adjustment brick in Aperture 3 now offers non-destructive local editing via the new Brush tool. You can paint an adjustment in or out using the same tools as the previous Dodge and Burn plugin (brush, feather and erase). Once you’ve applied localized editing, a new brush icon appears on the brick – clicking the icon brings the Brush HUD back for further tweaking.

Beyond the main adjustment bricks, you can also access brushes for individual adjustments (Dodge, Blur, Burn, Color etc). These then appear in the Adjustments HUD like any other brick and you can change the amount of effect applied. This is all in real-time, non-destructive and it flies.

The other huge change regarding adjustments? We can now duplicate any brick. Combined with the new brushes feature this means we now have something akin to layers within Aperture itself. This opens up a whole new world of possibilities.

Current plugins still require the creation of a TIFF or PDS file though. I don’t know if third-partys will have access to APIs allowing non-destructive editing – it would be pretty huge, but I’m not holding my breath. Still, I have a feeling my use of plugins or round-trips to Photoshop is about to diminish substantially.

full screen. all the time.

There are a lot of nice UI touches in Aperture 3 that give it even more polish than before. But the one I’m most excited about is the new Full Screen mode. I always loved full screen mode. But in my day to day workflow it was rarely used, mainly because I kept having to go in and out of it all the time – no longer. Apple have made Aperture 3′s full screen mode more productive than ever with new browser and project views, a navigation toolbar and a refined thumbnail view.

It is really, really nice.

real life printing

The print dialog has received a massive overhaul: picture packages, autofill multiple shots according to size, brightness, saturation and contrast adjustments, the list goes on. For instance, I can now skip the book tool and create a contact page template complete with logo, title, subtitle, watermark and my choice of metadata – all within the print dialog. This is going to be a huge timesaver.

it’s the little things

Small details count. Because little things tend to add up. I use a lot of Smart Albums but often find myself having to go back to a picture’s original project. In Aperture 2 I had created a metadata view assigned to Tooltips (T) that included the file’s path so i could at least find out where the picture was located in the database. Every time I used it I wished for a “Reveal in Project” command. Every single time.  So I was ecstatic to find out Aperture 3 now had a command called… yes: Reveal in Project!

This is just one little thing. But man, am I ever happy about it.

labels! flags!

Yes. We can now assign labels and flag photos. No more weird keywords meant solely for organizational purposes appearing on Flickr. There were workarounds (custom metadata views) but this is welcome indeed.

faces, places, movies, fast switching libraries etc…

All These are just the tip of the iceberg. I could write ten pages on the new features and possibilities in Aperture 3. I haven’t talked about Faces and Places, the new book plugins that allow the use of the book tool with third-party suppliers, tons of refined metadata tools, IPTC compliance, fast switching libraries, searchable project description fields, Flickr and Facebook integration, a slideshow editor that’s essentially a built-in iMovie complete with video and audio, refined import panel, and presets…. oh! goodness… PRESETS!

Needless to say this is a milestone release that  - in my humble opinion – leapfrogs Lightroom by several meters at least. I’m pretty sure Adobe are scrambling right now. If they aren’t they’re being complacent.

I for one am glad I didn’t jump the fence. Lightroom? What’s Lightroom?

P.S. My library has just finished upgrading. It took several hours but everything seems in the right place. It’s now performing a face detection operation. I’m going to let it work and see how it goes. Hearing my new iMac’s fan for the first time (!)

For the past year – and more so these past months – the debate has been raging around Aperture and Lightroom, mainly from AP2 users who feel abandoned by Apple. The silence surrounding a new version of the application has been deafening, forcing a lot of users into the arms of Adobe for many reasons that have been discussed to death at this point. If you read this blog you know I’ll be sticking it out unless physically booted out of the Aperture camp.

There are a lot of technical reasons for my decision. I’ve mentioned them in other posts. But one thing that never seems to enter the debate is something less tangible: the fact that software can be an instrument in its own right.

flugelhorn?

I’m not talking about software as a tool mind you, but as an instrument. Like a violin, a piano or a… flugelhorn?
You see, through all my experimentation with various incarnations of Lightroom one thing has always been quite clear: I get very different results than I do with Aperture. Some of it has to do with my varying comfort level between the two apps. And some of it is purely technical, differences between RAW converters and such. But I’ve also come to believe that software – creative software – has a footprint and flow that affect the output. Software has tone.
I’m a musician. My guitar is a Fender Stratocaster. Everything about this instrument impacts what I do with it: the neck, the spacing betweens frets, how the body feels in my hands. All these design choices mould the way I use the guitar. In fact, over the years they’ve moulded the way I play guitar. I’m now convinced Aperture shapes my photography in pretty much the same way.
In the great debate between Lightroom and Aperture we seem to forget that they each have a very specific signature. The philosophical differences in design, the choice of available effects and the way they’re applied all contribute to shaping pictures in a very distinct way. In my mind they’re not instantly interchangeable, as many seem to imply. This, I think, is why I’m having such a hard time contemplating a switch. I’m not so sure I want to change oils for water-colour, Strat for SG.

the homogenous pool

Why do we feel this need for one app to rule them all? If everyone uses a brush, isn’t there a case to be made for using a palette knife? Ok, it’s not as clear cut as that. These applications can obviously be twisted and turned in ways that can make them much closer to each other in the end. Plugins are certainly an equalizer. Same goes for round-tripping to external editors.

But right now I can’t help looking at my choice of Aperture as a plus, something that puts me in a particular mindset that’s philosophically different from a Lightroom user. I see my photography in another context, I use other tools that work in other ways, I interface with my work through another window. Interface as zeitgeist so to speak. I’m not trying to delude myself into being some sort of rebel soldier either – I’m simply contemplating my choice beyond keywords, metadata and organization.

full of what?

I know, maybe I’m full of it. Just rationalizing my decision to stick with Aperture. But perhaps I’m on to something. Perhaps software design has become a much more intricate part of our creative process than we give it credit for. Perhaps it impacts our vision and field of view as well.

And perhaps I can wait a little longer.

Just before Christmas I received a new 27 in quad-core i7 iMac loaded with 8gb of ram. For those wondering about the performance gains in Aperture all I can say is: night and day. Working in Aperture 2.1.4 after the SL upgrade had become an exercise in frustration, making my work tedious and my temper… well… let’s just say my vocabulary was becoming limited to very short words.

I took my time with this new machine and decided to forgo migration and re-install everything from scratch. With a Time Machine backup available I did everything manually, one piece at a time, verifying each addition before going on. When you do this there are a couple of important folders to know about:

• Preferences and Application Support folders from the User library
• Application Support folder from the computer level library

The great thing about OS X is how logical the file organization usually is. All application resource files are usually well identified in their own folder in these directories, making it pretty easy to copy them over and keep old settings intact – a pretty important thing when you want to hit the ground running with a new machine. Everything user related is in the User folder, everything that affects the app as a whole is at the computer level. In the case of Aperture for example, all user custom settings (custom metadata sets, adjustments etc) are contained in the Aperture folder inside User-Application Support. Plug-ins are at computer level since they’re installed for all users on a machine. As I said, clean and logical.

Now some of you might be thinking: why not use Migration Assistant and be done with it? Because I’m a geek. And because I don’t trust Migration Assistant with pro level apps. I also wanted an absolutely clean install without four years of virtual grime coming over to my new computer. My two main applications are Aperture and Logic Studio and I’d been upgrading Logic since version 5 – that’s a lot of accumulated stuff all over the place believe me. Installing manually took a few hours (about 70gb of app files) but it now works perfectly and I know I don’t have redundant files messing things up.

Method

The method was pretty simple. To work faster, I bypassed the Time Machine interface and simply mounted its disk image in the Finder. This allowed me access to all my latest files (I had made sure to do one last backup before disconnecting my old computer) with quick and easy access. Basically, it was like having my old machine beside me – which was also available just in case. To do this you just click on the Time Capsule icon in the Shared section of a Finder window, open the folder and double-click the sparsebundle disk image. It’ll mount like any other image –  after that it’s just a question of navigating to the latest backup.

For Aperture it went like this:

• Install from the trial and authorize.
• Open the application to make sure it’s working. At this point everything is configured at default.
• Import a project to test further (before importing the whole library). Close the app.
• Browse my TMachine backup and copy over the prefs and settings from the appropriate folders into their corresponding destinations on the new computer (I also label them as a way to quickly identify what I’ve copied over).
• Open Aperture to check if it looks like home again (!): it does, everything is customized to my liking, just as I had left it on my old machine.
• Re-install the NIK plugins. Test again.
• Copy over my old library overnight.
• The next morning open Aperture while holding option and select the library.
• Done!

Performance

As I said at the beginning, Aperture flies on the new iMac like it never has before. There are no slow-downs. None. Even round-tripping to Photoshop – which was like bathing in molasses before – is now lightning fast. Every single task is now exponentially faster: importing, editing, exporting. I did encounter the stalling export bug at the beginning but for some reason it hasn’t re-appeared… fingers crossed. I’m sure the amount of RAM is a huge asset on its own. And I have to mention that when I did my first tests using an imported project on a trial managed library, performance was much less impressive. So much so that I was disappointed  and dreading importing my main library. This means I/O is also a very important factor in AP’s overall performance (my main library uses referenced files stored on external FW800 drives). Every little bit counts.

Future

The elephant in the room is obviously the lack of a new version of Aperture, something that is becoming very serious for many –  myself included. But this new iMac has extended my patience a bit. The performance is that good. And I can’t help but dream about an Aperture X version fully optimized for this multicore beast.

Magic?

A word about the Magic Mouse: I love it. It took me a few hours to get used to (my first reflex was to get rid of it to be honest) but I now wouldn’t dream of using anything else. The only problem I have with it is in – you guessed it – Aperture. It tends to be very sensitive to side swipes and scrolling gestures. This is not the case in iPhoto 09. Sigh. Another thing that needs fixing.

But I wonder at what point those of us using Aperture have begun suffering from Stockholm Syndrome, and are defending our captors rather than breaking free for greener pastures.

Full article here.

1) We can now turn Black Point Compensation back on and use paper profiles. Goodbye purple!
2) Aperture sends the right tray info to my R2880 so no more Preview workaround!!!

Number 2 had me worried: it didn’t work the first time I tried it, giving me the same wrong paper error. After cancelling the operation I went into the Print Settings in my preset and it was showing the right tray (sheet feeder). Instinctively I re-saved the preset and that seems to have done the trick. Not sure if it was a fluke or if it’ll need to be done for each preset. Frankly, I don’t care – just glad this is finally fixed.

I’ve also heard that the quad-core iMacs have begun shipping. APX for christmas anyone?

What I DO like is the fact that they’re being totally open about the process, allowing photographers to use the new tools and decide what works for them. This makes making business decisions a lot easier than the limbo Apple currently forces us to live in.

Things I really like:

• The noise reduction and basic RAW rendering looks a lot better – way better than Aperture 2, which is a big deal.
• Local edit tools seem more fluid – and the fact that they exist at all shames Aperture 2.
• History, history, history.

Not to beat a dead horse but I still don’t see myself switching to this app unless Apple drops the ball on AP3 or leaves us in the dark for another six months. Or three.

Oh! just give us something already will you?