Has anyone encountered any issues with the new Aperture 3? Specifically the application slowing down your computer? Its either always "processing" or "loading". What are some other photo editing softwares out there other than photoshop that allow for in-depth manipulation. I love Aperture 3, its interface and usability, but jeeeeeeeeeez, its chewing up my RAM.
I just bought a Mac Mini for myself as a Christmas gift - Recently updated iLife 09' to 11' just yesterday - I've heard a lot of things about Aperture 3. Good & bad things, I guess. I just really prefer to work with Photoshop CS5 and Lightroom 3. I have heard that it does take up A LOT of space using Aperture 3! My friend who has that, she swears by it and really likes the program itself. She's never had any issues with hers.
I use Aperture 3 as well and yes, sometimes it does slow things down a bit though I find it's usually after I've imported a heap of photos and it's still processing thumbnails and what not. If I let it do it's thing for a bit after importing it usually works fine for me.
Your other option would be Lightroom 3. I haven't tried this on my Mac yet so I can't tell you if it's any faster or not.
I have a relatively new quad-core iMac, on which I use Aperture 3. It has crashed a few times on me in the past couple of months. I shoot and edit RAW images, which on my new A580, are some pretty hefty files.
I also use Elements 9 for some editing, mostly pano stitching and other things that I know how to do pretty well in that program. Aperture exports the RAW images as TIFF files into Elements.
I will say that I don't think that either program will be any better or worse for you, it'll come down to the computer.
I use Aperture 3 for 90% of my workflow. I also sat with a "Genius" at my Apple store and tried to figure out what was going on. Here's a few things to think about:
1. A3 (or any other photo program) is VERY hard on the RAM in your machine and on the graphics card. If you're going to use any serious photo software every day, upgrade both if you can.
2. When working on a photo, do all your retouches before you make any other adjustments to the photo (contrast, curves, sharpening...). Aperture processes from the top down in the Adjustments tab. That means it does the RAW processing and then the retouches before it even thinks about cropping or enhancing or whatever. Lots of retouches will crash you before any other adjustment.
3. If you notice that you need to retouch after you've made a bunch of adjustments, deactivate all of your changes by clicking the little boxes to the left of each option (retouches, crop, enhance, exposure). When you're done, just click everything back on again and it will be how you left it. It's a pain but it will save you some crashes.
4. If it starts to bog down like crazy, restart your computer. I know it's basic but it helps.
5. Be wary of large libraries. Anything over three thousand may start causing problems. When I took my laptop in I had one library with 30,000 images. Now I make a new one on an external hard drive every month, but I shoot a lot.
6. Close any other programs if you can. I usually work with iTunes open, but if I have a huge file I close that, too.
If you keep these in mind, it's generally a pretty awesome program.
@drongo3 thank you so much for taking the time to respond with such detail. Im sure my RAW photo files are taking up a ton of space, i figured the Mac could handle it and will be making some upgrades very soon. I really enjoy the application and would hate to stop using it. I used it tonight with only a few glitches, after closing all application and running the adjustments in order as you stated in #3. Thanks again!
@fillingtime I did the upgrade but am still having the same problems as before. Will be incorporating some of Jeff's ideas, but thanks for posting your suggestion :)
I'm glad you asked about this. I've been using the Aperture 3 trial and I've made it crash almost daily, especially when I have a lot of edits on one photo, it really slows things down. My laptop is a year old and has a good amount of RAM and disk space, but it still happens to me as well. I'm going to try @drongo3's suggestions to see if this helps. I do really like Apeture 3 though. It does most of what I need and after watching the tutorials I was up and running in a really short amount of time.
@lislee75 Yup, same exact thing happened to me, same circumstances too. Let me know how the fixes work for you. I agree, its such an intuitive editing tool, I really dont want to stop using it. Also, what trick do you use for a "soft focus" look? Other than the blur brush, i cant find something to give that effect.
@atalitude For this shot I did the skin smoothing. If you put it in full screen there is a little button up top with a drop down where you can see skin smoothing. I don't have smooth skin, and was happy to smooth it out, but I also felt it went with the darker feel that I was going for.
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Your other option would be Lightroom 3. I haven't tried this on my Mac yet so I can't tell you if it's any faster or not.
http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshoplightroom/
I also use Elements 9 for some editing, mostly pano stitching and other things that I know how to do pretty well in that program. Aperture exports the RAW images as TIFF files into Elements.
I will say that I don't think that either program will be any better or worse for you, it'll come down to the computer.
1. A3 (or any other photo program) is VERY hard on the RAM in your machine and on the graphics card. If you're going to use any serious photo software every day, upgrade both if you can.
2. When working on a photo, do all your retouches before you make any other adjustments to the photo (contrast, curves, sharpening...). Aperture processes from the top down in the Adjustments tab. That means it does the RAW processing and then the retouches before it even thinks about cropping or enhancing or whatever. Lots of retouches will crash you before any other adjustment.
3. If you notice that you need to retouch after you've made a bunch of adjustments, deactivate all of your changes by clicking the little boxes to the left of each option (retouches, crop, enhance, exposure). When you're done, just click everything back on again and it will be how you left it. It's a pain but it will save you some crashes.
4. If it starts to bog down like crazy, restart your computer. I know it's basic but it helps.
5. Be wary of large libraries. Anything over three thousand may start causing problems. When I took my laptop in I had one library with 30,000 images. Now I make a new one on an external hard drive every month, but I shoot a lot.
6. Close any other programs if you can. I usually work with iTunes open, but if I have a huge file I close that, too.
If you keep these in mind, it's generally a pretty awesome program.
Hope this helps.
JGD
@atalitude For this shot I did the skin smoothing. If you put it in full screen there is a little button up top with a drop down where you can see skin smoothing. I don't have smooth skin, and was happy to smooth it out, but I also felt it went with the darker feel that I was going for.