Lightroom or Aperture

antc

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Anthony
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Hi all,

Having recently bought a Mac (swapped over from pc) I am looking to purchase either Lightroom or Aperture which I can of course now use if I want with my Mac. Wasnt an option before when I had my pc.

I have used lightroom and really like it. Never used Aperture and just wondered what peoples opinions are. Noticed the other day Aperture 3 is available in the app store for £45 which seems like a bargain for what I understand to be a genuine lightroom contender!

Anyway I am totally open to suggestions and would love to hear what you guys think of either and which you would go for.
 
personally i started out with Aperture but eventually imported everything into lightroom.
To be honest I think its just down to personal preference.
Not sure if Aperture has a 30-day trial but it would be good to test it out for a bit. If not have a look in an apple store.
 
i cam from a pc with lightroom over to a mac, bought aputure as it was good value but did not get on with it , lightroom just does everything that little bit better ! but many people manage with it , download the demo and give it a test !
 
Thanks guys, I have watched a few videos on it now. Going to download it and give it a whirl. To be fair its going to have to be good to tempt me away from Lightroom which I am already accustomed to.

I guess at the end of the day as you both rightly point out, its just personal pref, the same as if you prefer a mac of pc.

Just an extra option for me to consider now. I wonder, out of interest, has anyone gone from lightroom to aperture and is it even possible to take all the edits done in lightroom across into aperture or would you have to re edit them all in the opposite application regardless of which one you started with?
 
I use Aperture all the time - and I've got lighteoom, PS, etc
 
Aperture all the way, I just hated the Lightroom work flow.
 
Aperture all the way, first I couldn't do without the integration in OSX that lightroom just lacks, secondly the organisation just makes a lot more sense with the options you get much less 'file systemie with an app around' and then there are the excellent brushes much better way than layers imo.
 
No that's just some of the software I have, and I choose Aperture.
 
Any Pro's and cons for Aperture ? Perhaps i ought to give it another go and am just 'used' to lightroom ?
 
The best kept secret are the videos on apples website. If you still have your one-2-one go to the online training section via the concierge and it shows you how easy some of the advanced stuff is. Also the genius team at the MK Apple Store have some really good Aperture. I booked a session with them for editing/enhancing photos as I am happy with my organisation side of things and they really know their stuff.

Key important differentiator is the integration for me, the total lack of any duplicate photos or need to export. Also the RAW processor is very good, well it is for my D7000 at least, it transfers ALL in camera settings potentially cutting down PP significantly.
 
what do you mean if you still have your one - to - one ?
 
Any Pro's and cons for Aperture ? Perhaps i ought to give it another go and am just 'used' to lightroom ?

If you didn't currently have a RAW processor / workflow solution then I'd say at £45 Aperture is a no brainer. However as you already have Lightroom then it would be difficult to say that Aperture would be £45 well spent.

I use Aperture all the time. I've thought about Lightroom, but really there would be no real advantage for me to switch. Both are very good at what they do, and it's really difficult to say one is better than the other.
 
what do you mean if you still have your one - to - one ?

When you buy a new Mac for £72 you can buy 1 year unlimited training sessions at any apple store around the world. Absolutely amazing value, all apple owners I know bought it.
 
When you buy a new Mac for £72 you can buy 1 year unlimited training sessions at any apple store around the world. Absolutely amazing value, all apple owners I know bought it.

Yeah, it is good indeed, one of their best value things they do!
 
In Apple store only I'm afraid!
 
ah so you can only do this when buying a computer FROM the apple store ? not online or anything ?
 
Yes instore only, however if you bring in your online Apple receipt that should be ok. Unfortunately they don't do that anymore with John Lewis, PCWorld etc purchases as it became too popular...
 
When Lightroom 2 came out the price of upgrading Lightroom or buying Aperture 2 was about the same. I downloaded the trials of both, but already having been used to Lightroom 1 I got on better with Lightroom.

Today, the decision would be a lot harder, as Aperture is significanly cheaper and from what I've seen the brushes are much better than Lightroom and would probably mean I never went to Photoshop. However after using Lightroom since version 1.0 I'm not going to change.

One other thing to bear in mind is that the Lightroom license is cross platform, so if you had Lightroom on your PC, you can just install it on your Mac rather than having to buy it.

If you need to buy Lightroom, I would seriously consider Aperture. It should be a fairly easy test to export a DNG with processing embedded from Lightroom and import it into Aperture.
 
tomkbucks said:
ah i also take it an old purchase wont qualify either !

You could try it - I think a lot is how you come across really
 
You could try it - I think a lot is how you come across really

Indeed, I had a year old one-2-one on my wife's apple id which I didn't realise they activated when we bought it. So basically a year went by and we didn't use it. The in-store genius did see that, I was low rate, apologetic etc and they restarted it for another year for my wife.
 
I didn't get one 2 one when I bought my mac, but dad has with his. As said it's fantastic value.
 
I know Lightroom is cross platform, but I didn't realise the licence couljd be used on both. I know when we volume licence it at work they have differnet keys. However, it is the multplatform nature of it that wins the deal with me.

Im so indecisive when it comes to my favourite OS that I swap between Mac & Windows on a daily basis.....and Linux occasionally! use Lightroom on myPC at the mo,but that's not to say I won't invest in a higher end Mac in the future,and I can think of nothing worse than having to move Lightroom libraries into Aperture ( this is coming from someone who doesn't actually have enough decent pics worthy of being called a library :D )

I do like Aperture though, and If I knew I was going to stick to OSX I may well prefer it!
 
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