Apple introduces Aperture

Apple today introduced Aperture, to be available through the , the first all-in-one post production tool designed to provide everything photographers need after the shoot. Aperture features powerful compare and select tools, nondestructive image processing, color managed printing and custom web and book publishing. "Aperture is to professional photography what Final Cut Pro is to filmmaking," said Rob Schoeben, Apple's vice president of Applications Marketing. Compare and select tools in Aperture allow photographers to easily sift through massive photo projects and quickly identify final selections, and the application automatically groups sequences of photos into easy-to-manage stacks based on the time interval between exposures. Aperture will be available in November for $500 (system requirements were unavailable).

Aperture allows photographers to navigate through entire projects in a full-screen workspace that can be extended to span multiple displays, tiling multiple images side-by-side for a faster, easier compare and select.

The Loupe magnifying tool examines portions of images in detail without the need to zoom and pan across large files. A virtual Light Table builds simple photo layouts, rearranging, resizing, and piling them together in a free-form space. RAW images are maintained natively throughout Aperture without any intermediate conversion process, and can be retouched using a suite of adjustment tools designed specifically for photographers. Aperture's nondestructive image processing engine never alters a single pixel of original photos, giving photographers the power and flexibility to modify or delete changes at any point in the workflow. Aperture can create multiple versions of a single image without duplicating files, allowing experimentation without risk of overwriting the master image or using up large amounts of hard drive space. Aperture images can also be launched directly into Adobe Photoshop for compositing and layer effects. Aperture features a complete color-managed pipeline with support for device specific ColorSync profiles and a set of high-quality output tools for showcasing work. Print options include customizable contact sheets, high-quality local printing, and color-managed online prints.

by MacNN Staff