Aperture 2.0 has shipped. It needs Tiger 10.4.11 or Leopard 10.5.2. It's $200, down $199 from 1.0, and an upgrade is $99. If you purchased 1.5 recently then you can get it for $9.95.

Apple claims 100 new features that I have not had time to read yet.

Apple's Aperture page has many details. including the specs. The features page has some Quick Tours to watch and there are many tutorials. You download the User Manual, and a publication called Exploring Aperture. There is a compatibility checker that will see if your system can run it.

As usual there is active conversation (maybe less whining?) at Apple's Aperture discussion page.

Tags: Aperture, Updates, Anticipation, RAW, DSLR

Joe Schorr, Apple's Senior Product Manager of Photo Applications (wasn't he just product Manager for Aperture a while ago?) has spoken to the assembled throngs in a posting on the Aperture discussion board:

We're constantly working to make Aperture an even better tool for users, and will soon release an upgrade that includes RAW format support for new cameras and other exciting new features. Please stay tuned.

Joe Schorr
Sr. Product Manager, Photo Applications
Apple

My guess is that at the first possible moment following PMA opening its doors (ie Thursday morning), Apple is going to announce whatever it is we have all been waiting for. Then, I'm sure the real whining will begin as it dawns on people that Apple has somehow not implemented every single one of their personal favorite missing features.

[Update: Nothing so far (the end of Jan 31st). I saw this posting at DPReview:

The booth number reserved for Apple (X128) simply says HOLD. It doesn't even identify the company by name anymore. Perhaps they will be a no show.

Curiouser and curiouser.

Tags: Aperture, Updates, Anticipation

There has been a great deal of speculation as to what will be in the next release of Aperture -- even as to whether it will be called 2.0 or 1.6 -- but now there are rumors starting to appear. I saw this one on DPReview. It's a typical "I have a friend of a friend whos hair cutter knows this guy who overheard two people on a bus talking" kind of rumor. So there is no way to know how accurate it is. There are so many things that could be changed or improved, that practically any subset would be believable. You can even see how people were thinking a while back at MacPredict (the site appears to no longer be updated).

What does appear to be unanimous is that either Apple will announce something at PMA this week, or thousands will defect to Lightroom. Apart from some bug fixes, it has been an awfully long time since any significant changes were made: 1.5 was released September 29, 2006 according to Wikipedia.

Fraser Speirs posted his wishes for Aperture a short time ago. And Eric Barzeski made his wish-list known a year ago and is itching for information. Sören Nils Kuklau has a list that he posted last year. Inside Aperture speculated some time ago, around the same time that Ed Fladung had a go. Chuqui hoped for 2.0 before Christmas 2007, but was disappointed.

My needs are modest, so I'm wishing for things like better speed and better keyboard navigation. For the product, I think the best thing that could happen would be a flexible plug-in architecture so that the application could be expanded by third parties. I would also like to be able to have Aperture handle all media types, not just photos, and to have a lightweight application that can read the database independently. That would allow plugins and automation scripts run at the same time as Aperture, so not interrupting workflow.

We shall see. I hope it's not Leopard-only because I'm still on Tiger, waiting for a compatible update to SuperDuper.

Tags: Aperture, Updates, Wild Guesses, Photography, Anticipation

"Steve Weller's insights go far beyond that of a typical photographer. Get Your Head Around Aperture is filled with tips and tricks, a must read for first time users and Aperture masters alike" -- Micah Walter, photojournalist and contributor to Inside Aperture

It's done! I've taken more than a year's worth of Aperture articles and compiled them into a living PDF e-book. Many people suggested that I do this, so thanks are owed to them and to everyone who reviewed the book and made comments and corrections.

A PDF version of the Aperture articles on the site is convenient and useful. It's portable since you don't need to be on-line. You can put it on your laptop to read in the field. It's searchable by Spotlight and Preview. And it's printable. You get three editions: one 490-page edition optimized for screen viewing at 100%, so you can stash it to one side and have Aperture next to it, and two 160-page editions optimized for printing -- one for A4 paper and one for US Letter paper.

It's available only from this site. More information on the Get Your Head Around Aperture product page.

Tags: Aperture, Books, Anticipation, Get Your Head Around Aperture

Apple is now showing three short ads for the iPhone and announcing that it will be available June 29th. The pages with the ads are a little kooky, so here are direct links to Never Been An iPod, How To, and Calamari. I expect there to be lots more of these very effective nuggets of marketing.

Tags: iPhone, June 29th, Anticipation