Übermind has released three iPhoto plug-ins to complement their Aperture plug-ins: ÜberUpload for iPhoto, iPhoto to Picasa Web Albums, and iPhoto to Archive. They are offering a promotional price until the end of June.

Tags: iPhoto, Plug-ins

James Duncan Davidson recounts how he recently shot ETech and eComm: 11,000 photos in total, and processed them all with Aperture.

Tags: Aperture, iPhoto, Workflow

Apple has just released an update to Aperture 1.5.6 (130MB):

Recommended for all licensed Aperture customers, the Aperture 1.5.6 Update addresses issues related to performance, improves overall stability, and supports compatibility with Mac OS X Leopard v10.5.

• Resolves some minor compatibility issues with iPhoto 7.1, which organizes images by Event rather than Roll.
• Addresses issues related to metadata and sort order when sharing previews with iLife Media Browser.
• Improves reliability of queries based on Import Session.
• Addresses reliability when recovering an Aperture Library from a Vault.

Update: Later today Apple will release the Aperture Export SDK 1.5.5. This provides only minor changes. Notably there are no new APIs provided. I am seeing reports that Aperture is fast on Leopard. I'll get a chance to try it out later today or tomorrow when I have Leopard in my hands.

Tags: Aperture, Leopard, Updates, iPhoto, Vaults, Plug-ins

Fraser Speirs, author of FlickrExport plug-in for iPhoto and Aperture, is intimidated by keywording:

I’ve never really known why I couldn’t get into it, but last night I realised: Aperture’s beautiful hierarchical keywording system paralyses some part of my brain.

I made a reply in the comments that I reproduce here:

Better than keywording is captioning. The problem with keywording is that there is a temptation to worry about creating consistency, planning for the future, not duplicating things etc. It’s like trying to organize a chest of drawers when you have more kinds of things than you have drawers and you know that you will have to accomodate more things in the future that you’ve never even heard of. Keywording really exists to help other people.

So caption instead. Aperture allows you to layer captions. Caption everything with “Beach trip with Brian and Jan”, then add “In the car”, “On the beach”, “In the sea”, and “Evening bonfire” as appropriate. Then caption some of those with “Down the winding path” and others with “Falling into the water”, adding “Silly face”, “Too much beer”, and “Not enough beer” to others.

Captions are far richer and will capture much more of what is going on. Do you really have keywords for Silly, Face, Beer, Beach, Too much, Not enough, Winding, Path, etc.? They’re not noun-bound as keywords tend to be. And there is no structure. Why should there be? No use for it. Captions are there to help you. Think of them as evidence, not proof.

Really. Don't go overboard with rigidity. The takeaway is simple: keywords are for other people; captions are for you. Ask yourself why you are applying metadata.

Tags: Captions, Keywords, Intimidation, Aperture, Plug-ins, iPhoto

I am in the process of moving most of my work with photos to Aperture from iPhoto. I have been working with referenced files in Aperture with the master files staying in iPhoto. How can I move the master files to Aperture without de-stabilizing iPhoto?

You can do this very easily using Aperture's Consolidate command. Select the images and go to File > Consolidate Master... or for an entire project control click on the project and choose Consolidate Masters for Project...:

While consolidating usually moves the master files into the Aperture library (so causing iPhoto grief), there is an option to copy the files instead. This leaves the originals intact:

Of course now you have two masters on your disk, one in iPhoto and one in Aperture. Once you have confirmed that Aperture has the photos in its library as expected, you can delete the iPhoto copies.

Tags: Aperture, Q&A, iPhoto, Referenced, Consolidate

Bakari Chavanu has written an article for MyMac.com about the differences between iPhoto (6) and Aperture (1.5):

Now that I'm working as a wedding and event photographer, I'm shooting hundreds of pictures on each job and am having to meet the challenge of uploading, managing, and outputting photos for my clients. The process hasn't been easy. I've been looking at management systems like Adobe's Bridge and Lightroom programs, and even iView Media Pro, but with the latest update of Apple's Aperture, I think I may have found solutions to my larger and more complex digital photo management and processing problems. And believe me, when you're processing hundreds of photos for a waiting client, digital management is a problem that is not easily solved with iPhoto or even Adobe Bridge.

He has recently moved to Aperture and so is still learning its features. The site also has reviews of several books on and related to digital photography: The Digital Photography Book, Digital Photography: the Missing Manual, and Create Your Own Photo Blog.

Tags: iPhoto, Aperture

MacOSXHints has a hint on moving images from Aperture to iPhoto. There is also a $15 utility that does the same thing. Since I use iPhoto for almost nothing, I have not tried either of these.

Tags: iPhoto, Aperture, Importing