Around the same time, I had switched to a Mac for my primary home computer. I didn’t care for iPhoto *at all* and there was no OS X version of Picasa (there now is, and I have yet to try it). I started looking around for alternatives and came across the professional digital photography workflow applications like Apple Aperture and Adobe Lightroom. These applications combine rich cataloguing and metadata features with semi-advanced image manipulation capabilities. Both offer free trials so I grabbed a copy of Aperture and gave it a whirl.

Aperture’s code is designed to use the GPU to do much of its work. This is great when you have a lot of GPU at your disposal. On a Mac mini, it’s a world of pain. Apart from the slow editing, I was dismayed at how sluggish it felt overall compared to Picasa. My mini is a Core Duo 1.66 with 2G of RAM and most of OS X is quite snappy. To Apple’s credit, they do not recommend using Pro apps on machines without proper discrete video adapters. Be that as it may, I pushed forward and wound up purchasing Aperture, never having tried Lightroom.

I’d never gotten very familiar with Photoshop and how to do proper digital photography post-processing. When I acquired Aperture, I was more or less starting with carte blanche. I learned the basic import-and-review workflow first. I didn’t touch most of the adjustments beyond the basic automatic correction. Over time, though, I started adding tools to my repertoire. First white balance. Then Highlights/Shadows. Then Exposure. Then some of the color adjustments like Vibrancy. I still have a lot to learn but I find that whereas I used to stay displeased with a mediocre shot, I now have the ability to turn all but the worst ones into pleasing results.

Last month I was vacationing in Florida. We took a 5-night cruise and spent several extra days afterward with family. I had around 500 or so RAW images I needed to go through, post to the web and send to friends. I’d left my Mac at home (it’s small but it’s still a desktop) so all I had was my work laptop running Fedora Linux. Google ships a version of Picasa for Linux so I figured I’d give my old friend a try.

I brought in the RAW shots and started to go through them. Picasa is definitely FAST — a breath of fresh air when you’re used to Aperture on sub-par hardware. But as I began to work on individual images, I realized how severely limited Picasa is. Perhaps it’s the RAW converter, perhaps it’s the tools, but I could not get images I was happy with. Picasa’s Fill Light is weak in comparison to proper level and exposure adjustments. The white balance is decent but the highlight/shadow tools work the opposite of how Aperture’s do. In Aperture, the Shadows slider starts at 0 and as you increase it, the shadows brighten up. Very useful for those situations that needed a fill flash. Picasa’s go the opposite direction!

All this is to say that despite the slowness, I am 100% pleased with Aperture. I’ll be ordering a new MacBook Pro soon so hopefully slow photo editing will be a thing of the past for me.