What's better Aperture or Lightroom?

[Haligan]

I am trying to decide which organizer/editor to use. Aperture or Lightroom.

I am currently using Capture NX which I like. However it is a little slow and I think these other two I have mentioned would work better for organizing.

Any Suggestions?

[engstrom]

It's my understanding that you need a FAST video card - ATI Radeon X1900 XT or better - to run Aperture well. I've heard people say good things about Lightroom but I've never used it myself.

[billbunton]

Aperture definitely needs a fast video card, I'd agree the X1900 XT (or G5 in my case) is the minimum. I'm no longer using aperture, I was encountering too many crashes, and I don't think it's quite ready for prime time as a DAM program. You also have a problem if you have anything Apple considers a non-mainstream camera.

Lightroom has some definite performance problems when it comes to DAM. Raw processing is fine on my quad G5. One thing that slows it down horribly is trying to load a bunch of keywords -- I loaded Reich's Controlled Vocabulary, and it could take 20-30 seconds to apply a keyword to a photo. It's much better since purging unused keywords, but still slower than I'd like. It's also definitely not ready for prime-time as far as DAM goes.

Capture NX is not an organizer! Though slow, it's a good Raw processor (for NEFs, obviously), but it's definitely not a DAM program.

If you don't have a lot of photos to catalog, and don't need to work on multiple computers, then Lightroom is probably your best bet. I'm running lightroom in parallel with IVMP, but that really only works well if you're willing to convert your NEFs to DNG.

[Haligan]

Well after a little research I found out the xt1900 apparently has a bad fan design and is regularly overheating which is causing the crash. I find this very disappointing as I really liked the look of aperture.

I have looked at some of the lightroom demos and it does seem to work well and integrate with photoshop nicely. I am considering purchasing it.

Is there any other DAM software that people like?

I have heard some people say they like photomechanic. Is it good?

[RightAngle]

I'm using Lightroom and I LOVE it. I haven't used aperture so I cant give you a great comparison but I will say that Lightroom has really made my life a lot easier and gives me great results very quickly.

[billbunton]

PhotoMechanic isn't DAM software yet. It's an excellent browser, I use it as the first step in my workflow, but it doesn't have much DAM capability. (It's expected to at some point, but they haven't added it yet).

Why don't you download the free 30 day trial of Lightroom and see if it meets your needs. You can also take a look at the DAM book forums (http://thedambook.com/smf/index.php). They have one forum for discussing Lightroom as a DAM application.

[Haligan]

Thanks for the information Bill I will do that.

[cnoise]

1 for Aperture. Yes it is a little slow, but I haven't had any crashes with the program yet(Had it since December). I just like the workflow a little better than Lightroom.

[ddaquaria]

Add one more for Aperature. Although I have had crashes, I have figured out that it is actually the way the program "talks" to the video card when I have both my 30" and 20" connected. With just the 30" (or just 1 monitor connected), I have no problems at all. An easy way to speed things up is to cut off the preview mode (and I also deleted all my previews too). By the way, large aperature libraries can effect speed as well. I have not tried lightroom yet since I have been pretty happy with Aperature.

[Haligan]

anyone using iview mediapro?

[AndrewCCM]

I am a fan of Lightroom... But that said... It could definitely stand some improvements. But for version 1.0, it is pretty good. I am able to do a lot with it without the need for Photoshop.

All this said, on the PC side... Raw Shooter Premium was a killer fast RAW app. DARN YOU ADOBE for buying and killing the product! I can only hope that they build off of some of the core of that app someday. It wasn't a great organization application.. but for processing and workflow.. very good. No Mac version though.

I have all but stopped processing anything on my dual G5... Maybe someday I'll get a newer system...But buying a G5 only to see it die on the vine and move to Intel (after saying they wouldn't)...I am a bit miffed. Regardless, from a pure business sense, Apple made the right choice with the move... Just alienated some users awful quick after promising G5 improvements and the like. Sure IBM had something to do with that.. but still. I am so off topic with my last few comments. Sorry bout that.

[Arnor]

Hi Andrew,

Originally Posted by AndrewCCM

I am a fan of Lightroom... But that said... It could definitely stand some improvements. But for version 1.0, it is pretty good. I am able to do a lot with it without the need for Photoshop.

I was close to buying Lightroom. I need something like that, but I had been on the beta and it was slow. I downloaded the final trial (after it went gold) to an older AMD 3200 which I do most of my development work on and it was really slow. But at the time I didn't have a good graphic card in it so... I installed the trial also on a HP 3700 and it was just as slow. I'm talking like 10 _minutes_ to import a folder with 50 JPEG photos from Rebel XT (8MP). I can open the same folder in about 5 _seconds_ in Canon's DPP, version 3.0.1.5 (latest as of a week ago or so). I like DPP, but it doesn't have all the options that Lightroom has. OTOH it's free:) Guess I should get some more memory and try LR...

Best regards,

[AndrewCCM]

Originally Posted by Arnor

Hi Andrew,



I was close to buying Lightroom. I need something like that, but I had been on the beta and it was slow. I downloaded the final trial (after it went gold) to an older AMD 3200 which I do most of my development work on and it was really slow. But at the time I didn't have a good graphic card in it so... I installed the trial also on a HP 3700 and it was just as slow. I'm talking like 10 _minutes_ to import a folder with 50 JPEG photos from Rebel XT (8MP). I can open the same folder in about 5 _seconds_ in Canon's DPP, version 3.0.1.5 (latest as of a week ago or so). I like DPP, but it doesn't have all the options that Lightroom has. OTOH it's free:) Guess I should get some more memory and try LR...

Best regards,

Very odd.

I have an old 3Ghz P4 with 3GB RAM. The final version works very well here.

The Beta had a lot to be desired. However, since I owned Raw Shooter, I got Lightroom for free...So I am not complaining TOO much..

[AndrewCCM]

Oh btw: If you turn off Render Standard Previews...it'll import faster.

[photosbysergio]

Have only used Aperture myself with the Macbook Pro. It Took a while to get used to but it has become part of my workflow now. Can't see myself working without it.