Moving to Aperture 3 from Lightroom 3

Do I understand correctly that bringing images into Aperture 3 from Lightroom 3 will cost me the adjustments I've made in Lightroom?
If that's the case, what's the best strategy for proceeding? Stay in Lightroom?

Alexander CK wrote:
Here's a compromise I've worked out. In Lightroom, export your images (maybe only those that have adjustments) to high-quality JPEG, in the same folder as the masters. Also make sure all metadata is kept in sidecar XML files.
Then, import the folders as projects into Aperture, and choose to import raw+jpeg, with jpeg as the master by default.
That way, you have the Lightroom rendition (with all adjustments) available, though of course you can no longer incrementally tweak the adjustments. OTOH, if you want to mess with adjustments, you can always go back to the RAW file on a case-by-case basis (and you do have the jpeg sitting around as a "guide").
Thanks, that sounds like a plan worth trying.
I am torn; I love the editing and image quality in LR (that, and the LR betas have been more stable than Aperture's initial releases), but LR's DAM is quite lacking --- in particular, transparently relocating selected images (e.g., all older images with ratings < 5) is impossible; LR's project hierarchy always has to match the physical volume/folder organization on the disk. This is quite lame once you acquire enough images. Sigh.
Interesting. I agree that editing and image quality is very good in Lr; I haven't tried Aperture 3, though I was an Aperture 2 user before moving to Lightroom. But I think that Lr's DAM aspect is clearly superior to Aperture and I am leery about moving back to Aperture primarily for that reason. I just much prefer the Aperture interface, and its beautiful integration with OS X, iPhone, iPad, etc.
Thanks for your thoughts.

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Moving from Lightroom to Aperture

I've had Lightroom running on my iMac, but am looking at moving to Aperture on the quick recommendation of a pro photogapher friend. I haven't upgraded LR along the way, and so I'd be looking at buying the full program, which is more expensive than Aperture. And per my friend, workflow is pretty simple with Aperture, which sounds appealing. He's promised to give me a short tutorial on how to make Aperture work well for my needs
I have actually done very little in terms of reworking pictures in LR, so there's very little LR "work" to save. I have the originals on an external hard drive, organized into folders: Family Events, Travel, Kids Sports, etc. There are subfolders for various events (Dad's 75th birtday, etc.). My guess (not knowing much about Aperture) is that I should be well set up to bring these images into Aperture, and off I'd go. I could probably leave my LR catalog alone, since I don't have much work to retain.
Does this make sense, more or less? I should note that I do expect to have more time going forward to devote to working on my pictures, and I do have quite a few on that external drive (which is backed up, of course). thx

Michael Winner wrote:
...workflow is pretty simple with Aperture, which sounds appealing. He's promised to give me a short tutorial on how to make Aperture work well for my needs
Your friend is more optomistic than I am. IMO although one can evolve a simple workflow, there is a significant but worthwhile learning curve. I recommemnd fully completing one of the tutorials available.
Put 8 GB RAM in your iMac before starting so you can be sure any anomalies are not RAM-based. Also note that Aperture is a hardware hog.
I have the originals on an external hard drive, organized into folders: Family Events, Travel, Kids Sports, etc. There are subfolders for various events (Dad's 75th birtday, etc.). My guess (not knowing much about Aperture) is that I should be well set up to bring these images into Aperture, and off I'd go.
Yes on bringing them into Aperture. During import set to "Store Files: in their current location" so that you stay with what is called a referenced-Masters workflow. However moving forward you should lose the folder-think organization. Instead import Dads 76th as a (date based) Project, and use Keywords to identify things like Family Events.
My comments from an earlier thread:
First, Projects should be just that: individual-shoot based projects rather than some kind of organizing tool for all the architectural photos or whatever. For performance reasons personally I keep each Project under 500 20-MB images, making a second Project if the shoot is large (e.g. 110829_KJones_Wed_B). One or more albums will always organize the KJones wedding pix together anyway.
Folders are indeed flexible organizational tools but IMO often overused. Folders can effectively hide contents from view and therefore require users to remember how folders are nested and what is inside them. Folders were the only way to deal with single-original film, but are IMO limiting to image database thinking.
The way I look at it conceptually:
Aperture is a database, and each image file lives in one Project.
Albums are just collections of Pointers that point to individual image files living in one or more Projects. Since they just contain pointers, albums can be created or deleted at will without affecting image files. Very powerful.
Keywords can be applied to every image separately or in batches. Keywords are hugely powerful and largely obviate the need for folders. Not that we should never use folders, just that we should use folders only when useful organizationally - - after first determining that using keywords and albums is not a better approach.
As one example imagine the keyword "flowers." Every image of 100k images that has some flowers in it has the keyword flowers. Then say we want to put flowers in an ad, or as background for a show of some kind, or to print pix for a party, or even just to look for an image for some other reason. We can find every flower image in a 100k-image database in 2 seconds, and instantly create an Album called "Flowers" that points to all of those individual images.
Similarly all family pix can have a keyword "family" and all work pix can have a key word "work." Each individual pic may have any number of keywords.
So by using keywords and albums we can have instant access to every image everywhere, very cool. And keywords and albums essentially take up no space in the database.
Another approach is to use a folder "Family" for family pix, a folder "Flowers" for flowers pix and another folder "Work" for work pix. IMO such folders usage is a very poor approach to using an images database (probably stemming from old paper or film work practices). Note that one cannot put an image with family in a field of flowers at a work picnic in all three folders.
HTH
-Allen

Moving RAW files from one drive to another without loosing all your work in Lightroom

I am posting this for two reasons, the first is I have been trying to figure out how to get my raw files off my hard drive & onto my external hardrive for ages, as my laptop is filling up & slowing down with the huge files my new camera captures. I have been researching this & have found it hard to find a clear answer to my particular problem using Windows 7 not a Mac.
After loosing some files in Lightroom when I moved them within Explorer instead of Lightroom, & being unable to figure out how to add a new drive in the Library module in Lightroom to move them to, I wanted to make sure I got it right when I moved the lot of them. I finally figured out a way, it might be round about, but it got it done without any trouble.
This is how I moved my files:
In Windows Explorer I moved one folder which Lightroom uses, from my laptop to the drive I want to store them all on from now on.
Then in Lightroom, under 'Library' (along the top, eg 'File' 'Edit' 'Library' etc) I selected 'Find missing photos' & led Lightroom to the new location. Now my external hd as well as my laptop hd was listed under 'Folders' (on the Left hand side of the screen along with 'Navigator' 'Catalog' 'Folders' etc) in the Library module.
After that it was simple. Just a matter of dragging & dropping from my C drive (laptop)to my G drive (external hd) while in Lightroom; Library module. This way Lightroom keeps track of where the files are stored & nothing is lost.
From now on I will be importing raw files from my camera to my external hd & working on them all from there.
If anyone has a simpler way please share it. I am very new at this & don't profess to be an expert. So any advice would be greatly appreciated
The second reason for this post is that I'd like to know how to make sure that the adjustments made in Lightroom are stored on the external hd as well, incase anything happens to the laptop?
Is exporting the catalogue what I need to do?
Or can I back up the Lightroom adjustments to my external hd somehow?
OR when I moved the raw files did this information move with them?
I understand that my raw files are the original unaltered files & that the changes made in Lightroom are recorded seperately & applied in Lightroom itself..... Well, that's what I think I know about how it all works after a few months of using it, so please forgive me if I'm missing something & I'll be very happy to be enlightened if you'd be so kind
Happy New Year to you all!

All the adjustments are stored in the catalog (not in the file). So you want to back it up, and the external is a good place. In the catalog settings (Edit > Catalog Settings > General) there is an option to set a regular backup schedule, and you'll be asked where you want to put it.
The backup is just a regular copy of the catalog, and you can simply launch Lightroom from that, by double-clicking it.
The image files themselves should also be backed up of course, but that's outside Lightroom.

Migrate from Lightroom 3 to Aperture 3 - Problems with DNG

Hello : )
I will migrate from Lightroom 3 to Aperture 3. I've tested Aperture for a while and I like it, but I have one problem. If I import DNG files, I lost all the settings I've made in Lightroom, except Metadata. Is there any way to import DNG files and get all the settings? If not I think a migration to Aperture will not be possible to me, because I've over 50.000 DNG files and I don't want to convert them to tiff or other formats and lost all the benefits of the RAW files.
Thanks
derRabe

Look at the video below- I think it will solve your problem.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7R4HgOZ3oBc

HT3412 I recently moved all my photos from iphoto to Aperture. I had several iphoto books and cards in my project file. When everything was moved to Aperture I can't find any of the books or card projects. Are they gone or can they be restored?

I recently moved all my photos from iphoto to Aperture. I had several iphoto books and cards in my project file. When everything was moved to Aperture I can't find any of the books or card projects. Are they gone or can they be restored?

1 - without specifics I have no idea how to help
2 - the question was "are you trying to use them in iPhoto? " - it sounds like you are - to do so you will have to export them from Aperature and import into iPhoto
3 - for information on how to use them in Aperature then you need to ask about how to use Aperature in the Aperature forum as it does not involve iPhoto
LN

Import from Lightroom to Aperture 2.0?

Would like to give Aperture a second chance, but I have already built up my lightroom library. Is there a clean way to do this?

Has any additional progress been made on migrating from Lightroom to Aperture without losing develop settings and metadata?
I tried the Aperture 2.0 demo and really wanted to switch. Lightroom gets absolutely bog-slow once you start accumulating "professional" quantities of photos in your library (I'm managing about 25,000 DNG images) and not only is it slow on its own, it takes a death-grip on anything else running on your Mac as well. Aperture 2.0 was unchained lightning by comparison. And the new plug-in architecture and brush-on dodge/burn effects in 2.1 are deal-sealers for me.
Problem is, I've invested hundreds of hours in cropping and exposure adjustments of my images in Lightroom, and I can't face walking away from all that work and then having to re-do it, even with a superior tool.
Since both of these applications are nondestructive editing tools, all that crop and exposure setting data is just data in databases... I can't believe there's NO way to export that data out of LIghtroom's database format and convert it into Aperture's database format! Surely there's a third-party opportunity here -- I'd certainly be glad to pay for a Lightroom-to-Aperture converter that really worked, and I'll bet a lot of other people would as well.

Migrated from Lightroom to Aperture: TIFF's in LAB mode don't work

I migrated from Lightroom to Aperture and I noticed many TIFF's were black, or strangely colored (reddish, greenish). I couldn't figure it out, but I think I know what is the problem. I used to work in LAB-mode in Photoshop for quite some time, and I see that those files cause the problems.
Not only can't I see the previews correctly, Ican't do anything with these files (not even open them in Photoshop). What can I do? Because these files are my portfolio (the material I sell, exhibit, etc.). They're extremely important for me. What can I do? I'm willing to convert them to RGB if necessary.

There have been some issues with greenish previews lately. Browse this forum for threads with the tags "green" and "Previews". If that is the problem, then only your previews look strange and your original images might still be o.k.
So I recommend to check if the images or only the previews are faulty.
If you have a referenced Library reveal the masters in the Finder and look at the master with Preview or another Photo Browser.
If your library is managed, you can reveal the masters inside your Aperture Library by opening the package (in Aperture 3.2.1), select the Library in the Finder and click "Show package contents". You will see folders "Masters" and "Previews". Compare the Masters and the Previews.
If only the Previews are faulty, then select the the images in question in the Aperture Browser, ctrl-click them and select "Update Preview". If that does not help ...
What can I do? Because these files are my portfolio (the material I sell, exhibit, etc.). They're extremely important for me. What can I do? I'm willing to convert them to RGB if necessary.
I assume you have a backup or can access the originals you imported into Aperture.
Convert a copy of one of pictures to TIFF in RGB mode and see if Aperture can handle that properly.
If you are satisfied with the quality do that with all your important pictures.

Switching from Lightroom 5 to Aperture 3.5? Seeking input from those who've done the same

Long and short, I love Mac as it streamlines every process I want to do and "just works". While iPhoto is a simple program, I found it largely effective in managing my photo library for years.
Then I had a baby and bought a DSLR... I went from a taking few hundred photos a year to a few hundred a week. Right now, I'm just importing the photos directly into Lightroom 5 (upgraded for free from Lightroom 4) and occasionally doing the "round trip" from Lightroom to Photoshop Elements and back. That said, I don't have a lot of versions.
I can't put my finger on it, but I just don't like Lightroom. I feel like I'm dumping pictures into a repository that's hard to view them in. It's rather anti-intuitive to use the various modules and I find that my photos aren't any better organized than simply being dumped into folders by date. I've found them difficult to browse. Maybe there's a better method, but I haven't found it yet. I miss the simplicity of iPhoto but could probably benefit from some pro offerings. Perhaps Aperture is that happy medium that I'm locking for?
My biggest want: Importing, sorting, tagging and most importantly, organizaing and viewing photos is a simple, streamlined process.
If I were to switch to Aperture, would I simply import my Lightroom folder(s) (it organizes by date in a very Windowsesque file structure - no library like iPhoto/Aperture)? I would love for Aperture to intelligently orgnize photos into Projects by their date/location (not all are GPS tagged). I'm not worried about losing updated file versions as any changes I've made have been very minor and few in total.
Also, I read that Aperature doesn't keep versions of files that have been edited in Aperture or Photoshop. Is that true?
Any help is much appreciated.

Yeah, I've nothing good to say about Lighroom's user interface. It was clumsy and unintuitive back in the pre-1.0 betas, and subsequent releases haven't improved the situation. Besides a vastly superior workflow, you'll also notice that Aperture makes far more efficient use of screen real estate.
Aperture's Smart Folders will let you view by date/location to your heart's content. See also Five Simple Rules. You really want to understand the different kinds of folders and how they relate to projects before you get going. Aperture will read metadata from XMP sidecars during import. See metadata mapping.
Likely the thing you'll miss most are noise reduction and lens/perspective correction. Aperture's noise control is laughable by today's standards. Do note that there's a noise slider in the raw adjustment brick of the adjustment HUD. But for anything serious you'll want to run through DxO. Same with lens/perspective correction outside of micro 4/3 lenses. Aperture now relies on Apple Maps for geotagging, the resolution of which is just awful in backcountry areas.

Printing from Aperture, and printing from Lightroom.

Hello,
I have noticed when I print from Aperture using my Canon i9950 and a custom paper Colorsync profile, and if I then print from Adobe's Lightroom using the same Colorsync profile and paper, the print from Lightroom is much sharper. The Aperture print is exact in every respect except it is noticeably softer.
Anyone else notice this? And if so is this a recognised problem that may be fixed in 1.1?
Kind regards,
Anil K Solanki
G4 Dual 867 Mac OS X (10.4.5)

Hi Charles, I totally agree with you. Lightroom's printing features are really excellent. In comparison Aperture almost seems like the printing of photographs was something the Aperture dev team bolted on at the last minute.
I sincerely hope Apple sort out, what for me is inexcusable in a professional commercial app. A few photographers I know are going to use the next release of Aperture as a turning point, if it can't print as good as the Beta Lightroom then they will become Lightroom users and say good bye to Aperture.
Apertures sorting and logging tools really are second to none, but if the print quality is poor, what is the point. I know for a large number of photographers, producing prints is not high on their list of needs, especially if they are supplying prints for publication or the web. But if I want to do what my old fashioned enlarger can do, which is create great prints, then hey I am not going to get it with Aperture.
I know Apple can fix this, I just hope they do.
Anil.

Transfer files from aperture into lightroom 5

Transfer raw images in aperture into lightroom 5

dxr_msp wrote:
However there isn't much documentation on exactly how it works. For example, I'm not sure how it handles your Aperture Library if all the Photos are contained within the Library, versus referenced files.
I have a step by step here if it helps: Ready to move on from Aperture or iPhoto? | The Lightroom Queen

How do I import images from Aperture into Lightroom 5?

I've just installed Lightroom 5 onto my Mac. I waited for it to ask me which image management software I wanted to use as default (I currently use Aperture); then I went looking to find the 'source' to enable me to import images. It doesn't recognise Aperture or the 3000+ images held in its folders.
How can I import the images?

Have you tried some of the online articles?
e.g. http://lightroomsolutions.com/articles/migrating-from-aperture-to-lightroom-where-do-i-beg in/

From Nikon ViewNX to Aperture or Lightroom?

Currently my main DSLR is the Nikon D300 and I am happy with the way Nikon's ViewNX organizes my RAW files.
But I am considering Aperture or Lightroom because I am going to buy one more camera and it will not be a Nikon, so I want ONE application to manage all my RAW files.
I've been test-driving the Aperture 2 and Lightroom 2 free trials for one week or two and I'm pretty satisfied with the organizing capabilities of both. The only point I'm not satisfied with is that the colors and sharpness of the NEF files are not quite right when opened with either Aperture or Lightroom.
Is it true that RAW files are best opened by the original camera manufacturer's own software? This issue aside, I'm not sure whether Aperture of Lightroom is better. Also, as I'm using a Power Mac G5 and I'm not likely to upgrade to an Intel machine in the near future, I'm concerned that the upcoming
Aperture 3 and Lightroom 3 will not support PPC Macs anymore. So if I'm going to purchase a copy of either Aperture 2 or Lightroom 2 for commercial use, I want to do it quick.

The colors and sharpness in the default rendering from Aperture and Lightroom will differ from Nikon View. That's largely a given, as the "default" rendering that View uses is based on proprietary Nikon information. So Aperture and Nikon will both do a default render based on the RAW data and on the work that the respective engineering product teams did to get a result that looks "good."
Sharpening should be easy; RAW files themselves are typically not that sharp - the RAW converters apply little sharpening. You can easily do this yourself in the respective applications… Aperture's default edge sharpening is fairly good but not very aggressive. Lightroom's sharpening can be a more manual procedure, but can also achieve very good results. I would absolutely encourage you to spend a fair bit of time experimenting with the sharpening in both programs and look at some specific parts of images at 100% and seeing which you prefer.
As far as color goes, I prefer the default rendering of Aperture to Lightroom at this time, but that's for my Canon camera. Lightroom 2 brought camera profiles which does help a fair bit. But I'd encourage you to look at Aperture's default color rendering, versus a few of the Lightroom profiles, and decide if you have a preference. Lightroom 3 is attempting to improve their default renderings, but running a PPC machine you don't have that option. Given no such product as "Aperture 3" has been announced by Apple who knows if/when/what it will look like or support from an OS or architecture perspective.

Swith from Aperture to Lightroom?

Considering switch from Aperture to Lightroom (have used Aperture for 6 years, but also PS). Aperture is giving me "unsuppoerted format" notices on existing files. If I go to Lightroom, will I be able to go back into my old Aperture libraries?

That article contains a lot of irrelevant details and isn't very clear about the key steps.
For your raw files, use Aperture's File > Export Masters and make sure that, as you are migrating raw files, that you tick the Create IPTC Sidecar File (the screenshot in that article is misleading).
That creates a copy of your files - so you will need free disc space equal to the existing disc space taken up by those raw files. You then use LR's File > Import command to bring the files into LR. Just follow the standard import process - ie don't follow that article's advice to Copy as DNG (that's another issue).
Essentially that is it. Try the above with a few raw files, just to see the basic process for yourself. Then deal with any other complications.
John

Moving edits from lightroom 2.2 to cs3

i'm having issues with moving edited images from LR 2.2 to CS 3 with the right mouse click (right click moves pics from lr to cs for more editing)
seems lightroom or cs is hanging up. either way, cs isn't receiving the image.
i had deleted the old lr 2.2 and re-installed 2.2 again in hopes of solving the adjustment brush hang ups..now this is a new issue ugh... :(
signed,
frustrated

Deleting Preferences may have a better effect. Onna Mac, Cmd-E opens a LR RAW file in PS. Are you talking about the contextual menu you get by right clicking on an image?

I exported jpg, tif, psd, and dng files from Lightroom but Aperture does not see them except for dng during import

How do I import jpg, tif, psd files exported from Lightroom 3 into Aperture 3.2? I had no problems before...seems like since I installed Lion, they do not show up in the import folder.

How are you trying to import them (again) ? If you're importing through the Import Window and have RAW only set then that's all you'll get.
Also what's an Import Folder? Not sure how Lightroom fits into this. If you share your workflow with us we might be able to help.
regards

Moving to Aperture 3 from Lightroom 3

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