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Aperture 1.0: the Ars review


Why a new image program?

That says a lot: This is a
complement to Photoshop,
not a replacement.

With Aperture, many people are wondering if Apple is trying to cut itself out a portion of the image editing program market. Let's get this out of the way early: Aperture is not a competitor to Photoshop. Unless you bought Photoshop exclusively for the Camera RAW plug-in or the Bridge program, Aperture cannot replace Photoshop. It doesn't work well with CMYK source images (it outputs back to RGB), it doesn't composite images, and the full list of its available filters is at left.

Still, in this review I'll be referring to similar tasks or tools in Photoshop and you might be thinking, is that fair to compare this app to the industry-standard program that's now in its ninth version? Well, Apple is clearly positioning Aperture to be the one-stop shop for your RAW editing and high-fidelity image adjustment needs, and at US$500, they are basically saying that this is professionals-only, so it should have pro-quality tools. Photographers are a finicky lot. If you think you can razzle and dazzle them with hype only, you're insane.

Also, it's bound to get asked, so let me set the record straight: Aperture is a PPC-only app:

I'm sure it will be made a universal binary by the time x86 Mac machines capable of running Aperture ship.

The interface

Similar to other Apple professional apps like Motion and Final Cut Pro, Aperture sports a dark grey background and buttons. Despite the continuing legacy of the OS X Finder to disappoint new and old users, Apple knows how to make you drool with the look of a program. Like the newer version of iTunes, the bezels are cleaner and there is no brushed metal. This is almost definitely where the OS X Leopard interface is going and for the most part it's a welcome change.

When not starring for the covers of techo albums, Arthur spends his
days making ornery old man noises and gnawing his nether regions

It's tidy and can be rearranged, with the different elements hidden or shown with quick key commands. They can't be closed, or torn off manually though, despite my best mouse button mashing. The adjustments palette is available as a separate floating palette and there is a nice professional-looking black full screen mode that still lets you work very comfortably.

Aperture sets itself apart from the competition
by making you go blind.

My only real gripe with the Aperture interface is the tiny type used throughout, like in Final Cut and DVD Studio Pro. Everywhere you look, in the dialog boxes, contextual menus and filter/keyword panes, it's a veritable 8-point type party. They try and make it less illegible by bolding up the fonts but it's really fuzzy and on my 22" monitor at 1600x1200, I'm constantly squinting to read things (and I have near-perfect vision). Maybe things look better on the twin 30" LCD setups that you see in all of Apple's user profiles but we can't all be Kevin Bacon's wedding photographer.

"Ok great, now give me Footloose! Ok, now Quicksilver!"

The wealth of cheesy classics that guy has done is astounding.

I think Apple is assuming that everyone is running on larger monitors now but they forgot about that resolution thing that also increases, nulling any increase in physical scale. There isn't an option in the application preferences to change the type size and I don't think I'm alone in suggesting it's something that should really be addressed in all of Apple's pro app line. The legibility problem gets even worse with the new-fangled white text on dark grey dialogs introduced with Motion. While on first impression they look slick, it's a generally known thing in publishing that reverse type (white on black) is not easy to read, and so if someone is going to be spending a long time in front of a long article, reverse type is usually avoided. How Apple figures that having small antialiased reverse type is any more tolerable is beyond me and I hope it doesn't become a trend.

I tried to alleviate the problem a bit by disabling anti-aliasing on small font sizes but even after relaunching Aperture, the change in the System Preferences had no effect. Apple should be smarter than to kid themselves about the failed ergonomics of gimicky slick stuff like this. And if they insist on keeping these catchy-looking sales tools like jamming the interface full of tools by using smaller fonts, then at least give us the option of turning them off. That or put some magic sharpening spectacles in the box. Or better yet, two 30" monitors (it would need a bigger box though, so that might not be an option).

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