Mac post -Aperture or Elements?

[JRO]

Has anyone here used Aperture? I am in the midst of the free 30 day trial and was wondering if anyone more experienced than I had some feedback for me.

So far I like it, though being a novice with post production color correction I seem to be making my ocean purple as my sharks color gets just about perfect.

So I guess I really have two questions;
1) Aperture or Elements?
2) Any tips, tricks, presets, etc for getting that beautiful blue ocean without having beautiful blue sharks?

Thanks for the help,

Jeff

 

[bvanant]

Aperture or lightroom. Elements and Photoshop are really designed for graphics folks who put pictures into other documents. Lightroom and aperture are for photographers.
Bill

 

[M_Bipartitus]

I've used Aperture and Photoshop for some years, both are useful as they have different roles in the post-production workflow, as bvansnt said. Aperature (or Lightroom) is best for managing all your photos and applying corrections to entire images. Elements (or full Photoshop) is best for detailed changes to individual files, such as combining photos, making changes to parts of a photo, or adding artistic effects.

As for your purple ocean,

The first tip I would give for that is to play with the Levels adjustment. By selecting just the red channel, you have more control over the final colors. It takes some fiddling to learn what adjustments to make, but if can be good to learn.

A second option is to use the "color" adjustment (normally all the way at the bottom) after you have the subject looking like you want. Use the eyedropper to select the purple ocean color you want to change. Now use the Hue and Saturation controls to change the color of just the purple parts of the photo. You may also need to adjust the Luminance to get it just right.

A third idea is to put the photo into elements or Photoshop and split it into two layers. One for your shark and one for the background. You can then apply different adjustments to each layer. This is almost certainly going to be more time consuming and needs to be done separately for each photo. The first two methods can be applied to many photos using Aperature's "lift & stamp" functions. you can then go back and make fine adjustments.

If you would like more details on any of these methods, or any other questions, just ask.

 

[strobeless]

Hello JRO, I'm somewhat new to this board. I think a great deal of this question also depends on how many photos you take per session and per year. I'll get maybe 30 to 70 shots per session, and am lucky to get 6 dive trips in a year, so I don't feel the need for a dedicated light table/loupe program like Aperature, I just plod through my photos in photoshop siphoning the "keepers" into new folders as .psd files so I'm doing all the sorting myself. I can use bridge to view the keeper folders if I need to, and I also make separate iPhoto albums (yes, iPhoto :shocked2 for use with automated web gallery programs.

I think the photography vs graphics issue applies purely to "On Land" photography. IMHO the color challenges involved with underwater photography make photoshop an eventuality that cannot be avoided.

If budget is a concern, or if you shoot zillions of photos, you might get Aperture first. If your number of photos is not unmanageable and you've got the dough-ray-me, you might want to go straight to photoshop first.

As for sharks vs water, with color editing, you always move from the largest problem first to the smallest problem last. As M_Bipartitus aluded to, in underwater photo levels will almost always be your largest problem and will almost always be your first move. If your levels are fairly straight you could then move on to the shark and you could use a selective color tool to futz with the shark.

The Selective Color color control in photoshop has Neutrals, which you could use for the shark in which case you would not even have to select the shark. Hue Satch selective color control has no neutrals so in that case you have to at least make a loose selection. Selective Color in this case would be your best choice over Hue Satch, but it is a CMYK tool so it might intimidate new users and is probably not available in Elements.

Hope that helps. I'm somewhat long-winded, I know.

 

[ryssyr]

i have both. I routinely use aperture for managing my photos and have some workflows to do some color adjustments based on my standard dive locations. try using the eye dropper in the white balance area. also I like to toggle the view (using the 'v' key) so that I see only the image I am focusing on. then I use the heads up display (using the 'h' key) to toggle that on and off.

You might also notice that your output images look different than on your screen. you will want to set your image presets. go to Aperture-->presets-->image export

then look carefully about 1/2 way down the right panel and you will see ColorSync profile. I use ProPhotoRGB which matches closely what my print shop needs to get good calibration to the output I order.

The other great features in Aperture is the photo album assembly. PM me if you need any other tips.

 

[JRO]

Ok, thank you for the help. I didn't realize that the two programs were complimentary and not necessarily two versions of the same thing.

From the input you guys have given, it sounds as though I could just use iphoto for organizing (it seems very capable) and pick up photoshop. Please let me know if my logic is flawed. Also, is Elements good enough for the lighter user? (about 1000 pics a year or so)

 

[M_Bipartitus]

If you aren't familiar with photoshop, Elements should be sufficient. Most of the functionality you are likely to use is there and some things are a little easier to do, IIRC. There is a lot that Photoshop can do, but it's overkill until you start to push Elements to it's limits.

iPhoto could work for you in conjunction with Elements. iPhoto has fewer options for adjustments compared to Aperture. Since all of adjustments you should need are in Elements, you can get all the features you need. It just might tae a little longer as the two are not well integrated, to the best of my knowledge.

 

[bvanant]

Ok, thank you for the help. I didn't realize that the two programs were complimentary and not necessarily two versions of the same thing.

From the input you guys have given, it sounds as though I could just use iphoto for organizing (it seems very capable) and pick up photoshop. Please let me know if my logic is flawed. Also, is Elements good enough for the lighter user? (about 1000 pics a year or so)

Go online to the Apple and Adobe sites. Download the software and play with them all for 30 days. If I were only to get one piece, it would be lightroom or aperture. Not PS nor PS elements. Lightroom and Aperture are designed for photographers and other than using masks and layers for composite outputs, there is nothing that I can do in PS that I can't do in Lightroom. The idea of non-destructive editing of my raw images is one that is very compelling and more importantly, Lightroom/Aperture will not only let you edit your pics but keep them organized as well. In PS you will need to use Bridge which to me is a four letter word.
Bill