On Wednesday, October 19, 2005, Apple Computer introduced Aperture, the first all-in-one post production tool that provides everything photographers need after the shoot. Aperture offers an advanced and incredibly fast RAW workflow that makes working with a camera’s RAW images as easy as JPEG. Built from the ground up for pros, Aperture features powerful compare and select tools, nondestructive image processing, color managed printing and custom web and book publishing.
“Aperture’s saving mechanism is different: it doesn’t, or at least not in the normal sense that we’re used to. Instead, whenever an edit is applied to an image, Aperture will note that editt in its database. The more edits you make, the more records are added to the database, where each record is an edit. If you need to modify or remove a previous edit, you track it down in the database, and either amend the record (thus amending the edit) or delete it (thus eliminating the edit). And all edits remain whether or not you consciously save them. In fact, Aperture does away with the common ‘Save’ command because the edits are already saved in the database! A “Save” command would be redundant,” Yuhui writes for Yuhui’s World of Wonder.
“This is A Good Thing™ because it does away with the ‘Oh drats’ situation. Imagine if you’re typing in, oh, OpenOffice and realise too late that you changed your client’s name when you shouldn’t have. And horrors! You don’t know how it’s actually spelled! You can’t call the client, because that would be embarrassing,” Yuhui writes. “If OpenOffice had an Aperture-like method of saving documents, you would be able to search through the database of changes, find the record that says ‘You renamed the client’s name to something idiotic’ and delete it. Boom! Your client’s name is back to what it was, and the rest of your document is as before.”
“And that is revolutionary. Yes, there is the ‘Undo’ function in most programs, but these destroy the changes that you ‘step back’ through. For example, if your mistake happened at change #10, you’ll have to undo the last 10 changes, then reapply the nine changes that come after #10. What happens if you forget what changes you made those nine times? Good luck,” Yuhui writes.
Yuhui writes, “Unfortunately, I don’t see something like this becoming more mainstream. Sad to say, a lot of mainstream programs are stuck in an innovation rut. But I hope that Apple will be able to extend this database-saving mechanism to the rest of its programs. Once other developers see how cool it is, then perhaps they’ll also implement it. And then the revolution will be complete.”
Full article here.
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MacDailyNews Note: Apple’s iPhoto, which preceded Aperture, also has no “Save” command. iPhoto automatically saves changes to a photo, album, slideshow, or book as you work, so there’s no Save command. In a much more limited manner than Aperture, with iPhoto, if you don’t like the changes you’ve made to a photo, you can undo your most recent change by choosing Undo from the Edit menu. You can also revert to a photo’s original version by choosing “Revert to Original” from the Photos menu.
Related MacDailyNews articles:
Apple’s Aperture more revolutionary than you might think – October 21, 2005
Apple’s new Aperture signals that Photoshop is no longer invulnerable – October 20, 2005
Pro photographers see Apple’s Aperture as complement to Adobe Photoshop – October 20, 2005
Does Apple’s Aperture threaten Adobe’s Photoshop? – October 20, 2005
Apple’s revolutionary new Aperture software a must have for every professional photographer – October 19, 2005
Apple introduces Aperture, first all-in-one post production tool for photographers – October 19, 2005