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Apple Dumps Most of Aperture Dev. Team
SuperMog2002 writes "An article over at Think Secret is reporting that Apple has fired much of the Aperture development team. The Shake and Motion team was assigned to work on Aperture's image processing pipeline for version 1.1. Apple has also dropped the price of Aperture from $499 to $299, and is offering those who purchased the program at $499 a $200 Apple store coupon." From the article: "Perhaps the greatest hope for Aperture's future is that the application's problems are said to be so extensive that any version 2.0 would require major portions of code to be entirely rewritten. With that in mind, the bell may not yet be tolling for Aperture; an entirely new engineering team could salvage the software and bring it up to Apple's usual standards."
Apple had a "bug-ridden" program, due to the (bad) "architecture", where the development process was a "mess" - so they fired the (whole) team responsible. Just a thought.
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
Well, it looks like the RAW processing was both slow and gave unacceptably poor results, the program was buggy and at least one review called it 'unusable in its current form.'
an entirely new engineering team could salvage the software and bring it up to Apple's usual standards.
For a reference, the "Apple's usual standards for software" are "the best application in the Universe" (tm), that's tought to achieve.
They might as well fire all of their Windows ports division as well, QuickTime/iTunes on Windows is a piece of cr*p.
There's a good list of bugs at ars's review of aperture
The one people complained about most is the thumbnails not matching the actual image (and there's reports of this happenning in iPhoto too).
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
I heard they're bringing Woz back to fix it all up nice and purty...
This guy's the limit!
Before posting conspiracy theories and such, you may want to read what others have to say.
Check out Ars Technica's Aperture 1.0 reviwe:
http://arstechnica.com/reviews/apps/aperture.ars
... isn't it? Although I use a Mac Mini most of the time, my work PC with Windows 2000 makes some beautiful music with the latest version of iTunes. What's so bad about it? Seems to function precisely as it does in Mac OSX, my iPod syncs beautifully, etc ... what makes it so awful?
I remember installing QuickTime and some of the preferences are a wee bit clunky, but no more so than **chuckle** Windows Media Player **shudder**.
I don't think anyone's saying that Aperture 1.0 had some bugs and problems (as a 1.0 release of a MAJOR product), and the recently released major update, Aperture 1.1, addresses many of these (not to mention making the application Universal for PowerPC and Intel).
Apple may feel that Aperture's architecture needs to be completely retooled, but it's not going to kill one of its pro software products that has been out for mere months, especially one that was desired as much as Aperture. Apple just needs to figure out internally which teams are going to be responsible for ongoing development and/or retooling.
Yes, Aperture has had mixed reviews, but many people already love it and are basing their entire workflows on it. It's not like it's the incapable piece of utter shit Think Secret makes it out to be. (Gotta love Think Secret's sensationalism lately...must be bitter about becoming progressively more and more wrong about almost all of their pre-event predictions.)
Not an Aperture user, but I was struck by the review in Popular Photography that made some apologies for the horsepower needed to run it. Yes, imaging is tough, but the program was apparently too slow to test unless it was installed on the absolutely most-tricked-out, highly-upgraded Power Mac G5 you can lay your hands on. Usually, the creampuff reviews from such magazines will give this sort of thing only the barest mention. The fact that the review actually talked about it for a few sentences told me that the program had problems.
I really hate having to read between the lines of reviews from mainstream outfits. That's why I love my online sources.
We're saying here that a good strategy for a piece of softwares survival is to make it so bad that someone will be compelled to rewrite it?
No, we're saying that if your software is so bad that you actually have to apologize to people who bought it with cash than it might be a good survival strategy to rewrite it.
KFG
Apple is rebating for software already sold, because it isn't good enough for their standards? My god, what would happen if Microsoft had to live by these standards?
Just an observation: Apple's website's frontpage ad for the new 17" MacBookPro has Aperture on it's screen. If Aperture was so crap and dead as some are suggesting Apple woundn't use it in their advertising for their latest flagship product.
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lightroom: http://labs.macromedia.com/technologies/lightroom/
and the beta is better than the aperture release version
no windows beta at this point, sorry
Adobe/Macromedia does have a direct competitor, It's called Lightroom and is also in beta. http://labs.macromedia.com/technologies/lightroom/
Considering the ongoing litigation "Apple vs. Does" and the fact that "Nick de Plume" of Think Secret fame may be involved, I wouldn't believe ANY information coming out of Think Secret.
From what I've seen, Aperture is a great application that stumbled out of the blocks with some performance issues and fairly poor handling of many devices' RAW formats. The 1.1 update has resolved the bulk of these issues.
If Aperture has any problem, it's that it is a solution in search of a problem. Most amateur photographers' needs are met with iPhoto. Most professional digital photographers are slow to adopt new technologies, because they directly impact the bottom line. It takes time to learn new applications and new methods of working; time that could be better spent working with clients and making money.
Aperture also has direct competition in the form of Adobe Lightroom.
In any case, I find it highly unlikely that Apple has dissolved the development team for an application that just released a 1.1 update and a universal binary to positive reviews. And with the recent price drop, Apple clearly wants to get this application in the hands of the users.
Think Secret is wrong on this one. Perhaps they are wrong on purpose. Could they be intentionally smearing the application in the press? Were they paid off to do so by Adobe?
Hmmm.
Bibble is better, and was started by one guy in his garage that wanted some decent SW for the raw files coming off of his digital camera. At least four developers have touched it over the years...i.e. small, smart and agile development team. I think they're pretty cool. The principal developer/entrepreneur Eric Hyman gladly does the support, and he's a very nice guy besides. The SW is QT based and they do extensive testing on Mac (their professional customer base), Linux (where they get many helpful comments) and Windows. They have a freeware version. The whole series of changes you make to an image are stored as an .XML file, which lets you edit it and script a systematic image-processing stream to apply to whole shoots once you pointy-clicky on a representative image to see what works. Reputed to have the best white-balance algorithm in the business. They're usually the first to decode a new obfuscated raw file format for new cameras, too.
Well, there's something to be said for Apple's decision here. Not many companies (that I have had dealings with) would offer a $200 rebate to everyone who bought a product just because the product was not up to par. Firing the team responsible, plus this rebate, is the kind of mea culpa companies, especially computer-related companies, hardly ever provide. (Granted, the rebate as an Apple coupon is a little unfortunate, but I wouldn't complain about that too much.)
It's hard not to compare this to MS (M$ if you prefer), considering how many times there have been calls for the heads of various decision-makers/teams/ec., and how unrepentant Microsoft has been when their products suck. Not to say they always suck, by any means, but they are the biggest target out their, and a juicy one on this topic.
"Last time I checked, you don't get 'dumped' because your code was amazing."
Of course, no one here is praising the team that got dumped. They are praising the way Apple handled this problem, and bashing MS because many think (rightly, it seems to me) that Microsoft would not have responded at all like this.
Although the moon is smaller than the earth, it is farther away.
The fact is, RAW data doesn't look very good, but Apple showed it with as little alteration as possible, because customers had said that's what they wanted. The RAW importer in Aperture 1.0 showed what was really there, without the prettying-up that the cameras do when they convert to JPEG, or that Photoshop does when it coverts RAW to TIFF.
Several reviewers, including the clown at ARS technica who is admittedly not a pro photographer, and had probably never seen RAW data in his life, complained that it didn't look like images that had been through Adobe's converter.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
That is entirely incorrect.
Photoshop is an image manipulation tool. Aperture is a tool for professional photographers and photo editors (I don't mean people who manipulate photos, I mean people in editorial positions who select photos to be used for a purpose -- think "the photo editor at the New York Times" type of position) that has its strengths in managing RAW image files as if they were JPEGs like iPhoto can. It has phenomenal capabilities around metadata and managing a large library, and offers the basic correction tools that photographers would need (exposure, color correction, saturation, contrast, sharpening, etc.).
There is little to no overlap with Photoshop, nor is there any evidence that Aperture has been "killed."
I happen to be a photographer, and have the problems that Aperture solved. At an event, I might easily shoot over 800 exposures. Before Aperture it would take me at least a day or two to sort through them and make my selects. At an event a week ago, I was able to sort through 762 exposures and pull out about 120 selects in under two hours. It has more than paid for itself many times over in productivity savings.
Chris -- http://www.bitter.net/
When I read the article on ThinkSecret, which is entirely a rumor, I thought to myself "I wonder how long it will take for this unfounded rumor to spread as if it were fact through the Internet like wildfire." Well, obviously the answer to that is not very long.
It's also obvious that whoever wrote the ThinkSecret article hasn't actually used Aperture. While Aperture is not perfect it does many thing much better than anyone else and some things that no else does. It's multi-monitor support is better than any other application on the market. And its photo organization and rating features are among the best. In my opinion Aperture was designed very well. Sure there are bugs, but it's only at 1.1 right now which is a good improvement over 1.0.
I don't think that Aperture will be going away any time soon.
infested with jello like fishes no melotron wishes
I know two of the engineers who wrote Aperture. They have both moved to other groups, one to Application Frameworks, and one to CoreImage. In each case, their new job is a higher-profile position. If there had been a round of firings of the Aperture developers, I would have heard about it.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Don't forget, this is Think Secret, who hasn't been right about anything for nine months now. Where is our touchscreen video iPod, our Mac mini PVR, our "iPhone," etc.?
It's weird how in tech journalism, you can get away with being wrong about nearly everything for almost a year and still get your stories read.
"Sufferin' succotash."
I think before you put TOO much weight on the Ars review, you should take into consideration what jcr said above, because I think it's an important point.
Saying that Aperture's output isn't as pretty as Photoshop's is like complaining that your photos look shittier on slides than on prints, without taking into consideration that with the slide you're looking at your own (and the camera's) handiwork and nothing else, while with the print you're looking at something that's been optimized by someone else (the printer) to look good.
The speed problems are unacceptable though. I just thought the Aperture/Photoshop comparison wasn't a great one; although it's odd to say it, Photoshop has become a "mid grade" application, I think Aperture was going for an even 'more-pro' crowd than the average Photoshop user.
I think in retrospect Apple is realizing maybe that market is smaller than they originally thought.
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Posting anonymously for obvious reasons.
Most of the team was not fired, they simply found new positions in Apple once 1.0 was completed because the project management was too shoddy. For instance I am now back working on Mac OS X. Most of the management however has been fired.
Aperture is not being abandoned but is just being reorganised.
Many of the problems in Aperture were caused, not fixed, by the Shake and Motion teams contributions. Originally the rendering pipeline, based on Core Image, was working fine but it was decided to speed it up so over a period of 4 months it was rewritten. It has never worked correctly since then.
The flamefest at Ars Technica about that was actually quite informative. RAW really is a raw dump of Camera sensors and looks like nothing without being "prettyed-up". So's apparently it is incorrect to say that Apple wasn't manipulating the RAW, they just weren't doing it to the same level of other products.
Whenever I hear the word 'Innovation', I reach for my pistol.
"customers had said that's what they wanted." That's something as a software engineer I learned years ago. Customers don't really know what they want. What you have to do is work with the and get to know them well enough that you get to know what they need. Aperture was not a total failure. It does most of what isneeded but Version 1.0 was not at all ready to be realeased. Aple should have done what Adobe did with Lightroom. They called the first release "Beta" and made it a free download. Adobe gets comments from real customers and no one is upset with Adobe because they didn't pay anything. But Adobe gets free feedback from real users The other thing in Apple's favor is that no one knows what one of these kinds of programs should do. Spreadsheets are mature, we know what one should do but these "raw workflow programs"? What are they? Apple was breaking new ground and taking a risk. Get them credit for that.
Actually, it is pretty bad.
That's just a small smatterng of the problems I've found with 1.1...
Please help metamoderate.
The rumour/inside dope I got was, an untouchable star was put in charge of Aperture. He could do no wrong because of a reputation gained from another project, but the rep was built off the backs of others who had covered for his serious coding and management deficiencies.
He was given free reign with Aperture, and since it was built from scratch, the projects structural flaws were built in from the beginning, without anyone having the clout to say "Hey, somethings wrong!". Nobody in the company knew nothing until around the first public demonstration, when it looked awfully pretty, but was nowhere near ready to be handed off to market. With a clear picture of what a mess the project was (and the star floating above the fray, unsullied of course), upper management gutted every other project to get SOMETHING shipped in time. So Aperture shipped, who knows if the star's status will be re-evaluated, and NAB gets less of an Apple splash because of all the talent diverted to clean up a mess,
The major problem, of course is that Aperture originated within Apple. Name a great piece of Apple software (OS X, FCP, Shake, iTunes). It was brought in from elswhere and given a pretty face. Stuff that was created from scratch--ignore until version 3.0
DVD Studio 1.5 was a steaming pile of **** and at $999 was a poorly layed-out, extremely confusing and unfinished application, basically it was little better than the raw app Apple picked up from Macromedia.
Half a version number and $500 less you have DVD Studio Pro 2, a complete rewrite that is easy to use, very well organized and works as advertised. The later versions get even better.
Apple seems to know when to throw away a dead end project and start again (Copland ring a bell?), and although I personally don't think Apperture is all that bad, I did think that it was too expensive at the original $499 price. I expect great things from Apperture 2.0
I have a studio, I shoot professionally every day. I run aperture on a Quad G5 with 8gigs of RAM it has been the best peice of image management software to date. The workflow is increadable. Yes the raw quality isn't as good as adobe's Camera Raw but adobe's wasn't as great in its first version either. The quality is 95% there. Yes there were some bugs and with any new software a learning curve (which scares most people) but honestly everything runs fine for me and it has cut my post production time and image management time 75% Also when i bring clients in i can whip photos around on two apple Cinema Displays with ease make selects in 15min normally, and there's the wow factor of images flying around (clients like blinking lights and razzle dazzle). What apple "Did" with their team is what apple does. Makes the best software availible bar none. This isn't for this article but lets face it they make the best desktop system bar none. They don't settle for 95% they settle for 110% (10% being the extra things they invented that you need but didn't know you needed untill they showed them to you). I personally think fireing it had a lot to do with the level of hardware needed to run it lets be honest how many times have you programed something and it chokes on your parents 5 yo comp but runs perfectly on yours. At anyrate if you buy a new $5k~20k camera every 2~3 years you can pony up for a Quad G5 to get the job done.
I use Aperture daily, along with photoshop and the other programs you'd expect a professional photographer to use heavily. Since the release of the 1.1 update several weeks ago, I can honestly say that Aperture is one of the nicer apps I use on a regular basis. But prior to that, Aperture was already saving me more time (read: $$) than any other tool I have.
Aperture is designed to let me import hundreds of photos from a shoot, in RAW, jpeg, whatever, QUICKLY add metadata, rate, sort, color correct for white balance, exposure etc.. This gets me to the point where I can now proof the images to my clients. The photos haven't been retouched, they are just in the form that lets a client see my skill as a photographer, and what images they have to choose from.
No matter who the client is, commercial, fashion, wedding, headshot... the faster I can let them see the proofs the better. From the 500 images in an average session... the client will only choose a few, which are then retouched in photoshop. I think this is what is hard for non-photographers to grasp; the sheer number of images NOT used. The workflow is designed to select only a few choice images, and then begin your post production processing of those selected images.
In many cases, especially with studio sessions, nothing really needs retouching after the image has been "tuned" in Aperture. Many times I'm sending the image versions directly from aperture to my lab printer. It is wonderful to use the Soft Proofing built-in to Aperture. It works great.
An important, but often overlooked core feature of Aperture is its top notch asset management system with versioning. Sure Subversion and CVS do version management better, but many of my colleagues have trouble with the concepts behind webmail, so Apertures simplicity in this area is admirable. I expect many new features will be added to the versioning and Vault system (like multiple library support), but much of what it does already is a major time saver. There are certainly alternatives, like lightroom, and bibble, which are each excellent in their own ways, but Aperture is more complete, and meets my needs better for now. Your mileage mat vary.
Lastly, I'm running Aperture on a G4 Powerbook. It runs fine. My RAW files are between 15Mb and 20Mb in size, and Aperture handles the hundreds of images per session fine. Could it be faster? Sure, what couldn't. But its not the nightmare that some report.
I keep seeing references to the "non-pro" "clown over at Ars Technica" who reviewed Aperture, but you know what, I thought the Ars review was quite solid, not only because his reasons for his opinions were legitimate, but also because his conclusions were corroborated by many other reviewers who have more "cred." I HAVE worked with RAW files, and after reading his review I concluded that the Ars review was fine.
jcr also reveals his own lack of knowledge about RAW by claiming that "The RAW importer in Aperture 1.0 showed what was really there, without the prettying-up..." That is flat-out wrong. RAW files have no intrinsic appearance. They are a single-channel grayscale file that is interpreted into three-channel RGB. There is no such thing as an "unaltered" RAW file because every RAW file must be interpreted using a set of assumptions. Every RAW converter is coded with its own set of assumptions as to what a "good" image looks like. It is much like printing from color negative film (as opposed to color positive film).
You need to understand that in order to understand the next point. Because there can be no "reference image," there really is no 100% right or wrong interpretation. So how could Aperture make an image that looks "right" with respect to user expectations? For that you have to understand what user expectations are based on. User expectations are based on the conversion performed by each camera maker's own RAW converter. Those are the individual targets Apple tried to hit.
The Adobe converter engineers, on the other hand, believe that most camera software makes images that have too much contrast and clipping and lack shadow detail. In other words, Adobe believes most camera defaults are aimed at making nice snapshots. The Adobe converter's interpretation is based on this philosophy. A certain number of users believe the Adobe conversions look better. Those who believe (rightly or wrongly) that the camera maker's interpretation are gospel tend to think the Adobe conversions look worse and Aperture looks better.
Every default raw conversion will involve a certain amount of image processing, sharpening, etc. that was not present in the original RAW data, and it is for that reason and the reasons in the previous paragraphs that jcr's statement is incorrect.