The Demise of Aperture

The Loop reported today that Apple has decided to kill off Aperture and funnel all its efforts into their new Photos app.

This is the best possible move for Apple and perhaps photographers in general who use Macs. Apple has always played to what makes computing easier and more pleasurable to the majority of its users. Aperture did not fit that bill.

Most photographers (the 99% who don't have clients) are better served by photo software that allows them to protect, edit and organize their photos in the fastest, easiest way possible, so they can go out and make more photos.

Aperture and Lightroom have traditionally done the opposite. They've become "everything buckets" for your photography. They've both stolen an insane amount of creative hours from photographers. Aperture is dead. I hope Lightroom follows.

The solution for those who morn the loss is to get apps that specialize. Get the best app for organizing and storage, get the best app for editing and get the best app for output. If you examine your needs, those very well be separate (and more enjoyable) apps.

Update: I don't know if the new Photos app is just another everything bucket. I'm hoping Apple is smart enough to figure out what the majority of photographers need (which is probably 10% of what Lightroom CAN do), and concentrate on making that feature set fast, lightweight and fun. That may get me to switch from using separate apps for everything.