More Apple Photos extensions are on the way

tokyojerry · Jan 12, 2016

All the feedback I am reading thus far, it seems I should give dedicated time to dark table. Am trying to find the least common denominator with the fewest 'headaches' for task accomplishment. Adobe's recurrring fee subscription model I don't like. Neither do have a lot of fondness for Apple's walled garden 'controlism' approach. I reckon these are to be excpected as each vendor attempts to define their own business model for revenue generation. So, on a personal level, it seems the path of least resistance right now is dark table, or some degree of tolerance for Photos.

robgendreau · Jan 12, 2016

Note that if you do go for the free Adobe Bridge, it does NOT include Adobe Camera Raw, unless something has changed lately. It can preview RAWs, but I think it just uses the embedded JPEG.

And in addition to media files, it can do a lot with other files as well, especially PDFs. A drawback of Bridge IMHO is that you can't manage Mac OS tags there; it does keywords well, but of course not all files can contain keywords (Mac OS tags are different, and are written as extended attributes in the filesystem itself). An alternative if you like tags is Leap, which can at least read (only) keywords, but also apply and read tags.

grcolts · Jan 12, 2016

tokyojerry said:
All the feedback I am reading thus far, it seems I should give dedicated time to dark table. Am trying to find the least common denominator with the fewest 'headaches' for task accomplishment. Adobe's recurrring fee subscription model I don't like. Neither do have a lot of fondness for Apple's walled garden 'controlism' approach. I reckon these are to be excpected as each vendor attempts to define their own business model for revenue generation. So, on a personal level, it seems the path of least resistance right now is dark table, or some degree of tolerance for Photos.

rb0321 · Jan 13, 2016

grcolts said:
rb0321 said:

Darktable was definitely daunting at first, and I think it's one of those programs that requires reading the manual fairly carefully, with frequent references back to it, until you get to that place where things start to 'click'. At this point I'm surprised a program this good is free.

--
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rb00321/

Click to expand...

Ditto on DT; Photos is useful on some images but in general does not go far enough. I miss Aperture and wish it were still being supported. Aperture was what basically brought me to Apple.

GR

Continuing to discover new things about DT and liking it very much. There's no batch processing but it would be nice to be able to copy the adjustments made to one image and apply them to another similar image, as a starting point.

So far I'm having to start from scratch with every image. It's fine for small batches but would be overly time consuming for a big day out with several hundred shots.

Have you found a way to copy the settings from one image to another in DT?

--
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rb00321/

grcolts · Jan 13, 2016

rb0321 said:
grcolts said:

rb0321 said:

Darktable was definitely daunting at first, and I think it's one of those programs that requires reading the manual fairly carefully, with frequent references back to it, until you get to that place where things start to 'click'. At this point I'm surprised a program this good is free.

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

rb0321 · Jan 13, 2016

grcolts said:
rb0321 said:

Continuing to discover new things about DT and liking it very much. There's no batch processing but it would be nice to be able to copy the adjustments made to one image and apply them to another similar image, as a starting point.

So far I'm having to start from scratch with every image. It's fine for small batches but would be overly time consuming for a big day out with several hundred shots.

Have you found a way to copy the settings from one image to another in DT?

--
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rb00321/

Click to expand...

Under the history stack you will find copy, copy all, paste, and paste all.

It is very handy and quick to apply the settings to other images. If you want to apply your settings to all of your images at once, select all, then copy all and paste all.

Hope this helps..

GR

Yeah, that seemed like the most logical place to look but I'm not seeing it. In the darkroom there's just the list of edits done, plus the icon you click to create a style. In lighttable I've looked everywhere and can't find what's referenced in the user manual. Is it something you have to enable in preferences?

Edit - OK, found it, kept looking for it on the left for some reason.

Thanks!

--
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rb00321/

tokyojerry · Jan 13, 2016

Thanks for the feedback. Yeah, I was exploring the interface a bit this morning and looking through online resources on reviews, opinions, etc.. It seems to be quite a powerful program although not the quickest loading. And it will be a daunting task to understand all it can do. Some rough edges like tiny squint eyed fonts on the interface, (how to increase size, IF, they can be increased) trying to read what each function does and how to use it. Also, the photo being editted only appears as a smaller frame size in the center of the screen edit area rather then filling the full photo edit area. I will get a hold of a PDF manual if available and do some reading. Better still, perhaps there may be some useful youtube videos on darktable. Often, 'A picture says a thousand words'.

tokyojerry · Jan 13, 2016

rb0321 said:
grcolts said:

rb0321 said:

Darktable was definitely daunting at first, and I think it's one of those programs that requires reading the manual fairly carefully, with frequent references back to it, until you get to that place where things start to 'click'. At this point I'm surprised a program this good is free.

--
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rb00321/

Click to expand...

Ditto on DT; Photos is useful on some images but in general does not go far enough. I miss Aperture and wish it were still being supported. Aperture was what basically brought me to Apple.

GR

Click to expand...

Continuing to discover new things about DT and liking it very much. There's no batch processing but it would be nice to be able to copy the adjustments made to one image and apply them to another similar image, as a starting point.

So far I'm having to start from scratch with every image. It's fine for small batches but would be overly time consuming for a big day out with several hundred shots.

Have you found a way to copy the settings from one image to another in DT?

--
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rb00321/

I also am new to darktable and discovering bit by bit. Regard your concern about batch processing, I did find this and wonder if that might be what you are looking for?

Click the tiny icons to the left of a function brings up this popup allowing for auto application of a preset to similar images.

Not sure if that is useful or what you might be looking for.

--
Jerry Suppan
(a.k.a. tokyojerry)
Tokyo, Japan

rb0321 · Jan 13, 2016

tokyojerry said:
rb0321 said:

Continuing to discover new things about DT and liking it very much. There's no batch processing but it would be nice to be able to copy the adjustments made to one image and apply them to another similar image, as a starting point.

So far I'm having to start from scratch with every image. It's fine for small batches but would be overly time consuming for a big day out with several hundred shots.

Have you found a way to copy the settings from one image to another in DT?

--
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rb00321/

Click to expand...

I also am new to darktable and discovering bit by bit. Regard your concern about batch processing, I did find this and wonder if that might be what you are looking for?

Click the tiny icons to the left of a function brings up this popup allowing for auto application of a preset to similar images.

Not sure if that is useful or what you might be looking for.

--
Jerry Suppan
(a.k.a. tokyojerry)
Tokyo, Japan

Not quite but Thanks for the suggestion. Did find that and tried it but I was looking for a simple copy and paste of current edits from one image to another, similar to LR. Didn't find it in the darkroom view because it's in the lighttable view. Here's a link to the user manual about it.

http://www.darktable.org/usermanual/ch02s03s07.html.php

Another quick way I just found is to single click an image that has been edited while in lighttable view. Hitting Ctrl-C copies the image stack to the clipboard. Single click another image you want to paste the stack to and hit Ctrl-V. Viola, the image stack is pasted and you can go to darkroom view and tweak as needed.

--
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rb00321/

tokyojerry · Jan 13, 2016

Well, at least that is one good feature / function of Apple's Photos.app, although it has a lot to be desired besides that.

Thanks for the link info to darkroom manual. I noticed that links to html of the v1.6. Here is a link to a PDF file of the latest v2.0. It might have updated information on the batch copy/paste feature you seek.

https://github.com/darktable-org/darktable/releases/download/release-2.0.0/darktable-usermanual.pdf

Subsequent to posting the above I watched a YouTube video relative to the changes from v1.6 to v2.0. You may want to have a look at the video for yourself. About 25 minutes and goes through some changes in Darktable from v1.6 to v2.0 You might be particularly interested to watch around the 10m or 11m poiint if you don't have the time to watch the entire video. This may be what you are seeking in applying adjustments to a set of files. It does not just take the settings made to a single photo and generically apply those settings to a batch of photos. Darktable 2.0 will take those settings from the copied image and recalculate the algorithm for each individual image to which you wish to apply those settings. Check it out.

--
Jerry Suppan
(a.k.a. tokyojerry)
Tokyo, Japan

rb0321 · Jan 15, 2016

tokyojerry said:
Well, at least that is one good feature / function of Apple's Photos.app, although it has a lot to be desired besides that.

Thanks for the link info to darkroom manual. I noticed that links to html of the v1.6. Here is a link to a PDF file of the latest v2.0. It might have updated information on the batch copy/paste feature you seek.

https://github.com/darktable-org/darktable/releases/download/release-2.0.0/darktable-usermanual.pdf

Subsequent to posting the above I watched a YouTube video relative to the changes from v1.6 to v2.0. You may want to have a look at the video for yourself. About 25 minutes and goes through some changes in Darktable from v1.6 to v2.0 You might be particularly interested to watch around the 10m or 11m poiint if you don't have the time to watch the entire video. This may be what you are seeking in applying adjustments to a set of files. It does not just take the settings made to a single photo and generically apply those settings to a batch of photos. Darktable 2.0 will take those settings from the copied image and recalculate the algorithm for each individual image to which you wish to apply those settings. Check it out.

--
Jerry Suppan
(a.k.a. tokyojerry)
Tokyo, Japan

The youtube video was very helpful and it’s nice to have the latest manual. ;-) Thanks for the link.

After playing around with DT some more I find it very capable but fairly cumbersome compared to LR. The NR isn’t as easy to use, or quite as good as LR. The lens corrections seem to work reasonably well but there’s no correction for vertical or horizontal distortion like there is in LR, and it’s something I use more often than I thought.

Overall, I have to say I could live with DT if I had to, but I’ve been using LR for several years, have gotten fast and proficient with it, and because that LR would be very hard to give up if I were to move to Linux. Despite these few shortcomings I'm going to keep using DT to see if my workflow with it continues to improve.

--

Bob

Explore Bob’s 898 photos on Flickr!

www.flickr.com

Gesture · Jan 15, 2016

I downloaded the Mac version. Is there a way to print an image? Not finding it.

rb0321 · Jan 15, 2016

Gesture said:
I downloaded the Mac version. Is there a way to print an image? Not finding it.

Yes, on the top right of the user interface click print, or you can type 'p'. Tried a quick test print and it was too warm. There don't seem to be many options compared to LR but I haven't played with it much yet.

Gesture · Jan 15, 2016

Thanks.

JRS88 · Jan 15, 2016

Gesture said:
I don't get it. Working under El Capitan, Preview seems to me to be a much more capable photo editor. Yes, Photos can import/organize, but shocked at how limited it is overall.

There has to be a market for a decent photo organizer on the Mac that is less expensive than Lightroom? I want individual albums/galleries that are just links to the photos stored elsewhere. Not an all-in-one library. Also, I want to be able to conveniently delete entries from the organizer. And, please, don't automatically ID all the people pictures for me.

Any products out there?

Maybe check out Mylio. It is not perfect, but a promising product with good customer service, a fast UI, good replication/protection features and what looks like a big pipeline of additional features. One of their headline features is managing photos from multiple devices and letting you choose to replicate just thumbnails, editable previews or original photo files.

Like LR, Mylio leaves your photos where they are and uses XMP sidecars for metadata and edit info (compatible with LR/PS). So if they go bust you don't lose your edits. I've been A-B testing with LR and compatibility seems good, so far.

They have multiple tiers which are not all cheap. But there is a 30 day trial to see if it is worthwhile. They also seem to keep upgrading the tiers - e.g. the free tier used to allow just 1000 photos, now allows 10,000 photos.

Caveat: All versions work with JPEGs. RAW editing purportedly only works with the middle and upper tiers.

Mike Boreham · Jan 16, 2016

tokyojerry said:
Well, at least that is one good feature / function of Apple's Photos.app, although it has a lot to be desired besides that.

Thanks for the link info to darkroom manual. I noticed that links to html of the v1.6. Here is a link to a PDF file of the latest v2.0. It might have updated information on the batch copy/paste feature you seek.

https://github.com/darktable-org/darktable/releases/download/release-2.0.0/darktable-usermanual.pdf

Subsequent to posting the above I watched a YouTube video relative to the changes from v1.6 to v2.0. You may want to have a look at the video for yourself. About 25 minutes and goes through some changes in Darktable from v1.6 to v2.0 You might be particularly interested to watch around the 10m or 11m poiint if you don't have the time to watch the entire video. This may be what you are seeking in applying adjustments to a set of files. It does not just take the settings made to a single photo and generically apply those settings to a batch of photos. Darktable 2.0 will take those settings from the copied image and recalculate the algorithm for each individual image to which you wish to apply those settings. Check it out.

--
Jerry Suppan
(a.k.a. tokyojerry)
Tokyo, Japan

WOW! Thanks for that screenshot Jerry, I had completely missed the copy/paste adjustments in Photos until seeing that.

tokyojerry · Jan 16, 2016

FWIW, just today I discovered a program called Lyve. Essentially it is something similar to the Mylio concept, but is free. You don't story all your photos online. You access them via thumbnail images regardless where they were created. Then, you download only the image(s) that you want to work on whatever device that might be. You can synchronize data across all devices and macs and Windows machines.

Here is a review of the app: http://www.cnet.com/products/lyve-app/

and their actual website for: https://www.mylyve.com/features

Has anyone considered Cyberlink's PhotoDirector Suite as an alternate to Lightroom?

Loading…

www.cyberlink.com

It seems to be quite a robust alternative.

tokyojerry · Jan 16, 2016

You are welcome. Only caveat though is, you can not highlight several files to apply in batch. Need to paste adjustments to each photo one by one. What is Apple thinking when they develop their programs? Lack of capital in spite of being the #1 capitalized company of any country on the face of planet earth? One would think that inclusion of such a basic function / capability in the development of their Photos.app would (should) almost be a no brainer. Anyway, better then nothing.

As an aside, I am also looking at Cyberlink's Photodirector Suite as a possible alternative to LR, or maybe even photos. http://www.cyberlink.com/products/photodirector-suite/features_en_US.html

--
Jerry Suppan
(a.k.a. tokyojerry)
Tokyo, Japan

Gesture · Jan 16, 2016

Thanks. Will look at it. Finally seeing more applications. The good news: people are taking more photos, even if on smart phones. Overall good for photography.

Gesture · Jan 16, 2016

Thanks, Jerry.

More Apple Photos extensions are on the way

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