AppleInsider Staff
Apple on Thursday notified customers who have previously purchased its Aperture photography software that the application will soon be removed from the Mac App Store, and invited those users to try the new Photos app as part of the OS X 10.10.3 public beta.
The update came early Thursday afternoon in an e-mail missive with the subject "Aperture News," apparently directed at those who have purchased Aperture through the Mac App Store. Apple reminded users that they will no longer be able to purchase Aperture after the release of Photos, though it will remain functional in OS X Yosemite.
Aperture users can migrate their library to the new Photos app, and that process will move all photos, adjustments, albums, and keywords. Apple invited those who wish to evaluate Photos before making a decision on which migration path to take — either to Photos or to a competitor like Adobe's Lightroom — to sign up for the OS X 10.10.3 public beta program, which includes the new Photos app.
Announced last June, Photos for OS X replaces not only Aperture, but also iPhoto, Apple's long-serving consumer photo organizer. AppleInsider went hands-on with the new Photos app last month, and found it a capable iPhoto replacement that continues to blur the lines between iOS and OS X.
The text of Apple's email is reproduced in its entirety below.
Dear Aperture customer,
Last June, we introduced the new Photos apps for iOS 8 and OS X Yosemite, along with iCloud Photo Library, which lets you safely store all your photos in iCloud and access them from anywhere.
When Photos for OS X launches this spring, Aperture will no longer be available for purchase from the Mac App Store. You can continue to use Aperture on OS X Yosemite, but you will not be able to buy additional copies of the app.
You can migrate your Aperture library to Photos for OS X, including your photos, adjustments, albums, and keywords. After migrating, your Aperture library remains intact. However, Aperture and Photos do not share a unified library, so any changes made after the migration will not be shared between the apps.
To learn more about Photos for OS X, click here. If you're interested in trying the OS X 10.10.3 Public Beta, which includes Photos for OS X, click here.
We thank you for using Aperture and hope you will enjoy the new Photos for OS X app.
Sincerely,
Apple
William Gallagher
Christine McKee
Chip Loder
Malcolm Owen
70 Comments
The new photo app is NOWHERE NEAR A COMPETENT REPLACEMENT for Aperture. There are ZERO editing tools other than rotate, and other worthless BS.
The new photo app is NOWHERE NEAR A COMPETENT REPLACEMENT for Aperture. There are ZERO editing tools other than rotate, and other worthless BS.
Hands down Photos is more responsive and since you've got to start somewhere, I'm happy it is with that.
Aperture still works, though, jeez.
Meaning that the other available editing tools are BS or that other, non-editing functions are BS?
Perhaps Apple will announce Photos plug-in support at the Watch event Monday? They seem like pretty disparate announcements, so I doubt this myself... Too soon to encourage pros to make the move, even according to iMore.
Could someone explain to me what happens in the following scenarios with iCloud Photos:
1. My Photos library in OS X exceeds the available flash size on my iOS device. Which photos will sync from the iCloud Photos and which will not? Am I going to be given a choice? This is a scenario that the majority of iOS users will face due to their current iPhoto or Aperture library size being hundreds of gigabytes.
2 In my Family Sharing scenario, I want to have one Family photo library and have all devices (including Apple TV) to be able to sync from this one master photo library that currently lives on one of the Macs, but with iCloud Photos enabled will also be synced to iCloud. Will Family Sharing support photo sharing in the same way as it supports app sharing and music sharing?
I do realize that I can use the Shared Streams to be able to share some or all of the "master" photo library with other iCloud accounts, including my family members' iCloud accounts. However, if I decide that I want my family members to have access to the entire photo library (that will be migrated from Aperture to Photos and synced to iCloud), which is currently 500 GB, I would have to purchase 500 GB of iCloud storage for every family member. If I never migrated to Family Sharing and continued to have one "master" iCloud account as the iCloud account on every iOS and OS X device in my family, I would not need to purchase 500 GB multiple times as every one of my devices would be able to share the same 500 GB purchased for the "master" account. So, it seems strange to me that Apple encouraged people to use Family Sharing to share apps and music among different iCloud accounts that are part of the same Family Sharing setup, but at the same time, Apple has no plans to do the same with photo sharing. Or, am I wrong and photo sharing works the same exact way between iCloud accounts that are members of the same Family Sharing as it works for apps and music?
Thank you.