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Thursday, January 18, 2007 -
Photography Tool Comparison: Task 3 - Correcting White Balance
I forgot to select the special "snow" setting for one of the photos I took with the only camera that I'm brave enough to take snowboarding with me resulting in a very blue image.
There obviously isn't a quick fix tool in any of the products for this, but here are the steps I've gone through and the results.\
iPhoto - quite a simple fix, I opened up the Effects panel and selected Antique which had the following affect:
Lightroom - not quite as straightforward. I used the colour picker and tried to find a mid-level grey to act as a neutral by hovering over various pixels whilst watching the image change in the preview window.
Aperture - similar method to lightroom. I used the white balance colour picker.
Some quite different results, I think that both Aperture and Lightroom will be able to do a good job when practiced with. So, Aperture and Lightroom get a point each.
Current scores:
Aperture - 2.5 points
Lightroom - 2 point
iPhoto - 0.5 point
Gimp = 0 points
Task 1 - Black and White
Task 2 - Removing Red eye
There obviously isn't a quick fix tool in any of the products for this, but here are the steps I've gone through and the results.\
iPhoto - quite a simple fix, I opened up the Effects panel and selected Antique which had the following affect:
Lightroom - not quite as straightforward. I used the colour picker and tried to find a mid-level grey to act as a neutral by hovering over various pixels whilst watching the image change in the preview window.
Aperture - similar method to lightroom. I used the white balance colour picker.
Some quite different results, I think that both Aperture and Lightroom will be able to do a good job when practiced with. So, Aperture and Lightroom get a point each.
Current scores:
Aperture - 2.5 points
Lightroom - 2 point
iPhoto - 0.5 point
Gimp = 0 points
Task 1 - Black and White
Task 2 - Removing Red eye
Photography Tool Comparison: Task 2 - Removing Red-Eye
As I don't own an off body flash at the moment, I'm dependent on the on-board flash and so often end up with red-eye problems. Of the 4 tools I've been looking at, only 2 of them offer red-eye reduction, although there is a feature request for lightroom so time will tell if it makes it into the final version.
Note: clicking on the images will launch the full size images which makes it easier to review the differences
The original image:
The manipulated images, aperture on the left and iphoto on the right:
I have links to a couple of red eye removal tutorials for Gimp in the Gimp for Photographers post, but the point in this evaluation is ease of use, and how good a job the standard tools do, not a 3 or so step process of how to manage it.
There isn't much to chose between the two images, they both leave a small red rim around the eyes, so both iPhoto and aperture get half a point.
Current scores:
Aperture - 1.5 points
Lightroom - 1 point
iPhoto - 0.5 point
Gimp = 0 points
Task 1 - Black and White
Note: clicking on the images will launch the full size images which makes it easier to review the differences
The original image:
The manipulated images, aperture on the left and iphoto on the right:
I have links to a couple of red eye removal tutorials for Gimp in the Gimp for Photographers post, but the point in this evaluation is ease of use, and how good a job the standard tools do, not a 3 or so step process of how to manage it.
There isn't much to chose between the two images, they both leave a small red rim around the eyes, so both iPhoto and aperture get half a point.
Current scores:
Aperture - 1.5 points
Lightroom - 1 point
iPhoto - 0.5 point
Gimp = 0 points
Task 1 - Black and White
Saturday, January 13, 2007 -
Photography Tool Comparison: Task 1 - Black and White
One of the things I do with quite a few of my photographs is to convert them into black and white. Sometimes this is because of the level of noise on the images when taking low level photographs.
I've taken the following image and converted it using four tools - Aperture, Lightworks, Gimp and iPhoto.
The following are the outcomes - in each case you can click on the images to download the full image - they have an extension according to the tool used, so black and white - iphoto.jpg etc. In all cases I have used the basic transformation provided and haven't updated any of the settings, or done any further manipulation. The images are ordered, clockwise as Aperture, Lightworks, iPhoto and Gimp.
To my eye both aperture and lightroom do a pretty good job with this image, both Gimp and iPhoto seem to have lost a lot the contrast. So, for this task both aperture and lightroom get a point.
I've taken the following image and converted it using four tools - Aperture, Lightworks, Gimp and iPhoto.
The following are the outcomes - in each case you can click on the images to download the full image - they have an extension according to the tool used, so black and white - iphoto.jpg etc. In all cases I have used the basic transformation provided and haven't updated any of the settings, or done any further manipulation. The images are ordered, clockwise as Aperture, Lightworks, iPhoto and Gimp.
To my eye both aperture and lightroom do a pretty good job with this image, both Gimp and iPhoto seem to have lost a lot the contrast. So, for this task both aperture and lightroom get a point.
Photography tools
Since starting to use a mac, I've been using iPhoto to process my photos with some extra Gimp manipulation where necessary.
Richard sent me a link to aperture a while ago, and the other day I spotted Adobe Photoshop Lightroom (still in beta), both of which come with free trials. As one of my new year's resolutions is to do more with my photography, I thought I should investigate and work with them both. So, over the next month, that's exactly what I plan to do.
Initial thoughts: Lightroom is very easy to get going with, the 5 stages in its workflow make sense - Library, Develop, Slideshow, Print and Web. Aperture looks like a comprehensive libary management system, but so far I haven't worked out where to start. First point to Lightroom. Both have histograms to help keep an eye on the exposure of the image after various manipulations. I'm going to try and take the same image and manipulate it in both packages (and also in iPhoto I guess) and see how I get on. I'll try and post updates as I make progress and any decision.
Richard sent me a link to aperture a while ago, and the other day I spotted Adobe Photoshop Lightroom (still in beta), both of which come with free trials. As one of my new year's resolutions is to do more with my photography, I thought I should investigate and work with them both. So, over the next month, that's exactly what I plan to do.
Initial thoughts: Lightroom is very easy to get going with, the 5 stages in its workflow make sense - Library, Develop, Slideshow, Print and Web. Aperture looks like a comprehensive libary management system, but so far I haven't worked out where to start. First point to Lightroom. Both have histograms to help keep an eye on the exposure of the image after various manipulations. I'm going to try and take the same image and manipulate it in both packages (and also in iPhoto I guess) and see how I get on. I'll try and post updates as I make progress and any decision.
