questions about how to save edits in Aperture (and a few other questions)

To preface this post, I keep my referenced photos on an 500 gig external HD, which is used in conjunction with my Airport Extreme, wirelessly to my MBP. I created the Aperture library file in the main photo folder within that HD.

First question: I'm editing photos using dodge and burn, and when I hit save, it creates another photo, but it looks exactly like the one I just edited.. In fact, I know it's the same. So where (if any place) does aperture put the edited file then ? And why is it only duplicating the original file (which then sits right next to it in the viewer) ?

Second question : When I fire up Aperture for the first time, it's always asking where the library is located, even though it sees where the last location was, which is the same as the current (and always will be). Then, I select the location, and it just hangs and hangs for what seems like forever. I eventually have to force quit it because it doesn't show up, and then try to restart it. It then takes a couple of minutes for it to start up (didn't time it, but seems like 4-5 minutes).

Is this normal behavior when storing a library on an external drive ? Or am I just blessed ? Anyway, that's it for the time being. Thanks.

Doug

More questions:

I want to add photos from my Aperture library to a mobile.me gallery, which was NOT created with Aperture in the first place. Can I do this without having to manually upload them directly from the mobile.me web page ? In other words, can I do this via Aperture instead ?

next: I sometimes forget what the address is of my mobile.me account (the one that people will see) and don't know if there's an easy way to get linked to it aside from bookmarking it, myself. So let's say I want to send the link to my main gallery page in an e-mail,(using Gmail, for instance) where would I do this ?

Doug

Doug b said:

First question: I'm editing photos using dodge and burn, and when I hit save, it creates another photo, but it looks exactly like the one I just edited.. In fact, I know it's the same. So where (if any place) does aperture put the edited file then ? And why is it only duplicating the original file (which then sits right next to it in the viewer) ?

Click to expand...

Welcome to the world of VERSIONS.
When you edit a photo in Aperture all you are doing (unless you perform dodging or burning) is writing metadata instructions, you aren't actually editing the photo itself. Why is this a cool thing? Because you save disc space and because you can create multiple different versions of the same photo. Lets say you have one RAW photo in Aperture and you adjust it's exposure by 1 stop. The only disc space you've used is the same disc space for that original RAW file. Now lets say you want to create a new photo from the same RAW file but adjusting the exposure by two stops. You can create a VERSION of it and do just that but still you are only using the disc space of that one original RAW file that is now generating both versions.

Right so what about dodging and burning. Unlike Lightroom Aperture can't apply dodging and burning as metadata instructions. Instead it actually has to render the RAW file as a physical file, I can't remember the file format off the top of my head, think it might be TIFF. This not only takes up more disc space as now your hard drive will contain a RAW and a TIFF file but this is why you now have two identical photos in Aperture. One is your RAW file, the other is the TIFF version of it with the burning actually rendered into it.

Where is it stored? In your Aperture library. Until you export the photo it can't be seen by other applications.

Doug b said:

Second question : When I fire up Aperture for the first time, it's always asking where the library is located, even though it sees where the last location was, which is the same as the current (and always will be). Then, I select the location, and it just hangs and hangs for what seems like forever. I eventually have to force quit it because it doesn't show up, and then try to restart it. It then takes a couple of minutes for it to start up (didn't time it, but seems like 4-5 minutes).

Is this normal behavior when storing a library on an external drive ? Or am I just blessed ? Anyway, that's it for the time being. Thanks.

Doug

Click to expand...

It doesn't sound normal but it's probably because your library is on a remote drive and possibly down to the type of library you've created. If you have a referenced library than the library itself will be a relatively small file (although it will grow as you make changes to photos) as it mostly contains metadata instructions instead of actual photos. If that is the case you could move it to your Mac HD which should improve things.

Doug b said:

More questions:
I want to add photos from my Aperture library to a mobile.me gallery, which was NOT created with Aperture in the first place. Can I do this without having to manually upload them directly from the mobile.me web page ? In other words, can I do this via Aperture instead ?

next: I sometimes forget what the address is of my mobile.me account (the one that people will see) and don't know if there's an easy way to get linked to it aside from bookmarking it, myself. So let's say I want to send the link to my main gallery page in an e-mail,(using Gmail, for instance) where would I do this ?

Doug

Click to expand...

Pass, never used Mobile Me so can't help I'm afraid. However assuming mobile me works via FTP then you can certainly set-up Aperture with that FTP information and set that as an Export option

HTH

First, thanks for taking the time to get to my questions, I really appreciate it. Sorry I haven't had time to reply till now..

I'm still a bit off on some things though:

Right so what about dodging and burning. Unlike Lightroom Aperture can't apply dodging and burning as metadata instructions. Instead it actually has to render the RAW file as a physical file, I can't remember the file format off the top of my head, think it might be TIFF. This not only takes up more disc space as now your hard drive will contain a RAW and a TIFF file but this is why you now have two identical photos in Aperture. One is your RAW file, the other is the TIFF version of it with the burning actually rendered into it.

Where is it stored? In your Aperture library. Until you export the photo it can't be seen by other applications.

Click to expand...

Ok, well I get that it creates a real physical file in order to render that type of edit, but what I don't get is why when I saw the duplicate file, it looked exactly the same as the original. It sat right next to the original in the viewer but... When I uploaded the image to my mobile.me gallery, I think the change (the D&B edit) became apparent. So that means there are actually 2 extra files then, and not just the one, right ? But where in the Aperture database would that exist ?

It doesn't sound normal but it's probably because your library is on a remote drive and possibly down to the type of library you've created. If you have a referenced library than the library itself will be a relatively small file (although it will grow as you make changes to photos) as it mostly contains metadata instructions instead of actual photos. If that is the case you could move it to your Mac HD which should improve things.

Click to expand...

I'm not sure of what the difference between a referenced library and a non referenced library is, to begin with. All I can tell you is that I made Aperture create the library in the main Photos folder on my external HD, and told it to reference the files from the same location (meaning the existing physical files). I believe that when I checked the size of the library yesterday, it was somewhere around 13 gigs, yet the actual size of my photo folder is more like 23 gigs, I think ? Perhaps though, what you've suggested would be better, if the size of the library would be that much smaller. Just have to figure out how to do this. I was thinking about going to the Apple store and sitting in on some of those lectures, which sounds like the thing to do about now.... I just wish Mac apps worked more like the ones I use on my Linux box. Things would really be SO much easier. Ah well. Thanks again for trying to help me.

Doug