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Apple Seeds Photos To Developers
5 February 2015
Apple has seeded its new Photos application to developers with the first beta of OS X 10.10.3 Yosemite. Designed to replace both iPhoto and Aperture, the release notes for Photos describe the new application:
All new for OS X, Photos automatically organizes your photo library and helps you perfect your photos with comprehensive editing tools. You can also store your photos and videos in the cloud using iCloud Photo Library and access them on all your devices.
Photos lets you:
- Browse your photos by time and location in Moments, Collections and Years views.
- Navigate your library using convenient Photos, Shared, Albums and Projects tabs
- Store all of your photos and videos in iCloud Photo Library in their original format and full resolution
- Access your photos and videos stored in iCloud Photo Library from your Mac, iPhone, iPad or iCloud.com with any web browser
- Perfect your photos with powerful and easy-to-use editing tools that optimize with a single click or slider or allow precise adjustments with detailed controls
- Create professional-quality photo books with simplified bookmaking tools, new Apple-designed themes and new square book formats
- Purchase prints in new square and panoramic sizes
Apple has said it plans to release Photos early in 2015 with CEO Tim Cook claiming it's on track for an April debut when it will be included with a Yosemite update. Before that, though, a public beta is planned. Meanwhile Apple has put up a Photos preview page.
PERSPECTIVES
The Verge is among a few sites that has had a peek at Photos and has published its First look at Apple Photos, the iPhoto overhaul for Mac. In the report, Dan Seifert says the most appreciated feature is how fast the new software is, although most obvious is the new design, which takes its cue from Yosemite.
"If what we've seen so far is anything to go on, Apple Photos offers a lot of potential," Seifert writes, "and it should make a lot of Mac users quite happy."
At Yahoo, David Pogue finds Photos for the Mac Is Clean, Fast, Connected -- and Unfinished. In his companion piece, Everything Worth Knowing About Switching to OS X Photos Pogue "covers the transition to Photos and its relationship to iPhoto and Aperture."
"The bottom line," Pogue concludes, "is that Photos is an all-new program, written from scratch, so there will be conversions, adaptations and new things to learn. Apple stresses that no data are discarded, while also freely admitting that Photos 1.0 is only a starting point for this new, mainstream photo-management app."
Derrick Story suggests Photos for OS X Strikes a Middle Ground between iPhotos and Aperture, although "early versions of Photos will feel more like iPhoto than Aperture," he writes.
He continues, "My advice is for Aperture photographers to think about a two-part strategy: what to do for 2015, then 2016 and beyond. For the remainder of this year, we have the luxury of sticking with Aperture on Yosemite and playing with Photos for OS X when it's released. By the end of 2015, we all should have a pretty good idea of how the new software is going to stack up against Aperture.
And Google has posted a note saying it was looking into releasing a Photos-compatible Nik Collection. "Please check back with us once Photos has been released in 2015 for an update on our compatibility status," the short note concludes.
Meanwhile, 9to5Mac points out Apple's new Photos app means big future changes for free photo storage. "It will be interesting to see how many users will be forced to upgrade to paid iCloud storage," considering a photo collection can easily exceed the free 5-GB allotment of an iCloud account.