I simply don´t get it. Been searching this and other forums. Please give me some advise.
I´m originally a PC guy. Family father who got at DSLR in -05. Before that a compact digital camera. I have 350 Gb of pictures fairly well organized on a NAS. Pictures manually organized in folders for each year, subfolders with shooting date YYMMDD XXXXXXX, where XXXXX is a short description i.e. “050810 Bbq party at neighbors”.
From 2001-2004 just jpeg taken with compact camera, from 2004-2010 jpeg+NEF and from 2010 until today jpeg+cr2.
In some folders I have deleted the no good photos and some folders are simply a fast copy from the memory card in the camera. (Working family father with a lot of ambition but not a lot of time). This means that when (if) I sit down and delete all the no goods I probably could decrease my total collection size to about 250 Gb.
The pictures are mostly of the “documenting life” kind. But there are also some “me trying to be a real photographer” - kind.
Now to the fun part:
I´ve just got my first iMac. 1Tb internal hard drive. Aperture installed. I seek order!
What next? How? Why?
I want to import all my pictures into aperture. Ideal would be to keep my files on NAS as referenced masters and just have the Aperture library on the internal HDD. However I've come to understand that this is not recommended.
1.
Should I import all pictures as referenced masters to a folder on the internal HDD, instantly using 1/3 of my total hard disc space?
Or
should I get a fast (and expensive) thunderbolt external HDD for my referenced masters (and these only)?
Or should I go with the managed on internal HDD option?
2.
Should I rate and reject on my PC BEFORE I import to Aperture?
3.
On import I would like to have my photos organized the way I have them now and I suppose this means that every subfolder (yymmdd XXXXX) equals a project?
How do i automize this import that probably will take a day or two?
4.
On my PC previewing raw files was giving me a heart attack and an ulcer every time. From now on Im planning on only shooting raw. Is this stupid? Better taking raw+jpeg and delete the raw file for the “life-documentation-pictures-that-I-never-will-post-process”. This in disc space saving purpose of course.
I would really appreciate your advice. Every tip and opinion valuable.
Best Regards
Tony
Thanks for your input! Really helpful.
I would really want to have all my pictures available in Aperture for family viewing, however there is only a small part of these I will ever edit. From recently and from now on I want to edit more frequently.
What do you think of putting referenced masters on an external 1gb USB3 drive keeping the aperture library on my internal fusion drive 1Gb? I will backup to my NAS.
When the thunderbolt drives get cheeper I’ll get one of those.
Kathy, you recommend I import one shoot (=one day for me) at a time? Does that also mean every day will be a seperate project in Aperture?
Thanks for the book tip Butch!
Shipping time over 1,5 weeks and I cant wait getting started!
If I continue my yy/mm/day filing system with referenced masters I should be safe ever going back to PC again?
Thanks again for taking your time helping me. Very valuble to me.
/Tony
Hi Tony,
I’m new to this Aperture Expert page, and according to my son, I’m very lo-tech (for ex: I don’t know what an “NAS” is…)— but I’ve been a photographer for a long time. A couple of your questions caught my eye, since I have been in your situation, though a few years back.
First, if I were you, I would absolutely NOT want to fill up 1/3 of my new IMAC’s HD with my old pics, unless I didn’t expect to ever take many more pictures. You will need that space for all the great new pics you’ll be taking on all the new cameras to come. Your wonderful old shots should remain apart, safe on an external HD or other computer, brought into Aperture by carefully importing little bits at a time, probably in a referenced library. I’m sure others can assist you with that as I only have managed files.
If you do bring in certain of these older files, they should be kept in separate libraries from your new work, named whatever you want. You seem to have that organization stuff down. Many organize by the year, etc. Aperture 3 allows many libraries to be created, which is good protection, along with a good organizing tool.
If you have the ability to edit prior to bringing the old into your new IMAC, I would highly suggest that you do so. This way, your “new Imac house” won’t have to be cleaned as soon as you settle in. Much easier for you to organize, and less likely to overwhelm Aperture 3, as these programs can “crash” if many unrecognizable types of files appear suddenly.
Not to worry you, but I have recent freaky experience with this—see my post/thread from Feb 24.
I would NOT suggest that you ever automate such a huge import. Much safer, though time-consuming, to fully edit and go gradually, seeing what Aperture can handle. Old old files might trip it up.
Go slowly, meticulously and you will not regret it.
In the future, always shoot RAW, because Aperture gives you so much more latitude to fix a poor file if RAW. (underexposure, color balance etc)
Back when I was working with PC, I used DPP which is a Canon program that made working with RAW not so bad. The trouble is that there are so many different proprietary equivalents to RAW that confuse the programs. I never have the camera shoot RAW+Jpeg because all you need is RAW. Once you have that maximum size in your Aperture you can export in any size or format. Never delete your RAW!
Have fun and be careful. Back up your gigantic library in a place you can always get it if the import gets muddled.
That’s my 2 cents!
monotypemaker
When you take on a task of this size … you need to build a foundation that will serve you for decades to come ….
So I’ll echo a recommendation I made in a similar thread … get yourself a copy of Peter Krogh’s book “The DAM Book” (found at the usual sources … be sure to get the second edition) … the author spells out not only the “how” to build a solid archive, regardless of the software you use, but also the “why” you should do certain things so your efforts can withstand the test of time.
Also keep in mind you can modify the recommendations Krogh makes to fit your goals … regardless it is a great resource for starting out right so you can avoid redundant efforts in the future.