Apple Photos is out as public beta! How can I transfer my Aperture 3 library to Lightroom 5?

07/03/15

Hi there! Kids make time go by really quickly…

Apple released their public beta to the next incarnation of Yosemite, namely 10.10.3. This next update brings with it the hope for all Aperture users named Photos. Which is meant to be Apples next big thing in Photography Workflow Software. Sadly after trying it out for some days, I have to report that it is not even matching iPhoto in all it's features, let alone Aperture. Photos is missing out on advanced editing tools and even simplifies/stupifies iPhotos editing tools. A feat, I thought was impossible on a desktop platform.

I will not do any tutorials on Photos as it is just a joke, I will not use anymore.

All recent Aperture users have to decide to either they try to stay with their beloved software as long as it works or as long as their cameras are supported or to leave the titanic and get onto a new boat. That new boat could be Lightroom, which I chose, Capture One Pro, Phocus or whatever suits the individual the most. In my case Lightroom did it for me and Adobe is even trying to convince people to change to Lightroom with a automatic import tool.

As I've tried the import tool, I decided to give you a run down how to do it better…

First, select all of your photos in the Aperture Library, go to the metadata menu and tell Aperture to write iptc metadata to originals.
As soon as this is done, select all photos again an relocate the originals via the menu option named alike. The choose a location and create a parent Folder for your new library. I called mine RAW and the year, as I had to export multiple libraries I used to have for the different years of my photographic history. Then hit relocate and make yourself a coffee or five as this takes some time depending on how big your library is.

After the process is finished, open Lightroom and tell it to import the folder and everything inside, with the port option up top set to "add".
Go, get yourself another cup of coffee.

After the procedure is done, Lightroom will greet you with a folder structure based on your old projects and will hold most ratings and all your tags as keywords. I don't personally know, why Lightroom doesn't keep all ratings but the biggest part of mine were there and the rest was easily added.

I will post a short guide to make you comfortable with your new Adobe surroundings but the basics of what I told you in the tutorials to get from iPhoto to Aperture still applies, it just looks a little darker!

If someone would like to use the automatic process Adobe is providing, be warned, Lightroom will take the folder designation, Aperture uses in its container structure, which will leave you with daily folder and collection named after your projects. This means it works like Aperture did but you won't have the added pleasure of finding your pictures without the need to startup Lightroom but right inside the Finder.