In this blog I go through tasks that export files from Aperture which you can then use to edit with Photoshop. Although Aperture does have some excellent photo editing tools, at this stage I still think Photoshop is the better tool to edit your best photos. The tasks on this blog are all geared towards editing your photos with Photoshop and backing them up. If you do not work this way can can skip some tasks in this blog.
I use Photoshop Elements 8. If you have another version of Photoshop you may need to make some changes which I will point out along the way.
7. Export Masters from Aperture
This task will use Aperture to export all Master Files with a given year and color label into the MASTER_WORK_FOLDER as seen in Figure 13.
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| Figure 13. Export Master files from Aperture to Masters folder |
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| Figure 14. My best photos marked with colours |
rake photos:export_working_masters[2011,purple]
Results are
/Users/rolf/PicturesTest/Masters/2011/20110814 Brown Hill Creek/DSC_6940.NEF 1 files were exported.
You can now edit this file in Photoshop from the MASTER_WORK_FOLDER. Save the photoshop file in the same folder and filename (use .psd extension), this is required for the next task.
If you do not use Photoshop Elements, but another version of Photoshop you will need to change the APP_NAME_APERTURE in the Rakefile. This name is what Applescript uses to name the Application. I have not tried this for other versions, but I believe it should work.
The task will not overwrite existing files and will not create duplicates.
In Aperture if you wish to export photos based on a tag or something else you should be able to modify the Rakefile for this. Look for "aperture.export" in the Rakefile.
8. Copy Master Work folders to External Hard Drive
After you have completed you photoshop work, it would be a good idea to backup your photoshop work. This is what this task does.
The task will copy and overwrite any file of the types listed in MASTER_WORK_FILE_TYPES (.psd, .xmp) from the MASTER_WORK_FOLDER location to the MASTER_WORK_BACKUP_FOLDER.
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| Figure 15. Copy your Photoshop edited files to your external hard drive |
rake photos:copy_work_folder
Results are:
Copy PSDs from /Users/rolf/PicturesTest/Masters to backup drive /Users/rolf/PicturesTest/Backup/Photos... 2 files copied
The 2 files are the .psd and .xmp files.
My external hard drive folder will now look like this:
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| Figure 16. My external hard drive photos file after running task |
This task will copy your photoshop work files onto a DVD for burning. It is very similar to the other DVD prepare task.
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| Figure 17. Create DVD burn folders for photoshop work files |
To run the task use the command
rake photos:prepare_work_folder_dvd
Results are:
Prepare a DVD for all worked files (PSDs) from /Users/rolf/PicturesTest/Masters... Total Size : 17,802,882 (0 discs were created) Remaining Size : 17,802,882 (0% full)
10. Create website JPGs from PSDs with watermark
I use this task for publishing my photoshopped files onto my website. For a website you do not want large file sizes because it will take too long to download. So you want smaller sized JPG files that will download quickly. Also you will want to add your own watermark to the image. Also it will copy the website file to the external hard drive as a backup. This task does all that. I found Photoshop does watermarks far better than what Aperture can do.
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| Figure 18. Create website JPG version with watermark. Copy to external hard drive |
You will want to add your own watermark. Look in the Rakefile at the top under the comment:
# Constants for Watermarking photosHere you will see a variety of options for adjusting your watermark.
To run the task use this command. You will need to create the collection folder on the external hard drive if it does not exist.
rake photos:create_collection
Results:
/Users/rolf/PicturesTest/Masters/2011/20110814 Brown Hill Creek/DSC_6940.psd /Users/rolf/PicturesTest/Collection/2011/20110814 Brown Hill Creek/DSC_6940.jpg
My Website Collection folder looks like this
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| Figure 19. My website collection folder |
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| Figure 20. A copy of my website collection files |
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| Figure 21. My website JPG photo with watermark |
11. Move Photoshop work files to burnt folder
I have now done everything I need with my Photoshopped files. So once again I will move these files from the MASTER_WORK_FOLDER to the PHOTOS_BURNT_FOLDER. This task is similar to the "Move burnt folders" task.
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| Figure 22. Move photoshop files to burnt folder |
This task will only move the files that have been burnt, not folders. So it reads the files in the DVD work burn folders as seen in Figure 17 for a list of files to move. It then uses this list to move the matching files from the master folders to the burnt folders. So it wont move files that have not been burnt on a DVD yet.
To run this task use the command:
rake photos:move_work_burnt_files
Results:
Moving Work files from /Users/rolf/PicturesTest/Masters to /Users/rolf/PicturesTest/Burnt... 0 files moved.
12. Status
The status task is the task I use the most. Its purpose it to find out the status of all your photo tasks. It does this by basically running all the tasks I have described, but without performing the action on the task. It just collects numbers of how many photos or folders are ready for some action. I encourage you to use this command before you run any task. For example the status task will tell you if there are some files to order, files ready for importing, DVDs ready for burning, etc.
To run the task use the command:
rake photos:status
Results
Task Status: ============ Step 1 - order_new_photos : 247 photo files need to be ordered. 1 GPX files need to be ordered. Step 2 - import_photos : OK Step 3 - prepare_dvd : 3 disc(s) to prepare for burning Step 4 - move_burnt_files : OK Step 5 - export masters : - Step 6 - copy_work_folder : 193 work files to copy. Step 7 - prepare_work_folder_dvd: OK Step 8 - create_collection : OK Step 9 - move_work_burnt_files : OK
13. Troubleshooting
If you do find you certain tasks are not working for you or your getting some errors, there are logs files you can look at. You may have already noticed a logs folder generated when running a task. The logs folder is found in the same folder as your Rakefile.
14. Conclusion
The tasks I have created in the Rakefile provided has saved me many hours of work and less errors. I do hope other Aperture users will find it useful. Once again I encourage you to create a test Aperture library and photo folder before implementing in your current work. Although I use this Rakefile for my own work, I cant guarantee there are no bugs. Also backup your work. If you do not have a backup drive yet, you need one. I sadly learnt the hard way about not backing up my work.
If there are any bugs found I will try to fix them. Also I may add additional tasks in the future. Feel free to give comments or suggestions.
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