Apple Photos as an Adobe Lightroom Alternative
Ayup! Since switching from Adobe to Affinity, I've been using Apple Photos as a replacement for Lightroom. Initially, this was purely for file management purposes. As I got to know the app a little more, however, it became apparent that the editing tools are really rather powerful.
Many of my recent images haven't even needed to leave Apple Photos. One of the things I was most pleasantly surprised with, is the variety of options at your disposal. All of your usual editing settings, including:
Exposure
Highlights
Shadows
Brightness
Contrast
Black Point
Saturation
Vibrancy
Black & White
Red Eye Removal
White Balance
Curves
Levels
Definition
Selective Colour
Noise Reduction
Sharpen
Vignette
Crop
Straighten
Vertical Adjustments
Horizontal Adjustments
Flip
Clean up
I mean, when did all of this happen? That's quite the list. As with Lightroom, you also have a set of filters (albeit, only nine) if you want a quick and easy starting point.
Apple provides all the essential editing options in the macOS Photos app. These are the same options you see in most photo-editing apps, and they should easily meet the needs of those who only want to touch up photos, crop them, or apply filters to enhance their appearance.
But it doesn't do this
If you're considering using Apple Photos as a Lightroom replacement, there are a few things you'll be without. Thankfully, if you're ditching Adobe, chances are it's for Affinity (or similar), and you can do all of the below within your Photoshop replacement.
Firstly, masking and selections. Editing specific parts of an image is usually essential, but this isn't something you can currently do in Apple Photos. If they ever add this in the future, it will become of the most viable free alternatives to Lightroom.
Secondly, not something I use, but pointed out by Gavin on Mastodon, lens corrections. If you use this in Lightroom to fix any optical imperfections, you'll need to do so in an app like Affinity.
Lastly, there's no auto straighten in Apple Photos. This is often quite useful in Lightroom, especially for lining up your verticals. At the time of writing this post, this feature isn't present in Affinity, either. Doing it manually is no major hardship.
Apple Photos is a program you might have overlooked in the past, but with steady improvements over the years, it is now a serious contender when it comes to post-processing your pictures.
What Apple Photos does well
Being Apple, the Photos app is clean, well-designed and easy to navigate. Having a robust set of editing tools in the same place as your file management system is a massive win. As mentioned, if I can achieve everything I need to without opening a separate app, then happy days!
All of the settings work as you'd expect them to. Some sub categories also have a main slider that adjusts all of the values within that particular section. For example, move the main Light slider to the left or right, and it will control the brilliance, exposure, highlights, shadows, brightness, contrast and black point individually. Pretty darn clever.
If you're looking for a quick edit without giving it too much thought, the Auto setting is well worth a look. One click, jobs a good'n.
The straightening tools, including horizontal and vertical adjustments are incredibly useful. It would be nice to see a little more precision, as you can move the slider with a visible difference to the image while it still says 0.
Lastly, the Clean up tool is Apple's version of spot removal, and then some. Remove specs, dots, distractions or entire elements. I only use this to remove small aspects from an image, but it always does so flawlessly. It will, however, label your file with a notice along the lines of edited with generative AI.
Apple Photos is a sophisticated software designed for comprehensive photo management, offering users the ability to organise, edit, and share their images seamlessly. It is particularly well-suited for individuals and professionals who require efficient photo organisation and editing capabilities, such as photographers, designers, and social media managers.
Ideal for a JPG workflow - Consider Photomator for RAW
It's worth pointing out that Apple Photos works pretty well for my own circumstances, based on two reasons:
I shoot JPG
90% of the look I want is achieved in-camera
Thankfully, photographer, tour guide and really rather generous fellow, Ewen Bell had some further input and feedback. As it turns out, the Photos app might not be quite as suitable if you shoot RAW.
Really grateful to Ewen, who took the time to explain some of the drawbacks (and better options) over on Mastodon. This follows spending a couple of weeks with a photographer who was using Apple Photos, and not getting on quite so well with it. I've included the entirety of Ewen's comments here, as they're all extremely relevant and useful. Thank you, kind sir!
We repeatedly found the range for sliders to be very limited compared to DxO or C1, meaning you can't lift the shadows very far, or pull back highlights very far. It made it impossible for her to access the dynamic range of her camera. She simply couldn't edit her photos in the same way the rest of us could, which was not a great experience for her ultimately.
The ingesting of RAW files is a big issue for novices. She was pulling in hundreds of gigs worth of images, and then can't find them on her drive because they're concealed inside a tome. That has major issues for backups, and even worse for just pulling out a RAW file to edit elsewhere.
The option to edit a file in something else only ever sent a JPG instead of the RAW to that other app. So that was a huge trap for beginners too.
You have to "export" a RAW file from Photos to your hard drive, which is fine for one or two, but imagine when you decide you might want to open a bunch of files in DxO to try out and now you end up exporting everything as a duplicate and doubling the storage requirement. Urgh.Short version: Please consider PhotoMator instead of Photo. It's a much better tool for the job. Or step over to DxO maybe. But PhotoMator is the next step up for Photo fans.
Update: Since trying out Photomator again, I'm sold. Definitely consider upgrading from Apple Photos for extra precision and editing tools.
Apple Photos & iCloud Pricing
Apple Photos is completely free, but only available if you own an Apple device. If you want your images synced across different devices, you'll need an iCloud storage upgrade. Completely optional, but quite handy.
There's a 0.99 pence / 0.99 cents plan with 50GB of storage and higher priced tiers if you need more space. Personally, I'm moving aways from subscriptions wherever possible, but I will keep this one. I can live with a pound a month for the convenience it brings.
It took some getting used to, but...
Overall, I'm really enjoying the clean design and simplicity that Apple Photos brings to the table. While it's not usually considered professional editing software, it does almost everything that Lightroom does.
Whenever possible, I do all post-processing in Apple Photos, only using Affinity for slightly more complex edits. The file management system is more or less exactly the same as Lightroom. You can set up folders and favourite images that you want to refer back to. This makes navigating your library super quick and easy.
As many photographers are currently seeking out Adobe alternatives, when it comes to file management and basic edits, Apple Photos could well be the perfect solution. If you're already in the ecosystem, it'll blend in seamlessly with your current set up and workflow.
If it's been a while since you took a proper look around the Photos app, it might just surprise you.
