Corporations typically like to deliver bad news on a Friday, and today Apple did just that, confirming the worst fears of shutterbugs everywhere by driving a stake through the company's venerable Mac photo software.
The Loop today reported that Apple is no longer actively developing iPhoto and Aperture, the free consumer and paid prosumer applications for Mac OS X which have been a staple of the company's photography lineup for years.
In their place, Apple plans to ship an all-new Photos app next year for OS X Yosemite, which will allow Aperture (and presumably, iPhoto) users to migrate their libraries to both the new software as well as iCloud Drive, which will power the revamped service.
“With the introduction of the new Photos app and iCloud Photo Library, enabling you to safely store all of your photos in iCloud and access them from anywhere, there will be no new development of Aperture,” Apple confirmed in a statement to The Loop.
The new Photos app will reportedly offers OS X Yosemite users "a more seamless experience" across both Mac and iOS devices, allowing search and editing of photos stored in the cloud.
It isn't clear at this time what Mac users running a version of OS X older than Yosemite are expected to do with their photo libraries, although presumably the current iPhoto and Aperture software will continue working on older operating systems for the foreseeable future.
Photoshop maker Adobe was quick to respond to the news in a blog post Friday, where they recommend now-orphaned iPhoto and Aperture users check out the Creative Cloud-powered Lightroom as an alternative.
"Put simply we’re doubling down on our investments in Lightroom and the new Creative Cloud Photography plan and you can expect to see a rich roadmap of rapid innovation for desktop, web and device workflows in the coming weeks, months and years," Adobe Vice-President of Digital Imaging Products Winston Hendrickson wrote.
Adobe's Jeffrey Tranberry also confirmed in a comment reply that the company is "looking into a way for iPhoto and Aperture customers to more easily migrate to Lightroom," but offered no timeline as to if or when such a possibility might arrive.
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