Apple Releases Aperture Edit Plug-In SDK
The Aperture SDK (Software Development Kit) was announced a few weeks ago to much excitement in the Aperture community. Apple have today released the SDK and made available for download from Apple Developer Connection.
The SDK allows third-party developers to create Edit Plug-ins that can be integrated into the Aperture workflow. Two types of plug-ins are available for Aperture, Edit Plug-ins and Export Plug-ins. Edit plug-ins allow the Aperture adjustments to be extended to third-party image editing software and tools, similar to the plug-ins available for Photoshop. Export plug-ins allow Aperture to export images to third-party applications and services; examples include iStockPhoto and Picasa. The SDK supports development of Edit Plug-ins.
Apple included a sample ‘Dodge & Burn’ plug-in when they released Aperture 2.1 that showed the capabilities of the new plug-in architecture. There was some debate on forums regarding the requirement for Aperture to generate a TIFF file that is passed to the plug-in, rather than being more seamlessly integrated into the Aperture adjustments. This creates a break in the non-descructive editing workflow, requiring the plug-in to load and save a new version of the image. It will be interesting to see how developers overcome any hurdles that this may introduce.
A great site to bookmark is Aperture Plugged In, a site dedicated to the plug-ins available for Aperture.
Apple has already started to include plug-ins on the Aperture download page. The following demo plug-ins are available for download:
- Tiffen Dfx Digital Filter Suite 1.0 - Tiffen Company
- Light! 3.5 - Digital Film Tools
- Ozone 2.5 - Digital Film Tools
- Power Stroke 1.0 - Digital Film Tools
Other plug-ins known to be in development include:
- Viveza - Nik Software
- dpMatte and HDRtoner - dvGarage
- Fisheye-Hemi - Image Trends
- Noise Ninja - PictureCode
For initial comments on the available plug-ins, Ian Wood has a great post over at Inside Aperture. Ian makes some good points regarding the increasing cost of plug-ins and the rather poor plug-in interface design of the initial plug-ins.
For people wishing to get their hands dirty, the SDK can be downloaded from Apple Developer Connection.
Hopefully we are seeing the start of an exciting time ahead for Aperture.
Tags: Aperture
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