Suggestions for a Mac images browser

[Shawn Marques]

Does anyone have any suggestions for a Mac images browser? I am looking for one that is comparable to Breeze-Browser Pro. I currently use Mac OS X opererating system. Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks

[Axel Hildebrandt]

Have you tried Lightroom or Bridge?

[Steve Kaluski]

Photo Mechanic, as good as BB, but better. It's for Macs!

Here you go Shawn:

http://www.camerabits.com/site/

[Rocky Sharwell]

I use Photo Mechanic if I have been shooting birds/wildlife and have a lot of images to do an initial edit before importing into Lightroom. If I don't have many images-as when doing street photography or landscape--I usually go straight to LR.

[John Chardine]

I should give Photo Mechanic a try. I looked at the web page and it appears to have a useful feature where you can click on a Google map and have the coordinates written to the EXIF data for selected photos. I like that.

I currently use Microsoft's Expression Media but there are concerns out there that Microsoft is not interested in the product and may drop it sometime in the future. I recently emailed Mr. Breeze and asked him about a Mac version of Breezebrowser. He replied saying that BB on the Mac would require several "libraries" that are not available. It baffles me why Adobe, Microsoft, and many many smaller companies seem to be able to produce versions of their products for Windows and Mac OSX, and yet Mr. Breeze is unable to. By all accounts BB is pretty darn good and I think Mr. Breeze is missing a huge opportunity to break into a new market niche by not making a Mac version.

[Clemens Vanderwerf]

Hi Shawn,

I use Photo mechanic as well and really like it. It is fast and gives you the option to add information prior to importing in LR or camera raw. I flip through my images quickly, delete what I do not need, and only import the keepers in LR for further processing.

[Shawn Marques]

Thanks everyone for your suggestions. I downloaded the trial version of Photo Mechanic and I'm currently slowly sorting through my photos from the weekend. My wife does my post prossesing with her PC and uses Breezebrowser pro and loves it. John I think you are right about them missing a real opportunity for the Mac's. I'll post what I think of the Photo Mechanic later on in the week. Thanks again

[John Chardine]

Update- since Shawn started this thread I downloaded Photo Mechanic and have "kicked the tires". My conclusion is that it's a fantastic program and I will be definitely buying it. It is fast, hugely customisable, and does everything a image browser and digital asset management program should do with none of the frills such as image editing, which as I have mentioned before, I do in Photoshop, so don't need this capability in my browsing software.

[Jon Saperia]

I have been using Photo Mechanic for about 18 months on my Macs and can not imagine a reason to change. One important point since this thread is about work flow is that with PhotoMechanic you can seamlessly launch your favorite RAW editor directly so you have a seamless integration from your browser to editor, much like you would if you used ACR and Photoshop. I use NX2 and can directly launch that as well. There is a lot of good thinking in Photo Mechanic that helps even after editing, like uploading to your favorite web site, etc.

[Keith Carver]

I'm a Mac user and have been using Aperture for several years. I really like it. The latest version 3.0 is very fast with many features comparable to or better than LR. Cost is $199, or $99 upgrade from Aperture 2.0.

[Jeff Cashdollar]

I use Photo Mechanic and learned it from Al and Fabs last year - love the image browse function and use it pre LRII integration.

[john jackson]

What is the advantage of using a program like Photo Mechanic before importing to Lightroom/Aperture? I would have thought they do very similar jobs.

Thanks

John

[Rocky Sharwell]

What is the advantage of using a program like Photo Mechanic before importing to Lightroom/Aperture? I would have thought they do very similar jobs.

Thanks

John

John,
Lightroom can take a while to import and do the previews.

For me it depends on how many images I have to import--If I have been photographing rocks out in the desert or other things that do not generally move much I don't have that many images there is not much of an advantage. If I have have been someplace like Bosque or Ft. DeSoto and have hundreds or even thousands of images of birds flying then I used photomechanic first to get rid of a large portion of my images. It can save a lot of time.

[allanrube]

+1 for Photo Mechanic. It is very fast displaying raw images. Only negative is it is a bit pricey.