On Friday, Pixelmator surprised with the announcement that it had signed the paperwork required to be acquired by Apple. If it passes regulatory approval, Apple will suddenly own a set of software that directly competes with Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop.
Pixelmator operates three photography-focused pieces of software: Pixelmator for iOS, Pixelmator Pro, and Photomator. While arguably less complete, the apps compete with Adobe Lightroom, Photoshop, and Lightroom Classic in that order. Many photographers will be quick to point out that there is considerable functionality missing from Photomator to consider it an actual Lightroom competitor and they’re not wrong: there are some serious holes that would need to be addressed. However, if Apple were to choose to put resources into Pixelmator and Photomator (go the Final Cut route — yeah, most folks forget that Final Cut was an acquisition — instead of pulling a Dark Sky), both could challenge Adobe’s market dominance that it has enjoyed for the better part of a decade.
The following is divided into three sections: features that must be added, features that would be nice to have, and areas where Apple’s control of hardware and software would allow for nice bonuses that Adobe has already proven it can’t match.
At a Glance
‘Must Have’ Features
Pixelmator and Photomator Must Both Continue
While photographers could exist in either Lightroom or Photoshop alone, the fact that both exist is a major reason why Adobe has been so successful. Lightroom is an excellent batch editor which allows it to work well for photographers who shoot en masse and also makes it the best application for third-party developers to build plugins for. Photoshop, on the other hand, is a good single-photo editor and excels when it comes to doing something more than just basic digital development. Being able to send files back and forth to Lightroom and Photoshop is important to a lot of photographers but is even more critical to anyone who dabbles in graphic design.
Fluid, seamless interconnectivity is a must and for Apple to play in this space, it will need to maintain both Photomator and Pixelmator.
Plugin Support
Speaking of plugins, Photomator and Pixelmator will need to be updated to support them. From what we can tell, Pixelmator doesn’t have the architecture for them and for many photographers, that’s going to be a non-starter. I have relied on third-party plugins for Lightroom multiple times over the last decade, so I’m firmly in the camp that this is a must-add.
Luckily, there is precedent: Apple’s defunct Lightroom competitor, Aperture, added plugin support in its second version.
Apple’s RAW Support Must Improve
A couple of months ago, I wrote that Adobe’s rapid support for RAW profiles had spoiled me and that is still the case today. It still boggles my mind that it wasn’t until July that Photomator and Pixelmator got support for the Olympus E-M10 Mark III, OM-System OM-5, Sony a7C II, Sony a7CR, and Sony a6700. When I spoke to Pixelmator, the company told me that while it does have its own RAW profile development team, it relies heavily on Apple’s native support for most of the RAW profiles in its library.
You might try and argue that Apple prioritizes RAW profile support based on camera popularity, but today, Apple still doesn’t support RAW files for the Fujifilm X100VI, probably the most popular camera on the planet. Whatever the case, Apple would need to revisit its priorities with RAW support and update its software to support all new cameras much, much sooner than it does right now.
Robust Digital Asset Management
Part of what makes Lightroom so desirable for photographers is how well it works as a digital asset management platform for photos. In order for Photomator to lure photographers away, it’s going to need catalogs, collections, and folder management — or at least its own version of an answer to the problems these tools solve. Apple will also need to add in support for keywords — which could be enhanced by Apple Intelligence to help generate those as well as filters. Many photographers will also demand a similar situation as Adobe’s Smart Previews.
It would be nice to see some of the robust printing support that Lightroom Classic has baked in. Fans of Aperture may remember its robust and beloved photo book creation tools, too.
Proper One-to-One Mobile Support
Adobe had a rather haphazard approach to Lightroom on mobile (and still does with Premiere Pro and Photoshop) and still separates its Lightroom and Lightroom Classic programs, citing that they are for different users. I can buy that, and Lightroom on smartphones has gotten much better over time, but at this juncture, Apple has the chance to decide to combine its ideal users into a single (mostly) unified interface that can be customized to fit specific needs rather than splintering-off those people into two groups.
Luckily, Pixelmator has already shown the ability to port nearly the same experience over to the mobile environment, since it has Pixelmator for iOS and Pixelmator Pro for desktop. There is not full feature parity — there are some limitations to how layering works — but Photomator should be a lot easier to handle in a mobile environment since edits are comparably simpler. That and Apple is regularly updating the power of its hardware, making an eventual iPad or iPhone Photomator experience capable of being pretty solid.
‘Nice to Have’ Features
Proper Tethering Support
Lightroom supports tethered shooting but it’s never been any photographer’s favorite platform for it. Unfortunately, shooting tethered is a requirement for a pretty small percentage of total Lightroom users and the same would go for how Pixelmator, and Apple, sees its audience. However, a strong, simple, reliable tethering experience with all major brands and cameras would be a fantastic addition to the platform.
Clear Language in Menus and Options
For beginners, Lightroom can be a bit of a bear to come to grips with. It might not be immediately apparent why the Library and Develop modules need to be separate (or what the point of a module is), and much of what the controls do isn’t well described either by their menu option or the name of the tool. Apple could entice a lot of new photo editors into a system that was cleaner and clearer with its language. The company generally does a very good job of this already, so it’s not much of a stretch to ask for it here.
Maintain the Focus of On-Device Enhancements and Cloud Security
Apple takes a lot of pride in its Secure Enclave and the fact that its editing tasks — including its new AI Clean Up tool and the Immersive Photo tool on the Vision Pro — are performed on device. Keeping the emphasis on on-device when it comes to photo editing will also be appreciated. By removing the cloud from the equation, photographers will feel less like a big company is trying to train AI on their photos and more that the company cares about keeping what is theirs, theirs.
If the cloud is absolutely necessary, like it would be for proper mobile and desktop workflows, then Apple will need to continue its stance on how it handles cloud security. Apple needs to maintain its current focus on privacy no matter where it serves a photographer.
Bonuses Only Apple Can Do
Perfect Integration with Apple Displays
Adobe Photoshop requires photographers to go through steps to maintain matched colors in it and on a user’s display. Apple has a chance to make display matching a thing of the past — at least when it comes to pairing software with hardware.
Because Apple would control the entire pipeline, Photomator, and Pixelmator would be able to seamlessly provide perfect color to editors, provided Apple displays are being used. The Studio Display, Pro Display XDR, and every MacBook screen would be a perfect rendition of whichever color space a photographer needed to edit in, to the best ability of those displays to show that color.
Speed and Performance
Premiere Pro has a history of bugs and crashes regardless of how fast a computer is and improved Lightroom performance is always at the top of photographer wish lists — so it goes without saying that Adobe doesn’t have the best history when it comes to optimization.
The best possible comparison to what photographers could expect from Photomator and Pixelmator Pro is how Apple manages the same situation on Final Cut Pro. Right now, the app is ridiculously fast and able to play back multiple 8K HDR video streams simultaneously with no lag and no dropped frames. It’s remarkably stable, too.
While critics bemoan Apple’s walled garden approach to hardware and software, it does enable Apple to do something software companies like Adobe can’t, and develop new apps and software advancements exclusively for a limited number of devices, which it also makes and develops in tandem with software. Squashing bugs and optimizing software is challenging but made much easier by being the company that makes the hardware that runs your software.
Apple and Pixelmator Can Shake the Creative App Space Up in a Big Way
While Apple may go the safe, boring route and just morph Photomator into its native Photos app on Mac, iPhone, and iPad (Photomator on macOS already looks convincingly like the Photos app as it is now), that would be a big disappointment and fail to capitalize on the opportunity Apple has.
The Pixelmator team has proven itself exceptionally talented and able to develop professional-grade photo and illustration tools with a fraction of the resources Apple can provide. Imagine what Pixelmator could do with Apple’s financial, engineering, and intellectual resources.
Most photographers (and other visual artists) use Mac. Apple has a large piece of the hardware pie, and if it takes full advantage of its pending Pixelmator acquisition, Apple can carve out a big slice of the software pie, too. Heck, even an attempt by a company as powerful as Apple to do so would shake things up a lot, inevitably benefiting photographers no matter what apps they prefer.
Image credits: Unless otherwise noted, images via Pixelmator