Apple Releases Aperture 3 With Faces and Places Tagging Features

Apple today announced the release of Aperture 3, adding over 200 new features to the company's professional photo editing and management application. The updated version includes the Faces and Places tagging features introduced in iPhoto last year, as well as a new feature called Brushes for making painting image adjustments to photos. Also included are Adjustment Presets, which offer one-click options for applying specific styles or looks to entire images.

"Millions of people love using iPhoto to organize, edit and share their digital photos," said Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. "Aperture 3 is designed for both professionals who edit and manage massive libraries of photos and iPhoto users who want to take their photos further with easy-to-use tools such as Brushes and Adjustment Presets."

Aperture 3, which runs as a 64-bit application on Intel Core 2 Duo Macs running Mac OS X Snow Leopard, is available for a suggested retail price of $199, with existing Aperture users able to upgrade for $99. A downloadable 30-day trial is also available.