Adobe goes toe-to-toe with Apple's Aperture

Adobe has launched a test version of Mac software that is seen as a rival to a professional photo program that Apple launched last year.

Adobe on Monday offered up a public beta of Adobe Lightroom, a program to help avid shutterbugs manage the work of processing, selecting and editing their RAW-format images. Apple introduced a similar concept with its £349 Aperture software that launched late last year.

Adobe notes, however, that it has been working on Lightroom for some time, although the final version is not expected until "late 2006".

"We first showed an early version of Lightroom at the Adobe Ideas Conference in April 2005 to demonstrate a new streamlined digital photography experience, from capture to print," Adobe president Shantanu Narayen said in a statement. "Even in beta form, photographers will find world-class technology that complements Photoshop."

While the initial test version is Mac only, Adobe said it expects to eventually offer both Windows and Macintosh versions of Lightroom.

The company plans to show off the software at its booth at the Macworld Expo in San Francisco, which kicks off today. The beta is also available free from Adobe's Web site.

Adobe is recommending that those who want to try out Lightroom have a system with at least a 1GHz PowerPC G4 processor, 768MB of memory and a 1,024-by-768 pixel screen. It won't run on systems with less than 512MB of memory.

The company said final system requirements and pricing have yet to be determined.