A photo editing test on the M1 MacBook Pro found that the 13-inch MacBook Pro M1 running applications optimized for M1 was faster than a “beast” of a Windows desktop PC – despite the fact that the latter was specifically specified with photo editing in mind and had a huge 128 GB of RAM.
Professional photographer Andrew Hoyle said he was “surprised” by the performance and concluded that an M1 Mac is a safe bet for photographers looking for an upgrade …
Hoyle is CNET ‘s Leading European photographer. He found that the MacBook Pro M1 with 16 GB of RAM did not compete when running Intel-based Photoshop, but it was a different story when he tried the M1 beta.
I tested how long it took Photoshop (in the beta versions of Intel and M1) to align 19 raw full resolution images and then merge them into a stacked focus image. It is a technique that I use regularly in the photography of my product, so it is important for me to have good efficiency here. [Focus stacking is where you take a bunch of photos with different focus points, then combine them in software to get the entire image in focus, from the closest point to the furthest.]
Intel-based Photoshop, via Rosetta 2, took 50.3 seconds to align the layers and 1 minute and 37 seconds to merge them. I compared this to an exceptionally powerful Windows desktop PC that was built with an AMD Ryzen 9 3950 X CPU, Nvidia RTX Titan graphics and 128 GB of RAM, specifically to be a beast with 8K photo and video editing. It took the PC 20 seconds to align the layers and 53 seconds to merge them – a clear victory for the PC.
However, I ran the same tests on the beta version of Photoshop that supports Apple M1. It took 22 seconds to align the layers and 46.6 seconds to merge them – an overall faster time than my immensely powerful editing equipment was able to achieve.
The M1 version of Lightroom also outperformed the PC when it came to importing 100 raw images.
The PC was still significantly faster when it came to video, however.
The Intel-based version of Premiere took 6 minutes and 25 seconds to export on the M1 MacBook, but the M1 optimized beta version took about half the time, with 3 minutes and 24 seconds. For reference, my desktop did the same export in 1:20.
Although Hoyle did not make any comparisons, he said that “there were no problems” when working with 4K files in DaVinci Resolve Studio, a state-of-the-art video editing and color correction application.
Despite everything, he says, there is no reason for photographers to restrain themselves.
Overall, I am impressed. Even when running non-optimized versions of applications, the M1 MacBook Pro still struggles a lot against a super-powerful editing PC, and the fact that it is able to outperform the PC in some tests when using M1-optimized beta applications is surprising. I am certainly excited about the performance improvements that we will see as more developers fully optimize their software for Apple’s silicon.
If you are a photographer and are considering upgrading, I would definitely say that the M1 MacBook is a safe bet. At a minimum, you will still be able to use all of your current software normally through Rosetta 2, and by the time the official M1 versions are released, these performance increases – and probably battery savings as well – are extremely welcome.
Personally, though, I would advise photographers and videographers on the market for a MacBook who are waiting for the 16-inch Apple Silicon MacBook Pro, expected later this year. In addition to the larger screen, this must be significantly more powerful than the 13-inch model. But if you specifically want the smaller format for portability, it looks like there’s no reason not to press the button right now.
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