Verified
Every file is hashed as it’s read and checked again at each destination — xxh3 by default, SHA-256 when you need a full audit trail. If a copy doesn’t match, you know immediately.
Beta out now · macOS
Custos
Verified ingest and fast culling for photo assistants and working pros.
Copy every card to two drives with checksum proof, pick up exactly where you left off when something goes wrong, and fly through the shoot in a native Mac app that finally feels like it belongs in 2026.
Built for the moments you can’t reshoot.
Three principles drive every decision in Custos — and none of them are optional extras.
Resumable
Pulled a cable? Lost power? Closed the lid? Custos picks up from the exact file it stopped on, with zero data loss and nothing to clean up by hand. Resume isn’t a feature — it’s how every job runs.
Modern
A native Apple silicon app with instant RAW previews, keyboard-first culling and an interface that looks like today’s software — not a tool frozen in 2003.
Highlights
From the card in your hand to the keepers in your catalog.
Two drives. One pass.
Offload a card to your shuttle drive and your backup at the same time — or run several cards at once, each verified on its own. Route photos and video to different destinations, and let Custos skip anything that’s already safely on your drives.
Concurrent multi-card ingest
Proof, not promises.
Every job leaves a self-describing manifest on the destination drive and a per-file record with the hash that proves each copy arrived intact. Export a PDF log or contact sheet whenever a client, producer or insurer asks.
Verified by device read-back
Cull at full speed.
Stars, picks, rejects and color labels straight from the keyboard. True 1:1 zoom on the actual RAW data, live histogram and waveform computed natively, and every decision written to standard XMP — so it carries straight into the editor you already use.
Lightroom & Capture One readyEverything coming in v1.0
Still dragging cards around in Finder? You’re in for a treat.
Checksum verification
xxh3 by default, SHA-256 for full audit trails — read back from the destination device.
Automatic resume
Interrupted jobs continue from the exact file, automatically — even on another Mac.
Dual-destination copies
Shuttle drive and backup in a single ingest pass, each copy verified independently.
Concurrent multi-card ingest
Offload several cards at once — no waiting for one to finish before the next.
Per-destination routing
Send photos and video to different places from the same card, in the same job.
New-only ingest
Custos reads what’s already on your destination drives and skips files that are safely copied.
Presets with locks
Reusable ingest setups with locked and required fields — built for assistants and digital techs.
Smart renaming
File and folder templates at ingest or in Browse, with a cheat sheet that maps your Photo Mechanic variables.
IPTC templates & hotkeys
Bake copyright and contact info in at ingest, and apply metadata profiles with a single key while culling.
Instant RAW previews
Embedded previews for speed, full RAW decode at true 1:1 when you need to check focus.
Live histogram & waveform
RGB, parade and waveform scopes from the display or the RAW data, computed natively.
XMP everywhere
Ratings, labels and metadata in standard XMP sidecars — picked up by Lightroom, Capture One and more.
PDF reports & contact sheets
Turn any job into a PDF log, a log with thumbnails, a contact sheet or a thumbnail ZIP.
Capture-time correction
Fix camera clock drift and time zones so timestamps and geotags line up across bodies.
GPX track sync
Geotag a whole shoot automatically by matching capture times against a GPS track log.
A native Apple silicon app for macOS. Ingest, verification and culling all run locally — no cloud round-trips, no phone-home. Windows follows after launch.
Buy it once.
Keep it forever.
Subscriptions don’t belong on a working pro’s toolbelt. Custos is sold as a perpetual license: the version you buy is yours to keep and use for as long as you like, with a period of free updates included. After that, keep working exactly as you are — or upgrade when a new release earns it.
A true modern Photo Mechanic replacement, built to work alongside you for years to come.
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Yours to keepNo subscription, and no expiry on the app you paid for.
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Updates includedFree updates for a set period after you buy.
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Upgrade on your termsNew major releases are optional, never forced on you.
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Works on locationYour license is verified on your Mac — no always-online check.
Where Custos is headed
The beta is the foundation. Here’s the direction we’re building toward — shaped by feedback from photographers like you.
- Hybrid photo + video ingestOne verified workflow for mixed-media shoots.
- Smart proxy generationEdit-ready proxies created automatically during ingest.
- AI-assisted cullingLocal, private blur and duplicate detection, plus best-of-the-set picks for similar frames.
- Panorama & stack detectionGroup bracketed, panorama and focus-stack sequences as they come in.
- Metadata variables & code replacementAuto-fill captions, keywords and filenames from EXIF and shortcut codes.
- Structured keywordsControlled-vocabulary, hierarchical keywords written to standard metadata.
- Reverse geocodingTurn GPS coordinates into city, state and country automatically.
- Team workflowsShared job templates, live card status and handoff reports for crews.
- Watermarking & batch-resizeWatermarked proofs and resized deliverables on export.
- FTP & email deliverySend selects straight to clients, wires or servers.
- Chain-of-custody audit trailsCryptographic proof of custody for high-stakes delivery.
- iPad companionReview and approve ingests on the go.
Nothing here is a promise for v1 — it’s the map. Beta feedback decides what comes first.
Bring it to your next shoot.
The beta is free and includes every feature. Download it, ingest a card, and tell us what you think — updates arrive automatically.
Found a bug or have an idea? Write to feedback@custos.photo