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Comparisons

This page shows you the result of correcting two photo with ContrastMaster and similar tools. It is meant to give you the chance to compare ContrastMaster with other tools. We tried to do the photo corrections in the other tools as accurately as possible and didn't try to cheat by using them wrongly. The names of the other tools aren't mentioned (only Photoshop), but they are sorted according to their price.

The Original Photo

The used photo is a bit underexposed, but offers a lot of different image areas with small details (the wall, sand and tree) as well as large details (e.g. the clouds and the car). There is a lot of contrast already in the image (between the bright sky and the dark foreground), but little contrast in local image areas.

	Enhancement	Comment

ContrastMaster - Normal Effect ($70 / $40)		This is just one of the various looks that you can produce with many effects of ContrastMaster. ContrastMaster improves the overall contrast by brightening shadows and darkening highlights. It also increases contrast in small and large image details. The original colors of the image are kept.
ContrastMaster - Strong Effect ($70 / $40)		This ContrastMaster effect was deliberately made quite strong to show how much contrast adjustment can be applied without damaging the image.

Photoshop Unsharp Mask		Unsharp Mask is sometimes used for local contrast adjustments. In this case the shadows become even deeper and the highlights brighter up to the point of blowing out. Larger details are emphasized a bit, but smaller details stay soft.
$150 Tool		The colors have been altered and look less natural. The clouds have not been emphasized very much. There are very few adjustment options, so you do not have much control over the effect. Higher effect settings sometimes produce artifacts or blown highlights.
$100 Tool		At full intensity the effect is still a bit moderate. The overall contrast is improved, but the contrast in the details is only slightly enhanced. There are no options to adjust the effect apart from the intensity slider.
$70 Tool		The sky looks too grayish and other smaller details have not been emphasized. It looks softer than the original.
$50 Tool		Looks very unnatural, because shadows and highlights have been removed too much. The result is oversaturated and the sky became quite ugly.
$40 Tool		It seems that the contrast has been greatly reduced instead of increased, which makes the image look faded. In the extremely brightened up shadows ugly artifacts were added.
$30 Tool		This tool produces a very strong effect. The contrast is increased in larger details, but smaller details come out soft. The original colors of the image were changed and do not look natural anymore.
Freeware Tool		This tool floods the image with ugly artifacts. They can be blurred away a bit, but then the image becomes too soft.