Plugins for Photoshop, Elements, Lightroom, PSP & others
Plugins for Photoshop, Elements, Lightroom, PSP & others
Plugin Newsletter - August 2008
Contents
========
EDITORIAL
CONTRASTMASTER FOR WINDOWS RELEASED: Sophisticated Contrast Adjustments
PLUGINS ESSENTIALS: How to use all filter plugins as smart filters in Photoshop CS3
POLL RESULTS: For what purpose do you use plugins?
NEW POLL: How many photos do you usually take during a holiday trip?
THE DISCUSSION FORUMS: FocalBlade for Aperture?, Buzz Pro 3, Trapcod Import, IrfanView Enlargements
FREE PLUGINS AND TOOLS: ChromAcute, LRViewer, Photo! Editor, Stepok's
Raw Importer, Zoner Photo Studio 8
GRAPHICS NEWS: Lightroom 2 & Camera RAW 4.5, Portrait Professional 8, SiteGrinder 2, Silver Efex Pro, Wow Photoshop book
PRODUCTS FROM THE PLUGIN SITE
ABOUT THE PLUGIN SITE
Dear Reader,
We have finally released a new plugin in the PhotoWiz series. It is called ContrastMaster and lets you adjust the contrast of images in sophisticated new ways. It also offers some new features that will also be added to the other PhotoWiz plugins in future. For example there is a new Preview tab control that lets you conveniently adjust and compare three different effect settings without leaving the plugin dialog. ContrastMaster also fully supports XP/Vista visual styles and a new tool bar that makes key shortcuts obsolete. ContrastMaster also supports multiple processors, pipelines and cores for major parts of its code. For more information about ContrastMaster see below.
There are some discussions about Lightroom plugin support going on on the Adobe Blog pages. Unfortunately it all sounds like poor excuses for not having added plugin support in Lightroom 2. And then it is mentioned that plugin support is not the highest priority for the Lightroom team. You have to love these people for the passion with which they defend their product, but you could get the impression that a few PR lessons would do no harm. But better read yourself at
http://blogs.adobe.com/jnack/2008/08/the_lightroom_v.html
http://blogs.adobe.com/lightroomjournal/2008/08/plugin_or_external_editor.html#1569484
Kindest regards,
Harald Heim
www.thepluginsite.com
CONTRASTMASTER FOR WINDOWS
RELEASED: Sophisticated Contrast Adjustments
-----------------------------------
Our latest ContrastMaster plugin achieves effective contrast enhancement
as well as creates dramatic contrast looks, photorealistic paintings and
HDR-like effects. It can turn low-contrast photos into vivid and detailed
images and transform ordinary photos into interesting and dynamic shots.
There is no other tool available that offers as many methods for contrast adjustment as ContrastMaster. ContrastMaster is not only more effective at squeezing image details and contrast out of photos than most other tools, it also offers more options for fine-tuning and controlling image contrast. With its masking options you often do not need to create selections or layer masks for selectively applying the ContrastMaster effect, which saves you a lot of time.
For downloading a demo version,
more information, screenshots and examples please visit
http://www.thepluginsite.com/products/photowiz/contrastmaster/
PLUGINS ESSENTIALS: How to
use all filter plugins as smart filters in Photoshop CS3
-----------------------------------
Photoshop CS3 offers a new smart filtering feature for non-destructively
applying filter plugins. By default Photoshop CS3 only allows plugins
as smart filters that explicitly set a certain bit in their resources.
However, it is possible to use all filter plugins by activating a hidden
internal preference setting. Plugins that support scripting will then
be fully usable as smart filters. But plugins that do not support scripting
will be helpful as smart filters only within one editing session in many
cases.
To find out more please read
the updated "Plugins Essentials" article at:
http://www.thepluginsite.com/knowhow/tutorials/introduction/introduction.htm#smart
POLL RESULTS: For what purpose do you use plugins?
-----------------------------------
280 people voted in the latest poll about the usage purpose of plugins.
Here are the results of the latest poll:
1. Photo Enhancement 57%
2. Graphic Design 13%
3. Special Effects 10%
4. Artwork 9%
5. Scrapbooking 6%
6. Other 2%
7. Web Design 2%
8. Editing of video frames 1%
Editing of 3D images 1%
So most people seem to use plugins for photo enhancement. If we combine the graphics design, special effects, artwork and scrapbooking categories into one category, e.g. called graphics effects, we get a 38% value. So a bit less than 2/3 of all plugin users mainly enhance their photos with them and more than 1/3 uses them for achieving certain effects.
For more poll results, please
visit the Know-How section at
http://thepluginsite.com/knowhow/
NEW POLL: How many photos
do you usually take during a holiday trip?
-----------------------------------
This month's poll asks you how many photos you usually take during a holiday
trip. If you just came back from one, then let us know the number of photos
you took. Otherwise We are interested in the number of photos that you
took during your latest trip.
Please vote at the bottom
of the page at
http://www.thepluginsite.com/
THE DISCUSSION FORUMS: FocalBlade
for Aperture?, Buzz Pro 3, Trapcod Import, IrfanView Enlargements
-----------------------------------
Here are a few posts from The Plugin Site Discussion forums:
Guntis wrote: "Do you
plan to make FocalBlade plugin for Apple Aperture 2? I'd be interested
in it."
http://www.thepluginsite.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3003
BUCKSHEL wrote: "Been
trying to find a way to purchase Buzz Pro 3; to no avail. Just can't seem
to get it! I have an earlier version which I covet, and would like to
update. Many thanks."
http://www.thepluginsite.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2987
austin1979 wrote: "hi
all really tough question here about the effect-plug in i want to use
for the shine effect. i have been thinking about purchasing trapcods shine
effect with my movie logo i have already created.but i also want to use
the xara extreme 4.0 software as well!so really my question is can you
import graphic`s form a diffrent software into trapcod or does it have
to be a specific software?..."
http://www.thepluginsite.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2993
allstar wrote: "I have
a bunch of files that ar 600x400 and close to , dpi shows 100 on most
, what do i have to do to resize/resample these for 8x10 quality prints
from irfanview??? or if there is a better way? thanks from a newbie."
http://www.thepluginsite.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2998
For more interesting discussion
please visit our forums at
http://www.thepluginsite.com/forum/
FREE PLUGINS AND TOOLS: ChromAcute,
LRViewer, Photo! Editor, Stepok's Raw Importer, Zoner Photo Studio 8
-----------------------------------
ChromAcute (Beta) is a free plugin (for Windows) for removing chromatic aberrations and color fringing from digital photos. It features a one-click correction of color fringing and batch processing. 16bit image support and a Mac version are planned.
LRViewer is a standalone viewer for Lightroom image previews that allows
photographers and their clients to exchange image selections and notes.
The commercial LRVmaker by the same company allows you to customize the
appearance and behavior of LRViewer.
http://imageingester.com/LRViewer-info.php
Photo! Editor is an easy to use image editing tool (for Windows). It lets
you remove red eyes, enhance the colors, make funny caricatures, add lighting
effects as well as straighten, resample and crop images. Additionally
there is a denoise tool and several makeup brushes. Photo! Editor also
supports batch processing, but only five common image file types.
http://pho.to/editor/
Stepok's Raw Importer is a simple tool (for Windows) for converting RAW
files to JPG and TIF. It supports a wide variety of
camera RAW formats, offers an enhanced RAW conversion algorithm as well
as exposure, dynamic range, color temperature, saturation, focus and grain
controls. It can also batch convert RAW files.
http://www.stepok.net/eng/raw_importer.htm
Zoner Photo Studio 8 Classic is a universal tool for digital camera users
(for Windows). It consists of an image viewer with an integrated image
editor. It offers tools for downloading photos from the camera, for correcting
image defects, archiving and managing images, and publishing them in various
ways. The download works like the Pro version for 30 days and then switches
to the Classic version. There is also an enhanced commercial version 10
of Zoner Photo Studio, which includes support for Photoshop plugins.
To view the features visit
http://www.zoner.com/photo-studio/compare-versions.htm
For downloading please go
to
http://www.zoner.com/photo-studio/download.htm
GRAPHICS NEWS: Lightroom 2 & Camera RAW 4.5, Portrait Professional
8, SiteGrinder 2, Silver Efex Pro, Wow Photoshop book
-----------------------------------
Version 2 of Photoshop Lightroom (for Win/Mac) now offers dual-monitor support, non-destructive localized image correction via brushing and gradients, camera profiles, enhanced search functionality and much more. It is Adobe’s first 64-bit application for both MacOS X and Windows Vista. The Camera Raw plugin and DNG Converter 4.5 are also now available and support over 190 cameras including Olympus E 420 and E 520.
http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshoplightroom/
http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop/cameraraw.html
Portrait Professional 8 (for Win/Mac) is an application for facial improvement
with the help of sliders. It lets you reshape faces, fix skin blemishes,
removing wrinkles, grease, sweat or shiny highlights, adjust the lighting
on the face, remove red eyes and whiten teeth and eyes. New is the improved
face sculpting and slimming, hair thickening, smoothing and re-coloring,
eye re-coloring and mouth enhancement. There is also a more expensive
Studio version with 16bit and RAW file support.
http://www.portraitprofessional.com/
The new SiteGrinder 2 plugin (for Win/Mac) includes compatibility with
Leopard and Vista, improved support for JPEG metadata, better pop-up menus
and support for non-English language characters. SiteGrinder lets you
generate web pages directly from within Photoshop.
Nik Software released Silver Efex Pro (for Win/Mac), a plugin for Photoshop
and Aperture for black and white conversion. It includes U-Point-technology,
protects against unwanted artifacts, 18 emulated black-and-white film
types, a grain engine, color filters, vignettes and more.
http://www.niksoftware.com/silverefexpro/
Peachpit Press released the "How to Wow: Photoshop CS3 for Photography"
book. Authored by Jack Davis, it includes tips and techniques from streamlining
workflow, hand-tinting to optimizing a series of photos automatically
in Camera Raw.
http://www.peachpit.com/store/product.aspx?isbn=0321509862
