Today, subscriptions are everywhere. You must pay by the month. But if you stop, you lose all your tool setup at the end of the month. Nothing is left, nothing is yours.

So, I prefer tools I can buy, that will serve me for years. If the service/cost ratio is good, I’m OK with purchasing a competent tool, but I don’t want to keep my wallet open at all times.

FastStone Image Viewer

The very first step in any processing is sorting. You need to move fast, you need to find the best images, sometimes in a batch of 10 (fast bursts are lethal for the number of images).

FastStone Image Viewer is a marvel in this respect: inexpensive, very competent in display and – above all – it offers a critical feature for sorting: it can display images 4 by 4 on the same screen for quick comparison. For example, you can zoom in on all four images in parallel with a flick of the mouse wheel and compare the quality of detail in the pre-selected images. Use the “Del” key to eliminate unnecessary images, and the “*” key to mark images for priority retention.

Since the software is free for amateur users, it’s even better. But a $35 lifetime license is still an attractive price to support the ongoing development of this indispensable tool.

DxO PhotoLab

Visualizing and sorting images is not enough. You also need to be able to work on them to fine-tune the rendering. FasStone Image Viewer has some interesting correction capabilities, but while this is sometimes sufficient, I can’t rely on it and need a powerful image processing tool (including RAW).

Photoshop has long been considered the benchmark. But the other tools on the market have really come into line. Today, there are only two reasons to choose:

• The user interface must be simple and effective
• Noise processing must enable you to gain ISOs to work in the best shooting conditions.

Adobe does this very well, but so do others. In particular, I warmly recommend DxO PhotoLab (not to be confused with DxO PureRAW plugin for Photoshop or Lightroom). The quality of RAW processing is exemplary. When it comes to noise reduction, it’s often the case that DxO does better than Adobe.

I therefore recommend two options:

1. Either you’re addicted to Adobe and need to add DxO PureRAW to maintain your usual workflow with incredible image quality.
2. Or you’ve discovered (with the trial version) that DxO PhotoLab is a perfectly fluid development environment that’s at least as comfortable as Adobe’s. DxO PhotoLab is French, and for €229, the software is yours for life. Upgrades only cost €109, but are not mandatory if you haven’t changed your camera (my main reason for upgrading).

I can’t get enough of DxO PhotoLab, and version 7 (yes, I know, version 8 is already out) is simply incredible in the detail it extracts from my RAW files.

A word of warning though: you need computing power. On PCs, a graphics card less than 3 years old is highly recommended to drive the processing engine.

IrfanView

This tool is a bit of a “tool bag” for my quicker DIY projects. For example, it’s very fast for image viewing. But it’s also remarkably easy to use for cropping or resizing an image without having to bring out the heavy artillery.

What’s more, IrfanView recognizes just about any image format (photo or not), which makes life easier for quick format conversion.

Sometimes, I am somewhat dissatisfied with the size of my digital photographs. The simplest way to improve (after the fact) is to run any Photoshop-like program, and apply a resampling (resize) preferably with the Lanczos method, in order to get 2x or 3x or 4x more pixels. It is fast and efficient, but it usually generates a slightly blurry but bigger picture. If the target is a large format print that could be watched from a short distance, or for something like printing on a very large canvas, I should have more details in the picture (more than what was initially collected by the camera). The image is still too small.

The other approach would be to use a software tool like Topaz Photo AI or the all-new Adobe Photoshop “Image Enhancer AI”. Those are Pro tools (“Pro” means “expensive”): Topaz costs 199$, its competition often relies on monthly subscriptions. For a normal guy (who only needs it a few times per year, at most), this is not applicable.

Why not look toward (free) Open Source tools? Fortunately, some are existing.

And I added another constraint: I want it to run on my own PC (no cloud resources and/or cloud subscription like what StableDiffusion requires).

The general idea

For a few months, I have been impressed by the multitude of Artificial Intelligence solutions (Didn’t you hear about something named ChatGPT?) and not only to generate human-readable text. Tools like StableDiffusion, Dall-E, or Midjourney generate spectacular pictures from a textual description (a prompt). But they often include a mechanism to extend their text-to-image activity to a much larger scale (usually they produce small pictures to sparingly use computer resources).

My solution – in details

I won’t detail the steps taken to reach that solution. But here it is.

One strong PC, with two options/directions that could be imagined.

• A powerful graphic/video card (not always, but often based on nVidia GPU).
• A super-powerful PC with (most critical) a lot of memory.

In my own case, I chose:

• i9-13900K (with a good AiO liquid cooler, because this beast can heat up quite quickly when running 100%),
• 64 gigabytes of DDR4-DRAM memory (you will hear that this is the limiting factor for the image size).

But, you could work with a smaller CPU (with a lot of patience), or a Mac computer.

Nobody would claim this is a cheap PC, but it definitely works reasonably well.

EasyDiffusion installation steps

EasyDiffusion is a free version of a tool very similar to StableDiffusion. You may install it on your PC, and it will run either on the CPU or on the video card.

• Download the installation program from the EasyDiffusion home page (according to your needs, you’ll choose the binary for Windows, Linux, or Mac).
• Follow the installation steps from the page, don’t worry about changing any option right now. You will need some patience (it goes and download additional models and other packages, it will build some of the files during the installation).
• Run the program from the Windows “Start” menu. This will open a Command window to run a few background things (no need to even look at this), then a browser window giving access to the EasyDiffusion user interface.

• For the first configuration, I would recommend clicking at the top of the page on “Settings” and selecting the following program settings:
  • Auto-save Images: YES
  • Save Location: select the appropriate directory to save your creations.
  • Open browser on startup: YES
  • GPU memory usage: High (with 64 GB of DRAM, you want to use it all or as much as possible).
  • Use CPU (not GPU): YES
  • Beta channel: NO.

Create a text file whose name should be YR_MoreResolutions.plugin.js with the following text contents:

// ==UserScript==
// @name         Ski-SDUI-MoreResolutions
// @version      0.1-YR
// @description  More Resolution Options
// @author       Super.Skirv, JeLuF, YR
// ==/UserScript==

(function() {

	options="";
	for(i=6; i<=32; i++) {
		options += '<option value="' + (64*i) + '">' + (64*i) + '</option>';
	}
    options += '<option value="' + 3072 + '">' + 3072 + '</option>';
    options += '<option value="' + 4096 + '">' + 4096 + '</option>';
    options += '<option value="' + 4640 + '">' + 4640 + '</option>';
    options += '<option value="' + 6960 + '">' + 6960 + '</option>';
    options += '<option value="' + 8192 + '">' + 8192 + '</option>';
    document.getElementById('width').innerHTML = options;
    document.getElementById('height').innerHTML = options;

})();

• Install the plugin, by copying the YR_MoreResolutions.plugin.js file in the C:\EasyDiffusion\plugins\ui directory.

Operation and typical use

When arriving at the EasyDiffusion page in your browser, you will need to feed it with a source picture to enlarge and the right upscaling options:

• Choose the source image with the “Browse” button.
• Custom VAE: None
• Image size: 3072 (width) by 2048 (height) – for 64 gigabytes of DRAM.
  • This parameter is dictated by:
    • The need to work on an image as large as possible
    • The memory size limitation. If you have only 16 gigabytes of DRAM memory, you will need to reduce these parameters each in a ratio of 2: 1536 by 1024. But you can explore the optimum for your configuration.
  • Swap the parameters if the image is in portrait (vertical) orientation.
• Inference steps: 50 (this has practically no influence, you can leave the default value)
• Prompt strength: 0 (This is the critical value: It will ensure that EasyDiffusion AI never tries generating a new artificial image from the prompt text, but concentrates on the upscaling job).
• Output format: choose the right file format for you.
• Show a live preview: NO
• Scale up by 4x with RealESRGAN_x4plus (Avoid RealESRGAN_4xplus_anime_6B which is totally not for photography)
• The prompt (at the top of the page), and the Seed value (in “image settings”) are not used, except when naming the output file.

If you don’t have enough memory, you can always reduce the “Image size” or you get a message like the following:

The message tells you what memory size it tried to allocate/reserve. This will guide you when reducing the “Image size”.

If you are correctly configured, after a few minutes, you will see the result like in:

Notice: the new resolution is now 12288 x 8192 pixels (we left from 6960 x 4640 pixels, to reach no less than 100 mega-pixels). But, above all, the Artificial Intelligence (of the ESRGAN network) determined new pixels not only interpolated but imagined as complementary to the existing ones and totally credible.

In the picture used for this example, don’t spend time checking the blurred background. But take a look at the fine details in the structure of the dragonfly wings. It may not be perfect (from the professional entomologist’s point of view, there are anatomy errors), but the ribs/veins and the light reflections are very natural-looking, even in areas where they are only half-drawn or half-blurred. The same remark applied to the eyes and antennas of the dragonfly.

On the opposite, don’t even believe the proposal from the software: It’s no use clicking the button to upscale again to 20032 x 13376; You already reached the maximum size allowed by the available memory. You can’t go further with only 64 GB.

If you want to check the results, I made the files available:

• Original
• Upscaled x4

When Adobe launched this kind of solution and when they made it compulsory in order to obtain the most recent version of their tools, some people warned that this was a major blow into the capacity to maintain a reliable capacity to work on our photos. Most either ignored the warning, downplayed its importance or or did not understand the full breadth of the risk. Today, the reality check is here; And it’s hurting real bad with thousands of professionnals waiting for the service to come back while trying to explain to their customers that nothing can be done until Adobe finds a solution (
I sympathize sincerely).

Of course, this suspended animation state is bad in itself (nobody missed that). But this is highlighting the issues at hand that were less obvious or more difficult to understand.

1. Unique/single failure point: If/when Adobe fails, we have no other option than wait. We are used to having a computer fail or a software stopping to work and -usually- it’s only (!) a matter of moving the DVD to a new PC, switching over to another workstation or another professional. Now, all Adobe customers fail in the same minute. This is a systemic risk like we are afraid of in the global bank system. No fall back option.
2. Opacity: The fact that Adobe Creative Cloud is far outside the scope of its users (except maybe some global-level customers who may have a direct line with Adobe management) makes it nearly impossible to have visibility. And in this kind of situation, we, the users, want/need to know immediately a/ what is happening, b/ what we can do to mitigate the situation (even if nothing is possible), c/ how/when the solution will be available. [And today, Adobe communication is an exemple… of what should not be done]

Is ease of subscription worht it? Is the flexibility of having always the latest release version at your hand worth it? This is anybody’s choice and the choice cannot be done for you. But, since we have some time on our hands (if your customers are not shooting on the phone right now), it’s time to think about our choices.

Finally, Adobe has officially announced the newest Photoshop: CS6. We know about everything of it because of the beta which has been available for a few weeks already (and there are a few videos available on a YouTube channel, for you to discover all the new features). But there is one new thing which was left undisclosed up to now, the price.

If the basic cost for a full license is nothing new (some people, including me, were hoping to see a price drop like for Lightroom):

• $699 for a Photoshop CS6 license
• Photoshop CS6 upgrades from $199
• $2599 for the full CS6 collection

But there is now a cloud-based solution allowing a new rent option: US$50 or 20€ per month gives you access to a wealth of applications: all the CS6 Master Collection applications, including Photoshop Extended. The only catch is that you have to pay a full year of subscription. This may not look great if you only need one of the applications but it’s astonishingly good if you need more.

If you are a student, you get an even better bargain at $30 per month.

Remember: You’ve got some time to still decide (Photoshop CS6 starts shipping at the end of May), but you can play with the beta version of Photoshop CS6 up to then.

Download it freely from Adobe Labs.

A reminder of the main new features:

• Improved content-aware patch which is behaving in a nearly magical way;
• Speed improvements everywhere;
• New User Interface with a dark background;
• A lot of newly improved tools (about everywhere).

As always, remember that the beta version will not work any longer after the arrival of the final/official version, that it is not exempt from bugs while Adobe gives no warranty about it (all very good reasons to have backup copies of your pictures before using Adobe Photoshop CS6 beta).

However, if you still want to have an idea of the future of Photoshop through some demos, tests and trials done on some of the versions which were leaked to the Internet, here comes Photoshop CS6 in full video glory.

In English:

Adobe Photoshop CS6.v13.0 Released MacOSX-Incl… par hikarivip

En español :

En français :

In Portuguese:

Last small advice: If you search with Google, you will certainly find a large number of links to download Photoshop CS6. Don’t forget that this is (often, but not always) a fraud to try and infect your computer with a nasty Trojan horse, more than with Photoshop CS6.

• Video demo of “PatchMatch“, an algorithm developed by Princeton scientific research and Adobe.
• AppleInsider’s sneak peek at CS6 look and feel
• Image de-blurring demonstrated at 2011 Adobe MAX in October 2011, and many other technological presentations shown at the same time.

But, for now, since April 2010, we are still stuck with the old and faithful Photoshop CS5. A very good reason to keep looking at enlightening sources of new techniques, tutorials, solutions and free plug-ins. The last ones I stumbled upon:

• An Introduction to Working with Layers and Masks in Photoshop
• Creating Textures in Photoshop
• How to Use Photoshop’s High Pass Filter to Soften Skin While Retaining Texture by PetaPixel
• Smarter Content Aware Fill in Photoshop brilliantly solves an issue often found when using “content-aware fill“: Photoshop sometimes fills with parts of the image that are taken from the most surprising places (and often the less pleasant ones). A simple and 100% efficient solution.
• Camera RAW vs. Lightroom einmal, in deutscher Sprache verfasst
• Finally, a hodge-podge of filters, brushes, plugins, all free for Photoshop: Free Photoshop Filters, Brushes and Plugins

So, many people want to see my photos immediately out of the camera, right after the recording. This is not an issue for me when we are speaking of showing the picture on the back of my camera (Nobody can see anything there, anyway…) but I actively resist when we’re speaking about final pictures. As a matter of fact, I work some more. This is something that ussually annoys a lot of other photographers, but that I consider an integral part of taking a picture (and this is a reason why I switched to digital photography early). First, I sort pictures out in Adobe Bridge. I usually keep only a small part of the images I shot. In a family reunion, I may keep half of the shots (It may vary). From a photo safari, I keep between 1% and 3% of the recorded files. The rest is not really worth it. Your mileage may vary (some will say that I should shoot less and think more, but it’s my style), but you need to select your best pictures.

Then, I enter the real development phase: I work from the RAW picture files of my camera, but this would be near exactly the same from JPEG picture files (I just prefer to start with images less digitally massaged by the camera to reach my own pictures). Consequently, a lot of what I do happens in Adobe Camera Raw (and it applies mostly to Lightroom users too). Here is how I proceed and… why.

The first thing requires to notice that the histogram of most images does not fully cover the full range from black to white: There is not real black (on the left of the histogram) and not real white (on the right). It may be an artistic choice, but in most cases this is merely a consequence of the limitations of the photo camera.

I follow a two-step approach to extend to a full light dynamic range. First, by using the Exposure control to push the highlights to the right of the histogram. Here, I pushed the Exposure to +0.35 to align the last bit of the histogram with the right hand side (I ensured that the white pixels are actually completely white, not light grey and I don’t blow them out).

Then, I do the same with shadows (and the left hand side of the histogram) using the Blacks, pushing only a little.

From this point, the picture dynamic range is maximal. It is also possible to correct the contrast, but it is not often necessary if the shooting conditions were average.Similarly, apart from significant problems in the original, it is not necessary to use the Fill light to lighten dark shadows.

The next step is to re-frame the image: Some will say that I have the bad habit of centering my subject too much, but when we speaking about very active animals, like the three jackals of this picture, I prefer to use the central AF zone of my Sony Alpha 700 which has the most sensitive and fastest AF sensor. So, I leave the re-framing job to Photoshop (even if I recognize that whenever it’s possible, it is simpler to think about framing correctly from shooting time).

For this, I use the re-framing tool in the tool bar at the top of the Adobe Camera Raw window and I choose the right frame with the mouse (thinking about painting traditions and the rule of thirds).

Some will prefer to start the whole process with re-framing (rather than waiting here for this). There are some good reasons for it (specially so when re-framing is used to remove an ugly over- or under-exposed area from the picture). I believe that in most cases, it’s more an issue of personal preference.

Next comes the most controversial step: Detail accentuation. It is easy to over-do it and I strongly recommend to keep the original Adobe settings rather than stepping all over it with too much accentuation (many people do it and I won’t give names). As a matter of fact, it’s true that I tend to force more of these fake details in web pictures than in quality prints.

The best is probably to experiment very lightly, in the Camera Raw settings, after zooming in onto the important area of the image (I’m less tempted to over-do it when it’s big in front of my eyes).

Then, it is simple to open a copy of the image in Photoshop from the “Open copy” button. It will be necessary to save a fine-tuned copy or to print it on your ink-jet printer.

I simply recommend to always convert colors (the impact is usually small but I tend to have confidence in Photoshop choices).

And here is a nice additional step that I get from Patrick Fagot, photographer that I love and whose teachings I used as a basis for my own ideas to use Photoshop, thanks to his advice during photographic trips with did together in Brazil an in Botswana. He advises to immediately add a colored frame to the best photos in order to give them a little additional pro finish and this is true that it help the picture to “pop out”.

It’s only a matter of using the Photoshop Image > Canvas size... control…

…and to choose a new size increased by a few millimeters around the image (and the right Canvas extension color – Black is often good but you can experiment).

Some will prefer the Relative control which allows to give a relative increase size, but I feel it is less comfortable.

From this description, it is possible to change a few settings around this. And I guess this will give inspiration to some of the readers.

If you want to go further: All other tips and tricks of YLovePhoto.

• Photoshop: Panoramabilder entzerren
• How to Reduce Your Depth of Field in Photoshop
• Camera Raw 6 : accentuer la netteté
• Learn the basics of color focus editing in Photoshop CS5
• Photoshop Tutorial Mine : from image to flickr
• Photoshop CS5: Der seltsame “Eigene Filter”
• Photoshop CS5: Tuning für den “Eigenen Filter”

And I will also add a few Photoshop plugins that I could recommend right now.

• Curves by Mehdi offers predefined curves (helping understand the curves feature of Photoshop
• Grain Generator by Richard Rosenman will add all the grain you want to your photograph (excessively configurable)
• virtualPhotographer by optikVerve Labs: 200 one-click preset effects
• B/W Conversion by photo-plugins.com
• Fed up with the work of cleaning out wires from the landscape, not having the fill-by-content CS5 feature? Go and download Wire Worm by MV’s Plugins

What is clearly the matter of speculative thinking is the availability date of Photoshop CS6. Most observers indicate that nothing should be expected before the beginning of 2012. But the usual cycle could be shortened to to take advantage of the holiday sales of the end of 2011.

On the contrary, some technical features are getting pretty clear.

Presentation

Visibly, Photoshop CS6 will receive a (more or less) revamped interface in order to take a better advantage of multiple screens (many graphic designers and photographers now use several screens to widen their work space and to spread several applications around). PS CS6 will allow to better spread the tools, palettes between these screens with a new specific “docking” mode and maybe some additional features to support these users.

Furthermore, it is also said by some that the integration of the high-end graphic card features will be improved again (to speed up many basic functions of Photoshop).

Features and productivity

Adobe is preparing to provide a whole set of new features looking toward the best possible result with the smallest number of steps for many day-to-day needs. We already new the content-aware fill feature to quickly clean up a picture zone without hours of brushing details and textures to keep the change as invisible as when the communist Kremlin was wiping out previous officials from photographs.

Here, Photoshop will come with CS6 features to give a picture the look and appearance of another which is provided as reference image. The examples that Adobe Photoshop could use may be as diverse as the pictures from a well known photographer (“I want my photo to look like one photo from Laurent Baheux or like one photo from David Lachapelle“). If you will not get their genius and elegance, at least, your picture will look similar enough.

I expect that if the reference image is an HDR picture, you will obtain directly the same colorful look without the effort to combine several images, and without the long DIY work of false HDR in Photoshop (6 not-so-easy-to-remember steps).

More generally speaking, the automated tasks like “automatic contrast” or “automatic colors” will be much improved and simplified in order to solve simple problems we all encounter: bad contrast, fuzzy images from hand-held vibration, offset colors, etc.

Then, (as usual, I’m tempted to say) Adobe is ready to improve its selection tools with more efficiency, faster operation, more precision.

Video et animated images

If you are interested in the possibility to present your photographs in an animated format, there will certainly be some more possibilities to go beyond “Animated GIF”, and Adobe Helium will be there to allow the creation of sequences, animations, and even some interactive web components based upon CSS3 and HTML5.

Furthermore, the video capture feature of our SLR cameras will be better served. This is pretty sure, even if we don’t know much except that the new Canon codec being developed for the future Canon EOS 5D MkIII will be supported.

Conclusion

We still have nearly a full year to wait until we see the details, but the already-planned features are significant. They will come with an extension of the use of the 64-bit architecture allowing to handle forever more memory space (we already know that 4 GB of RAM is now the minimum for comfort when using Photoshop and PS CS6 will be no exception).

Some ask if Adobe will apply its subscription/rental offer (month-by-month payment) onto CS6 and onto some other markets than USA. If this is the case, it will be the consequence of the subscription offer there and it could well start before the launch of Photoshop CS6.

Meanwhile, you can still go and have a look at the preview of some features of Photoshop CS6 (Alpha version) from November 2010.

You can now compare the single purchase, definitive but unable to evolve after the regular updates (about US$700) and a subscription or a rental scheme. There are several uses I think could be useful.

• Pay-as-you-go (for a pro photographer, this could be useful in front of the accountant; For the amateur, it could help “swallow” the high cost of the needed updgrade from an old Photoshop version): the yearly subscription is down to US$420, paid month after month (with a 1-year commitment, as in most mobile phone plans).
• Do not commit (for an hesitating photographer or willing to do a “long trial”, over the usual trial period offered by Adobe): the subscription is US$49 per month and can be stopped whenever you want without any question asked by Adobe.
• Pay when you need it (maybe for a traveling photographer who is often not using the tool): US$49 per month, but you need to decide when you need it or not. However, good planning could reduce the costs significantly.

This proposal is not available in all countries, but it presented on the American web site for Adobe: Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 family / Subscription editions.

See also http://hubblesite.org/gallery/behind_the_pictures/ where you can see the same video in very high quality.

I know that there are plenty of people using Adobe Photoshop. Here comes the time for your list of links to resources that could be useful to you (and me), this time with a large representation of the excellent tutorials from Digital Photography School (but not only them).

• Smarter sharpening with the High Pass filter
• Light Stalking : Lightroom or Photoshop, What is Really the Best Post-processing Software?
• How to Adjust Levels in Photoshop, a video tutorial by Scott Bourne (on Vimeo)
• Dodge and burn: In Photoshop Elements and with Adjustment Layers And Masks in Photoshop.
• A Quick and Effective Way to Enhance Contrast
• How to Batch Resize in Photoshop
• Photoshop: Working with Locked Pixels
• Seven Photoshop tips for better portraits
• Isolate an Object from a Complex Background in Photoshop

To close this issue, I’d like also to propose how to detect photoshopped images and the tools you could use:

• Your own eyes
• Image Error Level Analysis
• Photoshop itself, while pushing contrast and brightness levels to their extremes (up or down) to evidence the local differences

• Unshake is a free photo editing software written in Java that can remove blurs from your photos. It can be used on virtually any platform (Linux, PC, Mac, etc.)
• GIMP is the GNU/Linux-based photo editing software. It also exists in versions for Windows, Mac OS X. Since it has a full system of plug-ins, you can go quite far (including improving your photos with the Refocus-It and Iterative Refocus plug-ins for sharpening the photos).
• Another specific noise-reduction plug-in for GIMP is the GREYCstoration plugin (it will work well to improve photographs shot at high ISO levels).

That’s worth trying, isn’t it?

Besides, an for those of you who are strictly interested in using GIMP, there are additional resources to check:

• techZilo has compiled a handy list of its top 40+ plugins for GIMP.
• How To Use Photoshop Plugins On Linux

Let’s have some stocking stuffers in these festive times. Photoshop users should have the right to receive gifts before the set date of Christmas.

• Adobe Photoshop CS5: Smart-Radius detailliert (in deutscher Sprache)
• Encore un excellent tutoriel de Digital Photography School qui nous apprend à construire des images/illusions d’optique de type Droste : Droste ‘Frame in a Frame’ Effect
• Photoshop RGB to Black & White: Which Images Should You Convert?
• Photoshop-Tipp: Mehrere Smart Objekte einer Ausgangsdatei als voneinander unabhängige Instanzen
• An Introduction to Dodging and Burning in Photography
• How to Create a Pumpkin Carving Stencil in Photoshop
• Camera Raw 6 : maîtriser le contraste d’un paysage
• How to Add a Panning Effect in Photoshop
• Photoshop: Weg mit dem Pixelraster
• Do You Make This Classic Mistake in Black and White Post Processing?
• Learn the basics of color focus editing in Photoshop CS5
• Photoshop Tutorial Mine : from image to flickr

The future of Photoshop CS6 has been recently shown at MAX2010, the Adobe conference in Los Angeles.

I believe that the really impressive part of this technical demonstration is the set of automatisms which operate -essentially- by showing the machine an example of the result to reach rather than finding the right settings (as in this first example where the settings are automatically computed to reproduce the graphic style of the American photographer Ansel Adams). Clearly, Adobe keeps pushing Photoshop into more features built to reach a goal (sometimes a very ambitious one) rather than simply provide raw computer tools. And the magical de-blurring tool (registered trademark) is impressive too.

It’s really at the core of the idea of empowering the photographer. This is Photoshop CS6 (avant-première) before Photoshop CS6.

Via John Nack.

For the all-new Photoshop CS5:

• Photoshop CS5 Content Aware Fill – Just how good is it?
• An Introduction to Focus Stacking with Adobe Photoshop CS4
• Multiple Image Printing in Photoshop CS4

But also for those who stayed -for now- with an older Photoshop (like CS4 or CS3):

• How to Correct Perspective in Photoshop
• Photoshop Technique: Digital Airbrush
• The 8 Basic Things Every Photographer Should Know How to do in Photoshop
• Photoshop Toning with Adjustment Layers

And one specific addition for users of Adobe Bridge (included in Photoshop): 3 Things to Know about Working in Adobe Bridge.

• 15 Essential Tutorials For Photoshop Beginners
• 5 Secrets of the Photoshop Crop Tool
• Using Workspaces in Photoshop
• Photoshop CS3 – Adding a Neutral Density Gradient Filter
• How to Manipulate Colours in Photoshop using Fill Layers
• The Ultimate Guide To Cloning In Photoshop
• Use Photoshop Actions to automate actions
• How to Pop Color Selectively Using Channel Mixers and Layer Masks in Photoshop
• Enhancing Midtones in Photoshop

Returning from Botswana, I started to publish a few of the good pictures I shot in May 2010 while on a photo safari trip. If you are interested, you will find these images on my personal web site and some of them on sale at RedBubble.com. New photos will keep appearing on a daily basis, at least during all June 2010.

In parallel, I had been asked to describe my photographic workflow and the preparation of these photos from Botswana is a good opportunity to go and check this together.

The first thing I should mention is that I am using Adobe Photoshop CS3 (I did not jump to CS4 because of the price, because I did not seem to find the new features attractive enough and because Adobe Camera Raw was already compatible with my own Sony Alpha 700 RAW files).

Mostly, I start with a rough selection from Adobe Bridge. There, I will group images by subject (in the example below, the Bateleur Eagles pictures I shot on May 1st) to get relatively consistent sets of pictures.

There, I will do a first quick pass rejecting all impossible-to-correct defects (blurred image, the animal flew out of the frame, the subject is unclear or confused) and make a first selection labeled as such in Bridge (Ctrl-6). Often, there will be several shots of the same scene with nearly identical features, but I will not look into this right now.

This will be the basis for a second selection (Ctrl-7) where I will check in the details of each picture to make certain that the focus is as good as possible, there is no unwanted blur, the contrast is workable, the exposure is adequate, the details are OK (the light is shining in the eye of the bird or the animal, the attitude is pleasant) and I will try to select the best shot in a continuous burst (best attitude and best focus are the most important features here: A single move of the bird will change everything). This leads to a “feature evaluation” based upon my ALCID set of rules that will lead to an Adobe Bridge ranking from 1 star (Ctrl-1) to 5 stars (Ctrl-5).

Then, I will leave it in this state for a while. I need to give time for a second chance.

When I come back to the image set, I will concentrate on the best images and start working them with Adobe Camera Raw (even for JPEG files, its flexibility is enormous and will help a lot to expose correctly the final photograph). Usually, I start by setting exposure to maximize highlights (using the histogram view, I push the highlights as far to the right as possible without letting it blow out of limits). Then, I will correct blacks the same way (on the left of the histogram view). Last, I will check if contrast needs to be adjusted slightly or color can be toned down or up with vibrance.

Then, I open the image in Photoshop where I will correct the frame (in the example below, I removed a significant part of the frame because I wanted a square frame to enhance the impression of strength given by the Bateleur Eagle looking back at me) and I work on the slight details improvements (removal of a speck of dust, overall sharpening or softening).

In the end, the image is ready to be saved in JPEG (maximum quality) or TIFF format. Once in the largest size for posters and prints, once for web distribution (in a much smaller file size).

The web gallery where I sell prints of my photographs: http://roumazeilles.redbubble.com/works from US$2.39.

Adobe just announced the new features of Adobe Photoshop CS5 and Adobe Photoshop CS5 Extended. Don’t panic! These software programs will not be available before next month and for a price relatively normal at Adobe (read “relatively expensive”; See at the end of the article).

What these new versions of Creative Suite (CS so CS5) bring? I will point you more specifically to 5 features:

• Easier HDR: We will see more and more of these extreme pictures (for the best and for the worst)
• Intelligent fill (Content-Aware Fill)
• More efficient selection tool: To ease the selection of very complex shapes, to fine tune the border of a selection (like hair, always difficult to cut out)
• Improved RAW management: Camera Raw v6 will improve noise management and correction of vignetting
• Adaptation to 64-bit computers and systems, for a higher performance

Press Release

Milestone Release Celebrates 20 Years of Unrivalled Image Editing and Innovation

London, UK — April 12, 2010 — Adobe Systems Incorporated (Nasdaq:ADBE) today announced Adobe® Photoshop® CS5 and Photoshop CS5 Extended software, must-have releases of the professional industry standard for digital imaging. With millions of users celebrating the product’s 20th anniversary this year, Photoshop CS5 builds upon a rich history of innovation and leadership with groundbreaking features and performance gains that boost creativity and workflow efficiency. Packing in more technological advancements from Adobe Labs than any other release and incorporating enhancements to everyday tasks requested by the Photoshop community, the software has greater intelligence and awareness of the content within images, allowing for complex and magical manipulation in just a few clicks. Adobe Photoshop CS5 Extended delivers everything in Photoshop CS5, as well as advanced tools for 3-D which address the unique needs of the video, Web, medical, manufacturing and engineering industries.

Photoshop CS5 and Photoshop CS5 Extended will be available as stand-alone applications or key components of the Adobe Creative Suite® 5 family.

“The past two decades have demonstrated an amazing interplay between customers who want to push the limits of their personal creativity and a passionate team of Adobe engineers who make those visions a reality,” said Kevin Connor, vice president of product management for professional digital imaging at Adobe. “We experienced this firsthand when we posted a ‘sneak peek’ video of the team’s work on the Content Aware Fill feature a few weeks ago. It quickly became the number one viral video online, with close to 2 million views and its ‘magic’ was one of the top trending Twitter topics of discussion. This version of Photoshop has some of the most innovative and extraordinary technologies to ever come from our labs and clearly customers are already clamouring for it.”

Redefining the Image-Editing Experience
Now a native 64-bit application on both Mac and Windows®, Photoshop CS5 delivers superior tools and creative control so users can perform advanced image manipulations and compositing with ease. Revolutionary image intelligence behind Content-Aware Fill magically removes any image detail or object, examines the surroundings and seamlessly fills in the space left behind. Lighting, tone and noise of the surrounding area match perfectly, looking as if the removed content never existed. New Refine Edge makes nearly-impossible image selections possible. This innovative technology precisely detects and masks the trickiest types of edges, such as hair and foliage, while eliminating background colour contamination.

For photographers, Photoshop CS5 now offers next-generation high dynamic range (HDR) capabilities. When combining multiple exposures into a single HDR image, Photoshop CS5 preserves the full tonal range of a scene with unprecedented speed and accuracy. The new HDR Pro offers exceptional ghost artefact removal and greater tone mapping and adjustment control. With HDR toning, users can emulate the striking look of an HDR image with any single-exposure image.

Photoshop CS5 provides revolutionary tools that maximise users’ creative impact. Breakthrough painting capabilities include a Mixer Brush that blends an infinite combination of colours onto a single paintbrush tip, and Bristle Tips that offer lifelike brush strokes. Puppet Warp gives users the power to precisely reposition or warp any image element, such as straightening a bent arm in a photo or manipulating the landscape to generate a new perspective.

“Since its inception, Adobe Photoshop has been a key tool for pre-and post-production work in the motion picture industry,” said Jon Landau, Academy Award winning producer of Avatar and Titanic. “With Photoshop CS5 Extended, Adobe gives filmmakers new painting, HDR and 3-D tools that will help them push the limits of creativity. Faster performance with cross-platform 64-bit support and tight integration with other Adobe Creative Suite 5 software makes Photoshop CS5 an even more powerful tool in a filmmaker’s arsenal. Photoshop empowers filmmakers and creative professionals in virtually every other industry to turn their imagined ideas into onscreen reality.”

Community Involvement Drives Enhancements
In addition, more than 30 features and enhancements requested directly by the Photoshop community have been added to this release, including automatic image straightening, rule-of-thirds crop tool, colour picker and the ability to save 16-bit images as JPEGs. The goal of this engineering effort was to address seemingly minor enhancements that directly impact everyday workflow, but aren’t always at the top of the development list for a new release. A new customisable Adobe Mini Bridge panel is also available directly in the software for faster file browsing and management.

Taking 3D and Motion to the Next Level
Photoshop CS5 Extended includes everything in Photoshop CS5 plus tools for editing 3D and motion-based content. With new Adobe Repoussé technology, users can easily create 3D logos and artwork from any text layer, shape or mask, as well as twist, rotate and extrude designs for different looks. To mirror the realism and appearance of 3D objects, a new materials library offers a breadth of rich options, including chrome, glass and cork. Users can also enhance the appearance of 3D objects by quickly creating shadows with the new shadow catcher. For motion content, tools including paint, text and clone can be used directly over multiple frames of a video sequence with ease using single-key shortcuts.

Adobe Photoshop Family
Building upon the 20-year history of Photoshop innovation and leadership, Adobe offers a line of Photoshop solutions for every level of user. Photoshop CS5 and Photoshop CS5 Extended software are at the heart of the Photoshop family, providing unrivalled power and editing freedom. Adobe Photoshop Lightroom® addresses the workflow needs of serious, amateur and professional photographers, helping them find, manage, enhance and showcase images in powerful ways. Adobe Photoshop Elements software provides accessible tools and sharing options for photo enthusiasts. Snap-shooters can quickly and easily share and edit photos with simple gestures using the free Photoshop.com Mobile application on their iPhone or Android devices. Photoshop.com completes the Photoshop line providing an online photo sharing, editing and hosting resource for all.

Pricing and Availability
Adobe Photoshop CS5 and CS5 Extended are scheduled to ship within 30 days with availability through Adobe Authorised Resellers, the Adobe Store and Adobe Direct Sales. Estimated street price for Adobe Photoshop CS5 is £548 (ex-VAT) and £794 (ex-VAT) for Photoshop CS5 Extended. Upgrade pricing and volume licensing are available. For more detailed information about features, OS support, upgrade policies and pricing, please visit http://www.adobe.com/uk/products/photoshop/family/

About Adobe Systems Incorporated
Adobe revolutionises how the world engages with ideas and information – anytime, anywhere and through any medium. For more information, visit http://www.adobe.com/uk

Price

• Adobe Photoshop CS5: US $699 / £548 (ex-VAT)
• Adobe Photoshop CS5 Extended: US $999 / 1015€ TTC / £794 (ex-VAT)

Upgrades from the previous versions of Adobe Photoshop: US $149 and $349 respectively.

The most interesting will certainly be the “content-aware fill” that allows to fill empty parts of an image with adequate data without using the copy-paste or drawing tools.

Many a photographer will be listening. But the actual product will only be available later.

Adobe Photoshop: A wonderful tool.

Update: Let’s be as clear as possible. On April 12, don’t expect to be able to buy a new box of Photoshop CS5. It will be only a technical presentation. We will still have to wait for the real availability (maybe during this Summer).

After the recent announcements, it would be useful to look where Adobe is going now, or in the coming months. Here, it is OK to start using the bits of news becoming available.

First, of course, Lightroom v3 will soon be available (you can download the beta 2, already). DPReview obtained an interview with Tom Hogarty from Adobe which reveals some important elements about the new RAW file engine that you will find inside L3: “Adobe discusses latest Lightroom 3 Beta” tells us (with pictures) how much progress is stacked up in this beta compared to the previous versions.

Of course, as usual for Adobe, this technology will be present in the next version of Photoshop under the guise of an Adobe Camera Raw tool integrated into Photoshop CS5. But CS5 is not announced yet! You’re right, but the rumor had it that Photoshop CS5 would be presented in April. It’s now official that its launch will happen on April 12.

• Paste Images on Tilted Surfaces in Photoshop
• Understanding the basics of Sharpening in Photoshop
• Create Seamless Textures with Photoshop CS4
• Agrandissez votre studio dans Photoshop
• Détourage #1 : utilisation des couches dans un cas simple

photo credit: See-ming Lee 李思明 SML

Blair Mathis decided to reduce the distance between them by the installation of several plugins on GIMP. And the result is astonishingly interesting. All the more because the process is fully documented step-by-step, which makes it little more than a longer software installation.

1. PSPI
2. Layers
3. Separate+ from Yellowmagic
4. Liquid Rescale from Wikidot (for an image rescale without deformation as in CS4)
5. Additional brushes from Blendfu
6. GIMP Animation Package
7. Enable GEGL

But if this is not enough, there are also a few hacked versions of GIMP that have been already prepared for the Photoshop lovers. The most renowned are:

• GimpShop whose interface is specially good
• GimPhoto is slightly less convincing but is based on a more recent (and more powerful) GIMP version

Once again, here is how you can (nearly) download Photoshop for free, while being well on the right side of law.

Is this to announce one of the following:

1. The picture police?
2. A new powerful feature in Photoshop CS5 and other picture edit tools?

Source: NY Times.

On Windows, Photoshop SpeedUp is a freeware that can solve part of this issue. It gives all the tools to reduce load times for the big Adobe Photoshop tool.