Topaz Adjust v2.6

Aspire

I purchased Topaz Adjust plugin a while ago but had not really sat down and played around with all the adjustments you can do so after a drive around some local towns looking for inspiration this was one of the finished images;



The latest version has a much improved memory management and a few other things. Quite fun & it's amazing some of the details the filters can bring out in the photos!

If this isn't the correct place for this topic, please move

BinaryFx

Aspire, this is a little "wild" for my personal taste, so I will presume that you went "over the top" to demonstrate the possibilities and that this is not "final". The clouds and sky look a little "out there"!

I would like to see it blended into the original at a low opacity, to give a "flat" original some "interest" (similar to the "man from Mars" method made famous by Dan Margulis).


Stephen Marsh
http://members.ozemail.com.au/~binaryfx/
http://prepression.blogspot.com/

Aspire

BinaryFx wrote:

Aspire, this is a little "wild" for my personal taste, so I will presume that you went "over the top" to demonstrate the possibilities and that this is not "final". The clouds and sky look a little "out there"!

I would like to see it blended into the original at a low opacity, to give a "flat" original some "interest" (similar to the "man from Mars" method made famous by Dan Margulis).

Stephen Marsh
http://members.ozemail.com.au/~binaryfx/
http://prepression.blogspot.com/

Hi Stephen, thanks for your input however "out there" is what I was intending, this leans towards the Photoart category of photography and can turn out some amazing images. There are not many posted on this forum but on others like Photography corner & Canon Forum it is quite popular and people have processed some lovely striking images.

I don't apply effects like this all the time however some photos really work. You can also just use the program mildly to bring out minor details too. Depends on your taste really, but I am happy with how this image turned out

bradpowellphoto

Topaz Adjust
Thanks for posting your Topaz shot! I love the colours on the building!

I am crazy about Topaz Adjust and even have a gallery of before and after shots on my site. It definitely comes under the heading of photoart, but the details and colours it can pull out of an image are fascinating.






Theyre not for everyone but they sure strike a chord with me!

Brad Powell
www.bradpowellphoto.com

pathfinder

I have been playing with Topaz Adjust, as well as Topaz Simplify and Topaz DeNoise since early last winter.

I agree that it can be very useful and fun to create with. Like BinaryFX said, I prefer to use it on an adjustment layer, so that I can blend in back into my original image to tone it down a bit, or control its use with a mask as well. It can really find colors and shadow detail well, without destroying the image with horrible noise as well.

I shot this under an overcast cloudy sky in flat grey light in Arizona, and TZ helped me rescue it. In a print the green cactus needles just sparkle, and the rust looks like a fine sandpaper texture.

MarkR

Pathfinder,

Have you tried Topaz Detail yet? It seems to provide very high quality detail enhancement with no halos!

In fact, I have only a few cavils about it:

1. The pre-processing takes a while. One minute or more on my not-the-newest Mac ever.

2. While Detail doesn't seem to create halos, it will certainly enhance ones already in existance. I find it best to turn off sharpening/clarity before opening in Detail.

3. As with all the Topaz plugins, it works best on a seperate layer, so that opacity control and masking can be used, as necessary.

Here's an example. I wish I had the original to post for comparison (maybe this evening ...)



I do like using Adjust as well for making bigger moves, but I'm really liking Detail for images like this.

pathfinder

Mark,

I have not played with Topaz Detail, maybe because I don't prefer the "detail enhancement" offered in Topaz Adjust very much. I can see that it is useful in a 'grunge" kind of look, but that is something I rarely want, so I keep the detail enhancement dialed back in Topaz Adjust.

Maybe I should try the separate plug in of Topaz Detail.

MarkR

Pathfinder,

. I find with Adjust requires a much lighter touch, especially in the detail tab, as you noticed. I almost always end up checking the "process details seperately from exposure" box. Otherwise too much noise appears in blue skies and too many uncontrollable halos. Working on a separate layer to mask/fade is almost required. I think this ability to push the sliders to unreasonable levels is intentional, and on some level I actually like having control sliders that can be pushed to bounds beyond reason.

As an aside, I've also found that you can bring a lot of detail back from images in Denoise using very small amounts of noise reduction and the "Reduce Blur" slider to "crisp up" small details. My own (modest)testing shows better results than using Lightroom's sharpening tools, at least on very slightly blurry images. I am trying to get verification from Topaz as to the relationship (if any) between the Denoise "Reduce Blur" and the Topaz Adjust "Sharpen" tool.

pathfinder

MarkR wrote:

Pathfinder,

. I find with Adjust requires a much lighter touch, especially in the detail tab, as you noticed. I almost always end up checking the "process details seperately from exposure" box.

The details sider seems to be much more powerful, or sensitive, than the other sliders in Adjust. Sounds like we have the same experience.

Otherwise too much noise appears in blue skies and too many uncontrollable halos. Working on a separate layer to mask/fade is almost required. I think this ability to push the sliders to unreasonable levels is intentional, and on some level I actually like having control sliders that can be pushed to bounds beyond reason.

As I have said before, I tend to run large ares of sky through NoiseWare to keep my skies noise free, even with low ISO shots. I do my denoising on a layer also.

As an aside, I've also found that you can bring a lot of detail back from images in Denoise using very small amounts of noise reduction and the "Reduce Blur" slider to "crisp up" small details. My own (modest)testing shows better results than using Lightroom's sharpening tools, at least on very slightly blurry images. I am trying to get verification from Topaz as to the relationship (if any) between the Denoise "Reduce Blur" and the Topaz Adjust "Sharpen" tool.

I use the sharpening tools in Lightroom to crisp up images that were sharply focused to begin with. If they were not sharp to begin with, I bin them, not try to tune them up in LR or Ps. But that's just me.

I have noticed that the Denoise function of Topaz adjust can render images slightly sharper also if used lightly.

MarkR

pathfinder wrote:

The details sider seems to be much more powerful, or sensitive, than the other sliders in Adjust. Sounds like we have the same experience.




As I have said before, I tend to run large ares of sky through NoiseWare to keep my skies noise free, even with low ISO shots. I do my denoising on a layer also.


I use the sharpening tools in Lightroom to crisp up images that were sharply focused to begin with. If they were not sharp to begin with, I bin them, not try to tune them up in LR or Ps. But that's just me.

I have noticed that the Denoise function of Topaz adjust can render images slightly sharper also if used lightly.

I gotta start choosing my words more carefully! It sounds from your last sentence that we are about on the same page regarding using the tools to sharpen images.

It does lead to a mild complaint on my part -- do you denoise in adjust? Adjust in denoise? Detail and Adjust both have Detail sliders, but they work differently! Topaz has a lot of similar tools spread throughout their plugins. Sometimes they appear to be the same tool but with a different name, other times they have the same name but work differently in function. I appreciate the cross-pollination of tools throughout the plugins, but think it's unnecessarily confusing.

MarkR

And, for those who like presets in their filters, Action Central has a collection of them for various TopazLabs products for your amusement. Most of the Adjust ones are a little over the top for my taste, but some of the "Nutralizer" ones seem quite nice.

pathfinder

MarkR wrote:

I gotta start choosing my words more carefully! It sounds from your last sentence that we are about on the same page regarding using the tools to sharpen images.

It does lead to a mild complaint on my part -- do you denoise in adjust? Adjust in denoise? Detail and Adjust both have Detail sliders, but they work differently! Topaz has a lot of similar tools spread throughout their plugins. Sometimes they appear to be the same tool but with a different name, other times they have the same name but work differently in function. I appreciate the cross-pollination of tools throughout the plugins, but think it's unnecessarily confusing.

Topaz Adjust offers a lot of choices as you mentioned, more in the latest download ( 2.3 ) The earlier version had fewer choices so it was a bit easier I think.

I frequently start with one of the presets, and then begin to alter the sliders as I work through them until I get where I want to be.

I spend most of my time in Exposure adjusting the high and low sliders, and the color sliders. As I said, I keep the detail sliders backed way down for most of my images. I do not check the denoise box in Topaz adjust until just before I hit the enter key as running the denoising along with the other sliders really slows down the real time processing. I do use the denoising ability when I finally hit return to begin the processing in Topaz adjust.

I think Topaz adjust is a very inexpensive alternative to Lucis Pro with its dongle.

MarkR

And here's a 100% compare of the the earlier posted image: Detail vs. Lightroom's built-in sharpening.

The one on the left is Detail. All sharpening turned off in LR, work done in detail, then toned down by sliding the opacity back on a duplicate layer.

The one on the right is, I feel, pretty aggressively sharpened in LR. (Keep in mind it's a 100% crop of a 14MP raw file!) +70 Clarity, Sharpening at 100/1.1/60.

The final result, of course, is an artistic decision. And maybe the Detail one goes too far, but boy do I like having it in my toolbox.

pathfinder

That is very impressive, without the noise I had expected. Very nice indeed.

MarkR

pathfinder wrote:

That is very impressive, without the noise I had expected. Very nice indeed.

I just did an experiment in pushing up the sharpening sliders in LR and turning down the clarity slider. I can almost approach the level of the Detail image, but at the expense of playing "whack-a-mole" with halos: constantly fiddling with radius size and masking to keep them from becoming to obvious. I'll concede that it's possible that if I had a better command of sharpening I could get better results w/out resorting to Detail. .

Since you mention it, I suppose I should try a high-iso image, just to see what happens.

EDIT: high ISO Detail is Awesome! (as long as you avoid pushing the small details slider too far.) It does increase the noise slightly, but brings out an amazing amount of detail. Tested on ISO 3200 image with only color noise reduction in Lightroom.