2 Redos

bfjr

So I've been on the hunt for better B&W Processing and everyone says get/try Silver Efex Pro.
Ok, I'm game, oh wait I use NX2 and there is no blankety,blank, blank plug in.

Ah but if ya know anything about computers there's always a work around.
Did you know that you can use above as stand alone..........well that's another story

So Yep I redid a couple prior posts in SEP2

Richard

Ben,

To save everyone time, I'm going to repost the prior versions here, then comment.

Richard

There is much better detail in the face of the woman in #2. I think that's an improvement, though she might not agree . The first one shows better control of the highlights and more detail in the mid-tones. I've considered getting SEP myself but wonder whether it's worth the cost. I'm pretty comfortable with CS5 and can't help thinking that it ought to be capable of everything that SEP does. What's your impression?

RSL

Richard, There are two Nik tools you'll never let out of your hands once you've worked with them long enough to see what they do: One is Silver Efex Pro. The other is Viveza. I also find Sharpener Pro extremely useful, but there are other ways to do most of what it does. If you've been shooting at very high ISO Dfine can be helpful, provided you don't plan to convert to grayscale. I've had Color Efex Pro for several years and I don't find it terribly useful now that I have the other more recent additions to Nik's line, but it does have a pretty good filter to detect and correct a color cast if you haven't reached the point where you can spot the cast at first glance and correct it with more efficient methods.

I've used Photoshop for decades. I currently use CS5 for all modifications and use Lighrroom as a cataloging tool, occasionally using it for a tweak. Yes, in CS5 you can make a very good grayscale conversion, but with SEP you can make the same conversion in a tiny fraction of the time. It's difficult in CS5 to control the "structure" you easily can control in SEP and Viveza.

For HDR I've used CS4, CS5, Photomatix, and HDR Efex Pro. I've found that different HDR scenes call for different tools. Sometimes I get the best results in CS5. Sometimes I get the best results in Photomatix. Sometimes I get the best results by doing preliminary tone mapping in Photomatix and then finishing in CS5. But for a majority of scenes I get the best results directly in HDR Efex Pro.

All in all, if you're working seriously at photography I think the whole Nik package is a bargain.( And I don't own any Nik stock.)

bfjr

Richard wrote: »

Ben,

To save everyone time, I'm going to repost the prior versions here, then comment.

You know you're really a very good Moderator, just in case no one ever mentioned it

I thought I had deleted those

I'm still working on another and I'll try and give a better insight into SEP2 but my initial reactions is,
very nice product.

bfjr

Richard wrote: »

There is much better detail in the face of the woman in #2. I think that's an improvement, though she might not agree . The first one shows better control of the highlights and more detail in the mid-tones. I've considered getting SEP myself but wonder whether it's worth the cost. I'm pretty comfortable with CS5 and can't help thinking that it ought to be capable of everything that SEP does. What's your impression?

I can't speak on PS just never got to using it.

For me however this program is what I need for B&W, the $$ puts me off however.
I'm of course just learning it's in's/out's and hopefully will post some processed thru SEP2 soon.
There's is one thing it does very well, SELECTIVE COLOR !!

Richard

bfjr wrote: »

There's is one thing it does very well, SELECTIVE COLOR !!

Ooooohhh, I can hardly wait.

Russ sent me some info on SEP and it looks pretty impressive. My impression is that it doesn't do anything that can't be done in CS5, but that it makes it very easy to do targeted adjustments that would be extremely time consuming in PS, so much so that lazy people like me would never even try. Definitely on my wish list.