Software News

If you’re looking for a way to power up Photoshop, you might want to consider Perfect Photo Suite 9, a plug-ins package unveiled today by onOne Software. We reviewed Perfect Photo Suite 8.5, last month and liked this photo editing and effects app quite a bit. Version 9 of the Suite, which will be available in late October 2014, adds a number of new features and upgrades including faster Raw image previews, re-editable image files, and improved selection tools.

The most important tip I would like to share about travel photography is never buy a new camera or lens before traveling to Bhutan or even Carhenge. The next most essential travel photography secret is that using your equipment has to be instinctive; when a photo op presents itself you may only have a few seconds to get a shot. There’s no time to think about what menu to use or how to turn on continuous AF, or what exposure mode you’re in. Using your camera has to be instinctive; you should see—or even anticipate—then click the shutter. It’ll make travel more fun, too.

There are lots of apps out there for converting your images into classic looking black-and-white shots but few with the pedigree of Macphun’s new Tonality program. Created, in part, by several former members of Nik Software, who were behind the popular Silver Efex Pro black-and-white app, Tonality aims to to take monochrome conversion one step further.

Adobe announced this morning that final release versions of Lightroom 5.6 and Adobe Camera Raw (ACR) 8.6 are now available.

Adobe customers can can get the apps through the update mechanism in Photoshop CC and Photoshop CS6, or through the download links at the bottom of this page. Adobe says these updates correct "issues reported in earlier versions of Lightroom 5 and Camera Raw 8," without being specific about what those issues were.

Unified Color Technologies announced HDR Expose 3.1, a significant update to its standalone HDR image processing software. HDR Expose 3.1’s newest features, including faster merge and alignment tools, improved de-ghosting algorithms, a new panorama batch processing assist mode and a redesigned merge dialog, are designed to optimize any photographers’ HDR workflow and efficiently produce, high-quality, true color HDR images.

I first looked at Auto FX Software’s DreamSuite Series One in the January, 2006, issue of Shutterbug. Since then, Auto FX has gone on to create DreamSuite Series Two and DreamSuite Gel. Now, Auto FX has released upgraded versions of all of these filter sets, plus an additional 12 new filters in a collection it calls DreamSuite Ultimate.

There are many ways to share images these days, from social networks to clouds to full-fledged e-commerce platforms. For some, simple online albuming will do, but for others it can become an involving project that puts your images on the Internet in a very engaging way. It’s not only in the personalization of the look and feel of the wrapper around your image content that can separate your site from the crowd. It’s also the ability to work cross-platform, include an e-commerce component, and allow for a “translator” that can make your site accessible to folks and even clients around the world that can add to its attractiveness and functionality.