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DPChallenge Forums >> Hardware and Software >> Nik Collection - do you find it really useful?
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Showing posts 26 - 50 of 75, (reverse)
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 11/18/2014 11:53:17 AM · #26
Couldn't live with out it!!!! So ez to control, I use ALL of them... Lately been messing around with the analog effects and I've found them well worth the time. depending on the image, I usually loose dust and scratches, you can really make some beautiful soft effects in this one...
 11/18/2014 12:21:31 PM · #27
Originally posted by markwiley:
Originally posted by vawendy:
absolutely! I adore nik. I use both silver efex and color efex on every shot. (silver efex on color shots with a luminosity blend -- color efex on b&w after doing the silver efex).

Hey, Wendy -- I have a question. I regularly use a Silver Efex layer set to Luminosity on a color image. However, I've never thought to run a b&w Silver Efex layer through Color Efex. What Color Efex filters do you tend to experiment with on b&w images?


Wendy taught me about Darken/Lighten Center in Color Efex. I apply it to my B&Ws, too.
 11/18/2014 01:43:49 PM · #28
Originally posted by markwiley:
Originally posted by vawendy:
absolutely! I adore nik. I use both silver efex and color efex on every shot. (silver efex on color shots with a luminosity blend -- color efex on b&w after doing the silver efex).

Hey, Wendy -- I have a question. I regularly use a Silver Efex layer set to Luminosity on a color image. However, I've never thought to run a b&w Silver Efex layer through Color Efex. What Color Efex filters do you tend to experiment with on b&w images?

Darken/Lighten Center is THE best vignette tool out there. Glamour Glow followed by Detail Extractor give that soft/hard look that works real well sometimes. The gradient filter is more adaptable than SEP's version, for burning skies and foregrounds.
 11/18/2014 01:46:36 PM · #29
Hmmm, maybe, maybe. The only software I have is CS2 and LR4 - I will have to see if Nik is compatible with those, but I suspect that it may not be.
 11/18/2014 01:47:59 PM · #30
Originally posted by SaraR:
Hmmm, maybe, maybe. The only software I have is CS2 and LR4 - I will have to see if Nik is compatible with those, but I suspect that it may not be.

Not with CS2, I don't think, but compatible with LR4 I'm 90% sure.
 11/18/2014 01:59:07 PM · #31
Originally posted by Bear_Music:
Originally posted by markwiley:
Originally posted by vawendy:
absolutely! I adore nik. I use both silver efex and color efex on every shot. (silver efex on color shots with a luminosity blend -- color efex on b&w after doing the silver efex).

Hey, Wendy -- I have a question. I regularly use a Silver Efex layer set to Luminosity on a color image. However, I've never thought to run a b&w Silver Efex layer through Color Efex. What Color Efex filters do you tend to experiment with on b&w images?

Darken/Lighten Center is THE best vignette tool out there. Glamour Glow followed by Detail Extractor give that soft/hard look that works real well sometimes. The gradient filter is more adaptable than SEP's version, for burning skies and foregrounds.


Exactly what bear is saying. I seem to live and breathe for darken/lighten center. What a wonderful tool! But especially the glamour glow on the b&w. It does some awesome things. If it gets to "glowy", you can add detail back in, as Bear says, with detail extractor. Though most often I'll do librodo sharpening on it, or stick in in Viveza and play with the structure. The detail extractor is a bit heavy handed for me.
 11/18/2014 02:12:59 PM · #32
Originally posted by Ja-9:
[quote=nam] [quote=Ja-9] . . .
I know that if you have one (1) of their pkgs they will upgrade you to the full suite for free. All YOU have to do is contact them. You can't have gotten it as a "freebie" with some other software pkg bundle you must have a separate Licensing key for that one pkg. But if you have a license key for you Nik software pkg then you should be eligible for the upgrade to the whole suite.


Thanks again, Janine. I'm embarrassed to say I actually did that when the offer first came out. Thing is, even though all the components are there, I only use CEP, SEP and Viveza and have never paid any attention to the others. I have Topaz Denoise and like that, so I've never explored Dfine. I'll have to look at the other possibilities in the suite.
 11/18/2014 03:57:32 PM · #33
Originally posted by Bear_Music:
Originally posted by markwiley:
Originally posted by vawendy:
absolutely! I adore nik. I use both silver efex and color efex on every shot. (silver efex on color shots with a luminosity blend -- color efex on b&w after doing the silver efex).

Hey, Wendy -- I have a question. I regularly use a Silver Efex layer set to Luminosity on a color image. However, I've never thought to run a b&w Silver Efex layer through Color Efex. What Color Efex filters do you tend to experiment with on b&w images?

Darken/Lighten Center is THE best vignette tool out there. Glamour Glow followed by Detail Extractor give that soft/hard look that works real well sometimes. The gradient filter is more adaptable than SEP's version, for burning skies and foregrounds.


I also use vignette-blur and vintage filters...love this particular pkg (CEP)
 11/18/2014 03:59:03 PM · #34
Originally posted by Bear_Music:
Originally posted by SaraR:
Hmmm, maybe, maybe. The only software I have is CS2 and LR4 - I will have to see if Nik is compatible with those, but I suspect that it may not be.

Not with CS2, I don't think, but compatible with LR4 I'm 90% sure.


Yes it does work with Lr4...that being said for just $10 (USD) a month you could have it all!!! Very, very best thing I ever did!!!
 11/18/2014 04:58:48 PM · #35
I recently discovered the power of the Sharpener Pro part of the Nik bundle. Wow, it's amazing. I thought my images were properly sharp before. Nope. This thing really turns it up to eye popping sharpness, without the halos.

A number of my images were being rejected from shutterstock for not being sharp enough. I ran those same images through Nik Sharpner Pro, and 95% of them were accepted. It's now a must-do step in my process before submitting.
 11/18/2014 05:20:55 PM · #36
Keep these "go to" parts of this suite coming!! I'm writing them all down :)
 11/18/2014 05:38:30 PM · #37
Nice to hear how others are using the software. The possibilities are endless. I find tonal contrast very good for bringing out some detail. For me, it's a little less harsh than detail extractor.
 11/18/2014 05:46:00 PM · #38
Originally posted by Ja-9:
Yes it does work with Lr4...that being said for just $10 (USD) a month you could have it all!!! Very, very best thing I ever did!!!

What she said :-) Although it may be you only qualify for that special "Photographer's Deal" if you own CS3 or higher :-(
 11/18/2014 06:48:44 PM · #39
Originally posted by nam:
Keep these "go to" parts of this suite coming!! I'm writing them all down :)


+1 and I do plan to get Nik (from Nikon, surely? ;-) for my Xmas present...feel like I deserve it.
11/18/2014 06:56:20 PM · #40
This is all I practially use!

Love detail extractor, glam glow, no surprise there, but like someone mentioned above, tonal contrast is excellent as well.

Recently I've started using bleach bypass, that's amazing!!

But like Wendy mentioned darken lighten center is the best, I think I use that filter every single time I edit an image, it's amazing what colors you can extract from that.
 11/18/2014 06:59:23 PM · #41
Originally posted by Bear_Music:
Originally posted by Ja-9:
Yes it does work with Lr4...that being said for just $10 (USD) a month you could have it all!!! Very, very best thing I ever did!!!

What she said :-) Although it may be you only qualify for that special "Photographer's Deal" if you own CS3 or higher :-(


Hmmmm, I'm not sure...I know that I only had Lr before I had PsCC (I did have Elements) but it can be loaded (plug-in) into Lr...and I think many use only Lr...
 11/18/2014 06:59:58 PM · #42
As if any more feedback is needed, the software is great, the numerous tutorials are great, and the customer service interactions I've had with them have been great. There was a lot of apprehension around these parts when Google bought Nik, but the software has gotten better, their packaging of it has gotten better, and overall it's been excellent.

All that said, I am still waiting for them to implement my request for a big red X to appear when I'm overcooking a photo, so it's not perfect.
 11/18/2014 07:02:22 PM · #43
Originally posted by Neat:
This is all I practially use!

Love detail extractor, glam glow, no surprise there, but like someone mentioned above, tonal contrast is excellent as well.

Recently I've started using bleach bypass, that's amazing!!

But like Wendy mentioned darken lighten center is the best, I think I use that filter every single time I edit an image, it's amazing what colors you can extract from that.


Oh, and the Sunlight, Skylight and Indian Summer
 11/18/2014 07:57:21 PM · #44
Originally posted by Ja-9:
Originally posted by Neat:
This is all I practially use!

Love detail extractor, glam glow, no surprise there, but like someone mentioned above, tonal contrast is excellent as well.

Recently I've started using bleach bypass, that's amazing!!

But like Wendy mentioned darken lighten center is the best, I think I use that filter every single time I edit an image, it's amazing what colors you can extract from that.


Oh, and the Sunlight, Skylight and Indian Summer
Oh yeah, and not to mention reflector efex, and the yummy analog filters!!
 11/18/2014 09:11:34 PM · #45
Nikki, it's really pointless for you to be writing these down. The entire suite is wonderful to work with and explore. Each of us has experimented with the infinite settings and some of them work better on our images than they do on the images of others. It's really about finding which combination works best on YOUR images.

That being said, you cannot go wrong.
 11/18/2014 11:16:31 PM · #46
Originally posted by tanguera:
Nikki, it's really pointless for you to be writing these down. The entire suite is wonderful to work with and explore. Each of us has experimented with the infinite settings and some of them work better on our images than they do on the images of others. It's really about finding which combination works best on YOUR images.

That being said, you cannot go wrong.


Yeah, well, I write everything down. Doesn't mean I ever go back and read it though LOL Seriously, I adore some parts and just have never explored others and you're right . . . I need to do that. And what works well on one of my images may not work at all on another, especially since I don't really have a style.
 11/19/2014 12:40:30 AM · #47
I love NIK too. The versatility is amazing. I admit that I am something of a software junkie as I have the latest of PScc, LR5, and just upgraded to OnOne Perfect Photo Suite 9. Lots of redundancy, but I find things about all of them to like...and use. NIK's control point feature is excellent and just plain fun to use. You can't go wrong with NIK's suite of software IMHO.
 11/19/2014 12:49:53 AM · #48
Originally posted by chalice:
I love NIK too. The versatility is amazing. I admit that I am something of a software junkie as I have the latest of PScc, LR5, and just upgraded to OnOne Perfect Photo Suite 9. Lots of redundancy, but I find things about all of them to like...and use. NIK's control point feature is excellent and just plain fun to use. You can't go wrong with NIK's suite of software IMHO.

I'll see your On One 9 and Raise you DxO Optics Pro 10... EVERYthing's got something I love to use...
 11/19/2014 01:05:45 AM · #49
Originally posted by Bear_Music:
Originally posted by chalice:
I love NIK too. The versatility is amazing. I admit that I am something of a software junkie as I have the latest of PScc, LR5, and just upgraded to OnOne Perfect Photo Suite 9. Lots of redundancy, but I find things about all of them to like...and use. NIK's control point feature is excellent and just plain fun to use. You can't go wrong with NIK's suite of software IMHO.

I'll see your On One 9 and Raise you DxO Optics Pro 10... EVERYthing's got something I love to use...


I'll see your EVERYTHING and raise you one Capture One Pro 8... ;) (can't beat that RAW conversion!)
 11/19/2014 03:39:57 AM · #50
Originally posted by Cory:
Originally posted by Bear_Music:
Originally posted by chalice:
I love NIK too. The versatility is amazing. I admit that I am something of a software junkie as I have the latest of PScc, LR5, and just upgraded to OnOne Perfect Photo Suite 9. Lots of redundancy, but I find things about all of them to like...and use. NIK's control point feature is excellent and just plain fun to use. You can't go wrong with NIK's suite of software IMHO.

I'll see your On One 9 and Raise you DxO Optics Pro 10... EVERYthing's got something I love to use...


I'll see your EVERYTHING and raise you one Capture One Pro 8... ;) (can't beat that RAW conversion!)

Stand in the corner please gentlemen.

;)

Message edited by author 2014-11-19 03:40:12.
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