Color Efex Pro 4

[Craftysnapper]

Got my head around the Silver Efex now I have worked out out Color Efex Pro 4.the trick is in mastering the control points, they are basicley smart masks like in PS which I have not used in years. And as my eyesight is not the best for making accurate mask selections I can see myself using this Nik software suite more an more.

A Before and after in Color Efex Pro 4. a little over the top just to show what it is capable of.

First using a control point (smart mask) I brightened all the tones in the Cathedral. Second I added a blue graduate filter. now the problem is it also darkens the top of the building as well, so adding a subtractive control point I can remove the effect of the grad on the building...getting to love it.

I really should have worked on a 16 bit image from the raw file instead of a already processed jpegjpeg.

Edited August 20, 2016 by OlympusPaul

[Denis]

Thanks for your recent advice Paul, I do not fully understand what I'm doing with this suite of effects yet and it may be a long while before I do. I am a very slow learner.

Small explanations like this do help enormously. I didnt realise that you could use a subtractive point. so I have learned something already !

 

[FUJI]

WELL DONE Paul....

I just knew that once you had mastered those control points you would be up and flying.......it took me quite a bit if time to even discover them, never mind what they are capable of........you must be a very fast learner.....but like me you gave been pretty fast with other software so what you want to SEE in a finished study is already in the minds eye,,so to speak.

I look forward to seeing what else you come up with.

FUJI

[VWGolf]

I love Color Efex.

As you know, I take a lot of pictures of my Siamese cat and his chest, which is almost white, tends to burn out when I am using lights (most of the time).  I've found an excellent was to recover it is to use the detail extractor in a heavy handed manner, then put a mask onto the layer, invert it, and paint back in some of the detail that has practically burnt out, using the brush at about 40-50% opacity.  Lots faster and easier than mucking around dodging on a 50% grey layer.

The only annoying thing was I spent £100 on it last December and a month or so later, they made it free (and even gave refunds back to Jan-16).  But can't complain too much, as it's my favourite plug-in and I use it a lot (for other things too).