The Nik Collection is an important collection of plug-ins once published by Nik Software but then taken over by Google when it bought the company. Google then made the Nik Collection free but it has now been bought for future commercial development by DxO.
These Control Lines can already be found in DxO PhotoLab 6, but they are new to the Nik Collection 6. Control Lines are a special kind of selective masking tool. They work like a linear gradient tool, but with an eyedropper which can be moved around to select the tones or areas you want the mask to be applied to.
There are no new plug-ins in the Nik Collection 6 this time around, but significant feature additions to some and improved local adjustment tools across the board.
Black Friday may be over, but DxO now has a Holiday Magic offer running until December 31. If you buy two or more DxO products during this period it triggers a 30% discount at the checkout. This applies to any permutations of DxO products, including DxO PhotoLab 6 Elite, Nik Collection 5, PureRAW 2, FilmPack 6 or ViewPoint 4.
The star of the show is DxO Nik Collection 5, which is on sale at half its regular price – but there are savings to be had across the full range of DxO software too. But you’ll have to be quick. The DxO Black Friday sale started at 10am CET (9am GMT, 4am ET) on Monday November 21 and will end at 11:59pm local time on Monday November 28.
What’s in a name? Preset effects typically have names to give you an idea of the kind of subjects they might work with, but in reality you should just choose a preset that gives you the ‘look’ you want. For this dramatic seascape I turned to the Hollywood Glamour preset in Silver Efex Pro, one of the key plug-ins in the DxO Nik Collection.
Analog Efex Pro’s double exposure tool is one of the features that makes this program unique. Here’s a breakdown of how its Double Exposure presets work and how they combine double exposures with other effects.
Kodak HIE infra-red film was one of my favorite films, delivering dense black skies, dreamy soft highlights and heavy grain. Can I get the same effect digitally?
I love Silver Efex Pro. It’s a black and white photography plug-in developed by Nik Software and now part of the DxO Nik Collection. What makes it great is that it recaptures the look and feel of traditional darkroom black and white in a way that other plug-ins don’t. The preset effects down the left…
Color Efex Pro might not be your first choice for black and white conversions when the Nik Collection also has Silver Efex Pro and Analog Efex Pro, but if you want strong results fast, it might be just what you need.
Volume distortion (or volumetric distortion) is not a familiar term to most photographers, but it’s what makes ultra-wide shots look distorted at the edges, and it can be fixed… by the right software.