Recent Software Articles

We Review Oniric Glow, a Digital Artist's Dream Plugin

There are many ways to create a glow effect in Photoshop using layers and blending modes. What if you could do it in a fraction of the time and get even better results? Would you be interested?

Luminar Neo Makes a Dramatic Leap Forward With AI Masking

Users of Luminar Neo from Skylum will get a solid update when they launch the Windows or Mac raw editor today. The app gains MaskingAI, a feature that applies artificial intelligence to masking objects, saving a lot of time in the editing process.

How to Calibrate Your Displays

One of the first devices I bought for my office when I started with photography was, in addition to a proper monitor, a calibration device. Editing my photos with accurate colors and brightness has always been a priority for me. And the use of a colorimeter and monitor calibration software is a requirement for achieving those. In this article, I explain how to use such a calibration system.

Virtual Lighting Just Got Better!

Elixxier software is an innovative company that has produced very useful and helpful tools for photographers and filmmakers, especially when it comes to creating 3D light simulations.

Adobe Includes Frame.io in Creative Cloud for Free

If you’re entering the video production industry, you’ll be bound to start collaborating with colorists, motion graphics artists, and clients. You’ll also start using cloud-based uploading for review. You’ll be happy to know Frame.io is now included to use in Adobe Creative Cloud, so if you’re a Premiere Pro user, you’re getting a great workflow enhancer for free.

Skylum Team's War Stories

Many of you are likely familiar with the company Skylum. They make the ever-popular Luminar photo-editing software. Some of you may know that Skylum was founded in Ukraine, and the majority of their team resides there.

Focus Stacking Made Easy With Helicon Focus

A few weeks ago I published an article here on Fstoppers about handheld focus stacking. In this article I share my in-the-field workflow, as well as the automatic stacking option Photoshop offers to put all images together during photo editing. This option has its limitations though and because I lately had to work on some very complex stacks, I had to look for a better solution. And with Helicon Focus I found it.

Luminar Neo, a Complete Raw Editor?

It’s been a long time coming but Skylum Software has finally released Luminar Neo, their brand new version of the software that incorporates a ton of new features, is faster, and is simpler, but also offers more depth.

AI Skin Retouch Is Here and It's Pretty Impressive

Innovators and philosophers like Elon Musk and Sam Harris have been theorizing what our world will look like once artificial intelligence completely takes over our everyday lives. We aren't quite there, but if you've ever dreamed of a day when all your skin retouching might be completed using AI and neural networks, well, the future is a lot closer than you might think.

Luminar Neo's New AI Photo Editing Features

Luminar software has been leading the industry when it comes to artificial intelligence photo editing for years, and now, they are taking things even further with Luminar Neo.

Which Program Handles Fujifilm Raw Files Better, Lightroom or Capture One?

Fujifilm cameras have long been praised for the colors they produce. Lightroom has often been criticized for being incapable of processing Fujifilm raw files effectively. Capture One is generally recommended. Therefore, in this article, we will be comparing Lightroom and Capture One to see which is best for Fujifilm raw files.

Tips to Improve Your Results From Final Cut Pro

Final Cut Pro has become a staple of video editing and attracted many editors to it. Like most modern software, it is deep and nuanced, however, and you can always learn more. In this video, one expert takes you through some of his best tips.

Relight Your Portraits: Testing Out Luminar Neo's New AI Tool

Artificial intelligence has begun to have a real impact in photography via post-processing. This may be a contentious subject, but whichever side of the fence you are, it's interesting to see what it's capable of. In this video by Manny Ortiz, he reworks some images with Luminar's Relight tool.

Capture One Drops Branded Versions for Nikon, Sony, and Fujifilm Cameras

In the run-up to some big upcoming changes, Capture One has announced that they will be dropping their single brand versions of Capture One. Current users of these variants of Capture One 22 will be offered a free upgrade to Capture One Pro 22 or will be offered the standard upgrade pricing for those still using the previous version of Capture One.

Luminar Neo Gives Us a Better Preview of What’s Coming

Skylum has been heavily teasing its new editor called Luminar Neo for many months, and today, I received another working preview of the app, available on Windows and Mac platforms. The new version seems to run a little faster than the last preview, and it is fully native to Apple silicon. I tested it on my 16" MacBook Pro with the M1 Max chipset. The release version will be faster, but Neo was editing at a good clip.

What Do You Lose When Compressing Images With JPEG?

We encounter and use JPEG files daily, but rarely do we give any thought to what the process entails. More importantly to us as photographers, what data do we lose when using this lossy image compression technique?

Is There a New King of Photoshop and Lightroom Performance?

The reviews on Intel’s 12th Gen Core desktop processors, named Alder Lake, have all come in, and the results are surprising. Whether you’re looking to upgrade your computer or just want to stay up to date on tech trends, you’ve got to see how these chips performed.

Is AI Technology the Future for Photographers?

As photographers, we are always looking for ways to improve our craft and stay ahead of the curve. With new technology emerging every day, it can be difficult to know what is worth investing in and what will become obsolete in a few months. In this short article, we will explore the potential of AI technology and how it could benefit photographers in the future.

Your Virtual Studio Just Got an Upgrade

If you are unfamiliar with 3D studio software, it's maybe something worth checking out. Ellixxier software produces a 3D pre-vis studio that hits the mark in terms of time-saving when in the studio, and the software has just received another upgrade, allowing more freedom when planning your shoots.

Skylum Gives Us a New Sneak Peek at Luminar Neo

We've been keeping an eye on Luminar NEO, an upcoming raw editor from Skylum. In my last installment, I was given some preview software that showed three of the new features coming, including a relighting control, removal of wires, dust spots, and power lines.

On1 Announce the Release of On1 Photo Raw 2022.1

This major midterm upgrade to On1 Photo Raw brings more exciting and unique features that will certainly win it more converts from other asset management, raw development, and editing software programs

Lightroom’s Evolved: 3 Things New and Veteran Users Should Consider

Lightroom was one of the first serious photo-editing tools I used when I was getting started with photography, and it’s still a mainstay of my editing workflow. Whether you’re new to Lightroom or a veteran user, there are several unique considerations of the software: some are quirks of the program, while others are more recent changes that can impact your established workflow.

Why Can’t Photo-Editing Software Do This One Simple Thing?

Artificial intelligence is bringing incredible advances for photographers, from relighting portraits and making people smile, to cleaning up skin and swapping out skies. However, photographers everywhere would beg developers of photo-editing software to harness deep learning to create one simple tool.

Nik Collection 4.3 Offers 35 New Nature-Related Presets

I'm a long-time user of Nik Tools, and the suite of filters and presets has been advancing rapidly since DXO took the software over in 2017. There are tools to create a variety of monochrome looks, perspective corrections, sharpening, HDR renders, analog and film replication effects, color adjustments, noise reduction, and sharpening. Now, DXO is offering version 4.3 with 35 new presets, most useful to landscape photographers.

3 Alternatives to Adobe for Editing Your Images

When it comes to processing your images, Adobe is the standard choice for a lot of photographers, and many creatives go years without even trying other options. However, nowadays, there are a lot of alternatives to Lightroom and Photoshop, and whether you just do not like subscriptions or you are looking for a different way to work with your photos, this helpful video will give you a brief overview of three different options.

On1 Releases Sneak Peeks of Their Upcoming Amazing New Tools

On1 Photo Raw has changed from being an app that once played catch-up to advanced software with unique features well ahead of the competition. They have released three sneak peek videos of exciting features that are coming soon.

Improve Your Astrophotography With Topaz Labs

Astrophotography and nighttime photography generally come with their own respective challenges. The biggest problem tends to be increased noise especially in the shadow areas of an image. But what if there was some incredibly smart software that could magically get rid of the noise and improve your images, would you use it?

2021 Black Friday Deals for Photographers

Black Friday sales are here and we want to keep you up to date on some of the best photography deals available. These savings are only available for a very limited timeframe, so if there's something that piques your interest, make sure to act on it now!

Luminar, Photoshop, or On1: Who Has the Best Sky Replacement?

In the past few years, sky replacement software has exploded in both options and capabilities, and there are now several well-established options for photographers to choose from. On1, Luminar, and Photoshop all have varying sky replacement capabilities with different levels of performance, and this great video takes a look at all of them to show you which performs the best.

Zoner Photo Studio X's Fall Update Makes Develop Module Faster and Adds Features

Zoner Photo Studio X is a powerful and affordable editing suite that doesn't get the attention it deserves. Now they have improved the speed of the Develop module along with some other new features, increasing its viability as an all-in-one post-production and digital asset management tool.

Photoshop Isn’t King Here: The Speciality Programs That Are Just Plain Better

Just about every important image I publish or send to a client passes through Photoshop. It’s an essential part of my workflow, and if you’re like most photographers, I’m sure it’s a part of yours. There are, however, a number of cases where I’ve just found a significantly better tool for the job, one that’s worth paying for. Want to see why you should consider snagging these programs that beat Photoshop at their own game?

A Missed Opportunity or the Dawn of a New Age? Nikon's NX MobileAir App

Transferring images from the camera to the customer is a complex process that — depending upon your genre — will require a greater or lesser number of intermediate steps. Irrespective of who you are delivering to, you need to get photos off your camera, and this is where the fun and games start. Nikon has released NX MobileAir as another solution to fix the problem. Has it missed a beat or taken a bold step forward?

5 Reasons to Choose Capture One Over Adobe Lightroom

If you’re not a fan of Adobe’s subscription plans or find that editing your photos isn’t quite as quick as you’d like, you might want to consider checking out Capture One. Here are five reasons to make the move and five more reasons to stick with Lightroom.

DXO Launches Version 1.5 of PureRaw

I've been impressed with PureRaw since it first launched in April of this year. It is meant to be a starting place as you enter your raw workflow. It uses an extensive database of camera and lens profiles and corrects distortion, lack of sharpness, and reduces noise.

Is Photo Mechanic Plus a Lightroom Killer? An In-Depth Fstoppers Review Part 2: The Image Catalog

In Part 1 of this In-Depth review, I outlined the core philosophy of Photo Mechanic Plus before going on to summarize and test the ingestion process. Arguably, this is the star in the crown however, Camera Bits have now added an image catalog allowing it to manage your photo archive. Read on to find out how it performs, as well as a comparison with Lightroom's own catalog.

How to Use the New Photoshop Sky Replacement Features

Earlier this month, Adobe updated the sky replacement features in Photoshop CC. This feature can make an image pop or make it look over-processed and fake. Make sure you know how to get the best out of this powerful Photoshop feature and create strong, realistic images.

Skylum Reveals More Details of the Upcoming Luminar Neo

Skylum created a bit of a late summer storm when it announced a new image editor, Luminar Neo. The complaint from users has been that Skylum drops development on an editor, only to release a new one, while essentially going end of life on the current software.

Skylum Is Launching a New Image Editor Called Luminar Neo

Skylum revealed Luminar Neo today, which builds upon the unique AI-editing technologies for which the company is well known. According to the company, Luminar Neo further re-imagines the image editing experience, which enables creators to be more expressive with fewer boundaries and rediscover the joy in their creative work.

Adobe to Remove Photoshop 3D Workspace and Features

Adobe Photoshop is an incredibly complicated piece of software that is multifaceted and multipurpose. However, one of its lesser-known workspaces is going to be removed completely.

Is Unreal Engine the Future of Filmmaking?

The short answer is "yes", and it has already proven affordable and successful in a wide range of fields and production sizes. With the rise of virtual models and 3D rendered product catalogs, and real-time rendering, I think the real question is how far this technology will impact commercial photography and videography as a whole.