As much as I Love post-processing (and I really do), I’m always looking for ways to streamline my workflow. Â And while I had been, for years, a Nik Software man, it looks like I’m moving on, baby. Â Things really came to head when Nik Software released their latest version of Color Efex Pro, which I had really been looking forward to. Â Unfortunately, unlike so many out there, I was just not feeling it. Â Don’t get me wrong, it’s good stuff. Â It just doesn’t give me what I’m after, it seems. Â Most of the filters I had looked forward to using seemed to mess with the colors and pixels in a way that reminded me of what I did not like about HDR Efex Pro. Â What sealed the deal of my disappointment (your mileage may vary), was the fact that, during my recent migration from my 5 year old Macbook Pro to the latest incarnation, I had to uninstall each piece of Nik Software individually and then reinstall each one, again individually, to get them up on the new laptop. Â Not so with onOne Software’s Perfect Photosuite 6. Â With onOne’s Suite, all I had to do was deactivate any one product, and they were all deactivated. Â On the new laptop, the Suite installed as one, and I was able to activate the entire suite at once. Â More importantly, I was really digging what I was able to do to my photographs with Perfect Photo Suite 6. Â At this stage, I use it for 90 percent of my post-processing, and I spend less time post-processing! Â Sweet! Â By the way, who can identify the song with which I post-processed this shot? Â (Hint: It’s all in the title, and the lyrics speak to my shift from Nik to onOne.)
The photograph at the top is the final version, while the bottom is the unprocessed version straight out of Photomatix Pro.
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