Lotus Lamp

[ShaneS]

I headed out on my first photography meetup yesterday. We visited three Buddhist temples in the Honolulu area and I am still reviewing and processing the images.

At the same time I am am working with a NIK trial version that is expiring shortly. To that end, and with a push from Susan, I am trying to process as usual and compare with a NIK version of the same image. I will post two for your review and would like to hear your critical analysis and preference if you are so inclined. For the sake of comparison I will not tell you which was processed in CS5 solely and which utilized the NIK plugin until after your comments but I will say that I am aware that they are slightly different interpretations.

Version 1:



Version 2:

[Donald]

That is a lovely picture.

On the question of Nik or 'No Nik', it obviously all comes down to how much you think it is worth in terms of how you want to develop your workflow.

I think NIK offers options and makes processing more straightforward and intuitive. Not everyone will agree and they (and others) will be more than happy to use and advocate the use of, Photoshop and other tools to achieve the same results.

For me, the NIK tools provide the means of making the images I want to make, in a way I want to make them. But I'm not everybody and others will not like that way of doing things.

[ShaneS]

Thanks Donald. NIK does seems to be quite intuitive and I can see how it can simplify an edit with a little bit of practice. Although highly technical in actuality the software actually doesn't feel as technical as say, Photoshop, if that makes any sense.