Yee Haw ... and other utterances of great joy

[Donald]

Some Elements users might want to know that Harald Helm at the PlugInSite has just launched Elements XXL2. As far as I'm concerned the cause for celebration is the fact that there is now support for 260 smart filters from 26 3rd party plugin producers INCLUDING the Nik suite. YAHOO!! Open a bottle of wine!

What that means is that you can apply the NIK edits to your image (via Viveza, Silver Efex Pro 2, Colour Efex Pro 4, etc) and rather than have to lose the ability to adjust those those edits when you finish and go back into Elements, they remain available for further adjustment at a late date.

This feature has been available in the big, 'grown-up' Photoshop for a little while, but not in Lightroom (so far as I know) or Elements. Well, now we've got it and I, for one, am ecstatic.

For those of you who share my unbridled enthusiasm for this development and want to go for it, there is one little glitch that Harald is sorting out. SEP 2 is not working. When you try to call it up, you get Colour Efex Pro instead. Harald is onto this and will issue an update ASAP.

I should say I have no commercial interest in The Plug in Site whatsoever. Just lots and lots of admiration for what they're produced.

[Mike Buckley]

Thanks for that information, Donald. I haven't begun using SEP 2 yet but this is something I apparently need to keep track of.

[Kris V]

Some Elements users might want to know that Harald Helm at the PlugInSite has just launched Elements XXL2. As far as I'm concerned the cause for celebration is the fact that there is now support for 260 smart filters from 26 3rd party plugin producers INCLUDING the Nik suite. YAHOO!! Open a bottle of wine!

What that means is that you can apply the NIK edits to your image (via Viveza, Silver Efex Pro 2, Colour Efex Pro 4, etc) and rather than have to lose the ability to adjust those those edits when you finish and go back into Elements, they remain available for further adjustment at a late date.

This feature has been available in the big, 'grown-up' Photoshop for a little while, but not in Lightroom (so far as I know) or Elements. Well, now we've got it and I, for one, am ecstatic.

For those of you who share my unbridled enthusiasm for this development and want to go for it, there is one little glitch that Harald is sorting out. SEP 2 is not working. When you try to call it up, you get Colour Efex Pro instead. Harald is onto this and will issue an update ASAP.

I should say I have no commercial interest in The Plug in Site whatsoever. Just lots and lots of admiration for what they're produced.

Donald, thanks for mentioning the plug-in site - I used a lot of their stuff over the years, and I'm glad your message reminded me that it's time to go check them out again.
I don't use Elements, but I'm sure they have other goodies as well.

[mknittle]

I was "eyeballing" the pervious version . maybe it is a good thing I didn’t have the spare funds at the time
I am also looking at the NIK bundle.

[Donald]

... there is one little glitch that Harald is sorting out. SEP 2 is not working. When you try to call it up, you get Colour Efex Pro instead. Harald is onto this and will issue an update ASAP.

Just had an e-mail from Harald Helm advising that the problem is solved and that what is available for download now has everything working as it should.

EDIT - And it is. I am a very happy bunny!

[rpcrowe]

Great News! I love my NIK and I am sure that this will certainly be of benefit to users of PSE!

[davidedric]

Thanks, Donald. Verrrrrry interesting. I mostly use Lightroom but also have PSE12. I don't think this could ever work in Lightroom, but I could easily see doing most of my editing in Lightroom, passing a TIFF to PSE and on to Nik whatever, then any final editing in PSE. I will certainly have to have a look.

Dave

[NorthernFocus]

Do you know if XXL2 enables all of the PSE functions for 16bit images? Looking at the site there is a brief mention of being able to use layers on 16bit files. Now that I'm using LR for base processing I'd be a happy camper if I could use PSE on 16bit files to finish up the few things that LR isn't good at.

[Donald]

Do you know if XXL2 enables all of the PSE functions for 16bit images? Looking at the site there is a brief mention of being able to use layers on 16bit files. Now that I'm using LR for base processing I'd be a happy camper if I could use PSE on 16bit files to finish up the few things that LR isn't good at.

This might help answer the question:

An extract from the user Manual is ............

1. Open an image with 16 bits per channel in Photoshop Elements.

2. Choose "Prepare 8-bit Document" from the Image > Render sub menu or the Render button menu of the option bar inPhotoshop 11 and higher. This converts the current 16-bit document into a special 8-bit document that has the 16-bit dataembedded.

3. If you want to apply a filter, choose the Add Smart Filter command from the Render menu. In the displayed dialog you will only see filters that also work with 16-bit images. This is indicated by the "(16-bit)" suffix on the Add tab sheet. Double click a filter to apply it. If you switch to the Edit tab sheet you can edit the applied smart filters. Leave this dialog with the OK button. If you want, you can now you use the brush tool, gradient tool or other tools to restrict the effect of the smart filters to certain image areas.

4. If you want to apply an adjustment layer, use the Add Adjustment Layer command. Double click an item from the list to apply it. When you are finished click the OK button. The added adjustment layers are displayed in the Layers panel where you can also edit their layer mask. Please do not manually add other adjustment layers, because they will not be rendered to the final 16-bit image. You can add fill layers though.

5. To selectively brighten and darken certain image areas choose the Add Dodge/Burn Layer command from the Render menu. The dodge tool is automatically activated and you can start using it on the image to brighten up certain details. To darken image areas switch to the burn tool. You can also use the brush - best with reduced opacity - on the dodge/burn layer if you like. To undo changes it is best to use the brush tool with a mid gray color. You can also use the eraser tool, but we advice against it.

5. If you want to use a tool, activate the Add Tool Layer command. Now select your tool and start using it on the image. Some tools only work if a "Sample All Layers" or a "All Layers" check box is activated on the tool options bar. If you want, you can later adjust the blend mode and opacity of the tool layer on the Layers panel as well as add a layer mask to it.

6. You can also add other types of layers to the document. For example, you can add a text layer, shape layer or a fill layer.

7. Save the document as a PSD file in order to edit it later and render new 16-bit images from it.

8. Choose "Render 16-bit Document" from the Image > Render sub menu (or the Render button menu). As a result a new 16-bit document is created and the previous image operations (the layers and smart filters) will be rendered to it.

The Render commands enable you process an image with 16 bits per channel with the help of smart filters, adjustment layers and other layer types. Photoshop Elements does not support smart filters and layers for 16-bit images, but ElementsXXL makes it possible by working in 8-bit mode and later rendering the special 8-bit document to a 16-bit image. There is also a Render menu button on the control bar in Photoshop Elements 8-12 for accessing all Render commands
quickly.


Prepare 8-bit Document

The Prepare 8-bit Document command converts a 16-bit image into a 8-bit document with embedded 16-bit data. The Background layer of the 16-bit document is converted into two layers: one with the 8-bit image data (bits 1 to 8) and one with the remaining bits (bits 9 to 16). Both new layers are called "Base Image" and "Base Image (16-bit data)" and will later be used to recreate the original 16-bit image. You can save the prepared document in PSD or TIFF format and render it to 16-bit at a later time.

After your prepared the document you can add smart filters, adjustment layers and other types of layers to it. We recommend that you use the other menu items for adding smart filters and adjustment layers, because not all of them support 16-bit images, so they will not applied when rendering to 16-bit. The Add Smart Filter and Add Adjustment Layer menu items make sure that you only use supported ones.

[NorthernFocus]

Thanks for the information, Donald. After reading all of that, I think that means yes

It looks like they allow demo downloads do may give it a try.

[davidedric]

Hi Donald,

Prompted by a thread in another forum, and a few months down the line, are you finding that you make much use of this facility?

Dave

[Donald]

Hi Donald,

Prompted by a thread in another forum, and a few months down the line, are you finding that you make much use of this facility?

Dave

Dave

Absoluietly. Everything I process is now done by using the NIK packages as Smart Filters. It does make the whole process much slower as processing times are significantly increased. But I'm not in any hurry!

And once you do downsize and post up, you often find that something (e.g. the vignette) doesn't quite work as you wanted and it's so easy to go back in and just adjust it. Previously, you would have had to dump the file and start again from the beginning.

[davidedric]

Thanks, Donald. If you don't mind my asking, do you go Gimp to PSE to Nik and just use PSE as a "mule", or do you do significant processing in PSE?

I would be going down the Lightroom, PSE, Nik route, and I'm wondering what a sensible workflow would be.

Dave

[Donald]

Dave - For me it's:

• Raw Processing in DxO Optics. Save as TIFF
• Open with PSE11, but do nothing in Elements other than open the NIK packages as SMART Filters. Process and Save. Close Elements.
• Open TIFF file in GIMP. Re-size and output sharpening for web posting. Save as JPEG and PGN (for possible posting on Facebook)
• The End!

[Mike Buckley]

I'm curious, Donald, about why you bother using GIMP considering that everything you are doing using GIMP can also be done using PSE.

[Donald]

I'm curious, Donald, about why you bother using GIMP considering that everything you are doing using GIMP can also be done using PSE.

Just because:

• I'm used to GIMP
• I feel a certain loyalty to it as the tool that got me into post-processing in the first place and,
• I think that the Wavelet Sharpening plug-in is still the best sharpening tool I've come across.

[Mike Buckley]

Three excellent reasons!