January-February 2008New Tools Of The Trade |
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| By Staff | |
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Light UpAdd some flare to your work with Knoll Light Factory 3.0 from Digital Anarchy. Developed by Photoshop cocreator John Knoll, the plug-in gives you the tools to create and put in realistic lens flares and other lighting effects, including lasers, explosions and suns. You can choose from 19 flare elements and layer them to create the effect.  Beyond flare, the program has options for painting with light, obscuring light with a grayscale mask and generating totally original settings. This latest version features a simplified user interface, real-time previews, more than 100 presets and 16-bit color support. Estimated Street Price: $149 ($89 for upgrade). Contact: Digital Anarchy, www.digitalanarchy.com.
Classic LookIn development for more than two years, the Epson Exhibition Fiber Paper is meant to look and feel like the darkroom papers of old. From the samples we’ve seen, the paper closely replicates an F surface, air-dried, silver-halide print, delivering deep blacks and subtle tonal gradations. The images we looked at had a three-dimensional quality to them with excellent detail in the highlights and shadows. The paper is designed for exclusive use with Epson’s UltraChrome K3 ink. The company collaborated with many professional photographers to develop the paper. Custom printing profiles can be downloaded at www.pixelgenius.com/Epson, along with more information about the paper and color management. List Price: Varies by size. Contact: Epson, (800) GO-EPSON, www.epson.com. 
Memory FlashKingston boosts its CompactFlash Elite Pro memory card lineup with faster data-transfer speeds and capacities now up to 16 GB. The memory cards are optimized for high-end D-SLRs, delivering minimum sustained read and write speeds of 25 MBps and 20 MBps, respectively. The cards are designed to keep up with demanding pros looking to capture more continuous high-resolution images in less time. When it comes time to transfer those large files, the high-performance cards won’t slow your workflow. Estimated Street Price: $62 to $308. Contact: Kingston, (877) KINGSTON, www.kingston.com. 
Photo EfexThe Color Efex Pro 3.0 filter collection is loaded with 52 filters and more than 250 effects for quickly retouching, color-correcting and enhancing your photographs. New filters include Film Effects for replicating the color, contrast and grain of more than 30 film types; Bleach Bypass for emulating the look of this popular photographic and cinematic effect; Glamour Glow for adding a unique glow to portraits and scenics; and Tonal Contrast for controlling contrast in three separate channels. With Nik’s U Point technology, you can apply filters to specific areas of a photograph without having to create complicated layers and masks. The software is available in three editions. All have the same functionality and features, but with a varying number of filters. Estimated Street Price: $299 (complete); $159 (select); $99 (standard). Contact: Nik Software, (888) 284-4085, www.niksoftware.com.   |
