Would you care to tell us what?
Weird effects like Glamour Glow, for example. Or the dynamic skin softener.
Sure, you can approximate those results with PL+FP too, but it takes much more effort and the result is not exactly the same.
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no it’s not, if it was integrated there wouldn’t be the need of having .tiff files, you could have an extra panel like FP and VP have, or make nik panel beside the Fx panel in PL if they don’t want to work with “layers”.
you click “filter” which is above preset. that’s where the tools are and where the magic began.
some prefer canon while others like leica, a vespa is still the best looking scooter than any others =]
I’m really tired about this, so please see
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Are DXO Having a Laugh, or just Money Grabbing? - #27 by Wolfgang
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Are DXO Having a Laugh, or just Money Grabbing? - #30 by Wolfgang
and note, I’m NOT on a mission (like some)
.
For those who like to know what I wrote about Nik …
One of the most powerful features of Color Efex, which I use a lot, is that you can layer the filters and change the order on the stack. This level of control goes well beyond what PL on its own can provide and is, IMHO, worth the price of admission. And, on top of it, you can then create your own preset with your filter stack. But, yes, the TIFFs are much larger than the RAWs.
One thing that surprises me is that DxO didn’t bring the enhanced U-Points of Nik Collection 7 to Photo Lab 8. Maybe next time?
As always, your mileage may vary. I’m glad DxO provides an excellent set of tools that allows me to select the right combination to complete my vision for any given photograph.
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For my workflow, NIK makes more sense. I rarely use a digital camera, but I do use film cameras nearly every day. My film workflow entails
- Process film.
- Create a Contact Sheet by batch scanning negatives as low-quality Jpegs.
- Examine contact sheet, selecting candidates.
- Scan each candidate into a high-quality Tiff.
- Use PhotoMechanic to (1) add metadata for each TIFF, and (2) Associate each TIFF to its appropriate Catalog and Collection.
- Use Affinity to edit each TIFF; specifically use Inpainting brushes to remove scratches, dust, …, etc.,
- Still within Affinity: Use NIK SilverEfx and sometimes DFine to generate a high-quality JPEG.
8… Still within Affinity, scale and export newly edited candidate. This is the Jpeg image that will be used in some final product, such as a book, or slideshow, etc.
If I use a digital camera, then I rely upon an older version of CaptureOne (v. 20?) for editing, finishing, etc. I do not rely upon CaptureOne’s Metadata editing, preferring PhotoMechanic.
I suspect that most people in this Forum have a digital workflow, and, in that case perhaps having an all-in-one suite of tools makes more sense.
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I would make the argument that for the most part, DXO/Filmpack already has the Nik collection functionalities integrated. Let me explain my reasoning:
- Silver Efex: covered by a combo of Photolab and Filmpack
- Color Efex: covered by a combo of Photolab and Filmpack
- Analog Efex: covered by Filmpack
- Viveza: covered by Photolab
- HDR Efex: a bit of a tough one. As far as I know DXO can’t combine images to make a HDR image, but I am not sure how many people really use HDR anymore. It was trendy at one time.
- Dfine: legacy. Denoising is done much much better with the DeepPrime variants.
- Nik Sharpening: covered in Photolab. In fact, I rarely do any sharpening anymore since I have been using the DeepPrime variants.
I also find the tiff workflow from Photolab quite clunky. I primarily use ACDSee as my photo editor, but always run my images through Photolab first for denoising and optical corrections, and sometimes for Viewpoint and other stuff that Photolab does better. I was a huge fan of using Nik Collection as a plug-in with ACDSee, but Nik Collection no longer works with ACDSee, so I investigated alternatives. I am very happy that Filmpak does everything I need, and can be used as a photoshop plugin as well in ACDSee. For those who use DXO as their primary photo editor, the benefit of Filmpack being baked into Photolab is huge.
[quote=“platypus, post:7, topic:40316, full:true”]
To Nik or Not to Nik, that is the question.
Imo, the best way for you to find out if you need it is to test it with the free trial.
I’d agree here, but before downloading the trial pack, check out videos on YouTube to see what the different tools do and whether they’re what you’re looking for. They’re not really tools that can be mastered just by trial and error, imho.
Indeed. Moreover, the Nik Collection tends to be difficult to remove, unless one uses DxO’s cleanup tool available here:
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no software are, every software have a different approach.
Nik has its perk, you can use as many filters as you want, but changing the order will alter the result.
at the end of the day, Nik collection is a tool box of plugin, filmpack is a film emulation preset plugin, viewpoint is a geometry plugin, pureraw is a do it all for me plugin. they are all extra tools at extra cost for people that either want or need them.
So you pretty much agree with me? See if the software is something that can be useful to the user by understanding how it’s used before downloading.
always try before you buy, that goes for any software.
i know many that use adobe combined with pureraw or on1 with pureraw cause they don’t want PL and there’s more with other software that PL don’t offer like stacking, pano, hdr, creative vignette (sorry the one in PL is really archaic even with FP) and even resizing images, that is just to name those.
Resurrecting this thread with respect to Nik 8, as I have been having these thoughts this time around.
Some of the Control Point stuff seems more capable in Nik (I saw elliptical ones mentioned — long requested in PL).
Some of the ColorEfex, SilverEfex capabilities seem a lot more refined. A lot of the changes from 7 to 8 are to do with PS integration — huge if you use PS.
If I had the money sitting there and hadn’t found anything else to spend it on, I’d probably buy it. I already own LR, PL, Luminar Neo, Topaz Gigapixel and Photo AI, Affinity Photo, Photomator, Pixelmator, and probably more I haven’t remembered. Each has their strengths.
PL is the ‘Number 1’ for me because of the modules and DeepPRIME capabilities. Probably 90% of my photos would still be processed only in PL. But I’d like to get more creative. I’d like to try for some really striking B&W edits.
For now, I’m just going to stick with trying to learn to use more of what I already have (I have found other things to spend the money on). If I could buy just SilverEfex, I’d probably do it today. $160 for just that is a little steep for me.
Seriously don’t bother. I have it and the only “advantage” I can find is some presets - none of which I couldn’t emulate with FilmPack from within PL. What is more, I don’t have to leave the RAW workflow until the image is completely processed, apart from print sharpening and enlargement, for which I use Topaz Photo AI.
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I’ve used and loved Nik since it was its own company prior to Google buying it. My workflow has evolved a bit since I moved to PhotoLab. I still use Color Efex quite often, because it provides a crazy amount of control by allowing stacking of filters and extensive masking via control points. Since I got FilmPack, though, I’ve found that I use it more and more in lieu of Silver Efex, which I used to always use for B&W.
Old non-destructive workflow:
Lr->Ps->Color Efex->Silver Efex->Lr->output
Current nondestructive workflow:
PL->Color Efex->PL+FilterPack->output
WARNING: I’m not a Nik expert, although experienced enough to know that I’m not the one. Put it simple: want more sliders => go Nik, want more speed => go FP/PL.
The following is about Siver Efex (SEP, aka SFX), as Color Efex would require even more text.
Executive summary: Nik gives you more sliders.
Standard summary:
- Nik is useful for getting unique look
- Nik needs time
- Nik UI may let you down – it is slow compared to PL
- Nik gives you more sliders than FP, the differences being small, but sometimes worth the effort
- you must have enough time and patience to use it – Nik isn’t about brewing industrial beer
- Nik is often good to approximate your target settings using its previews
- want more unique sliders – go Nik
- if you don’t have specific and subtle enough goals, forget Nik
- if you like experimenting or want to learn B&W, use Nik
- comparison between FP and Nik is a personal thing, so try it yourself
- you may loose some detail in Nik, be it on purpose or not (no details provided for this claim, just some possibly silly experience)
- watch for posterization – standard problem with similar edits, especially in shadow recovery
- to get quick feel of Nik’s ‘speciality de maison’, try the following sliders in ‘Basic Adjustments’: ‘Brightness->Dynamic brightness’, ‘Structure’ family (it’s much different than FP fine-adjustments imho, different fall-off), ‘Contrast->Amplify Whites/Blacks’ (maybe Nik experts could add something here?)
- Some edits might be easier in SEP, some in FP/PL
- Nik may help you learn B&W
Background: Just few months of Nik experience, so don’t trust me too much. Most of my work is event photography, be it sports, dancing, or concerts (but no more weddings, uff). It’s fast action under “dirty” and poor light, noisy photos, mass production, short delivery times, getting more or less natural colors – something PL is perfect for. Hence I also try to make some other types of photography, not to be bored to death 
But even with my standard work, I try to deliver some personal look. Perhaps only 1% of my photos go to Nik. These have some special potential, not obviously attainable in PL/FP alone.
My workflow is most often like this: edit in PL, export to TIFF, use SEP, export to TIFF, use PL for final adjustments and jpeg export. Obviously this workflow is useful only for unique cases.
Nik has some serious deficiencies for me – no sidecars (you have to manually save your edits as presets (kept in the Nik database)), no version management (manual workarounds necessary), poor mouse wheel support (you have to switch to “keyboard mode” editing, which I’m not used to, but some may prefer it), no raw processor (additional distracting step), no multiple image processing, not too fast (PL is much faster to stay “online” with your edits).
Comparing SEP and FP. Let’s go through SEP settings.
Film Grain (Branded)
Personally, I would use the FP version.
FP gives you more control over the branded grain than SEP. There might be some niuances critical to film grain masters which I’m not aware of, though.
BTW, FP grain is just a repetition of a relatively small tile, probably 7x7mm of film scan. Not sure about SEP. It shouldn’t pose any problem, so better don’t worry about it (unless you are able to notice repetitions of a white dot on a clear sky ).
Color Filter
Very simple in SEP, maybe less prone to posterization than Channel Mixer in PL. Hard to say if it’s better than FP ‘Filter’ tool – both are quite primitive, but good enough in most cases. Feedback required.
Basic Adjustments
Most complex tool in SEP, with a misleading ‘Basic’ qualifier. Splits into several groups of sliders:
- Brightness – ‘Dynamic brightness’ is something you won’t get in FP or PL SmartLighting (which might be ‘better’, but still different)
- Contrast – the way Amplify Whites/Blacks sliders work seems to be unique to Nik. I’d like it to be in PL.
- Structure – nothing comparable in FP afaik, another basic feature which should find its place in PL.
- Tonality Protection – not sure when it works, experts welcomed
Let’s stop with the basics, as they require too much space to discuss here.
Selective Tones
ST in PL add/remove some microcontrast, while in SEP they act more like pure tone curve adjustments. This looks like a major difference, but I didn’t check it for sure.
ClearView
I didn’t “study” the difference yet. PL version seems to be more aggressive in colors. SEP version looks more “neutral”.
Toning
There’s more control in FP, but more previews in SEP. You may test adjustments in SEP first and use them in PL only to start a second round.
Vignette
The SEP implementation better suits me – I like the transition, shapes, easiness. Example usage – instrumentalists, especially piano and bass. Note that I’m often using “invisible vignette” in PL first, but that’s for a different purpose (thanks to @Wolfgang for coining the name in this forum, maybe it has more “fathers” elsewhere).
Burn Edges
I like it and I use it. Perhaps not so often applicable, but can make a difference, e.g. for moody portraits. Missing in FP.
Image Borders
You have more choices in FP, but some of them in SEP look more “tasty”. In SEP the border is always white. Used it maybe twice (happened to be the SEP version). I would like to be able to add some description text on the border (documentary or watermak type), in which case I have to use ImageMagick, as I’m too lazy to look too far for a “proper” solution. Still NP for me.
You may find some old posts useful, e.g. recall this post by @uncoy and some @Joju comments following it:
See also Are DXO Having a Laugh, or just Money Grabbing? - #58 by Joanna – if you think @Joanna’s emulations in FP replicate SilverEfex Amplify sliders well, then SFX is not for you (but that doesn’t “prove” the reverse implication :-)).
Hard to call it a true SEP/FP comparison, so maybe someone will try to do it better. Too much is often too little.
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FP is a pack of “film emulation” so basically another fancy word for “presets”.
Nik is a set of plugins for people using other software, giving you adjustment that you still don’t get within PL even with FP.
some people like Starbuck coffee, well… that’s their personal choices, doesn’t make them expert in coffee because they had one cup.
But not just that. I can’t find a definitive list of what FP adds into PL but here are the extra tools in my FilmPack palette…
- Colour filters for B&W work
- Film Grain in addition to that already in the film
- Creative Vignetting
- Blur including vignetted and soft focus
- Frames
- Textures
- Light Leaks
Plus the four Fine Contrast sliders that I couldn’t work without.
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I’ve decided that I need the new Nik Collection 8 even though Affinity Photo doesn’t have all the features of PS. So I bought Nik 8 today after testing it extensively.
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well lets face it, the contrast sliders and b&w filters should be part of PL Elite and not having to buy a pack of presets to unlock the not included tools you paid extra for Elite over Essential version. because Elite version is not complete without FP and VP.
for all other stuff you mention, Nik and every other software has them and they don’t charge any extra. For those using other software in combination with PL or not, than nik is better option and cheaper than buying FP and VP.
because you don’t need it doesn’t mean no one should get it. everyone is different and people like to use different things, have different workflow. impainting tool in AP does an amazing job compare to PL removal tool… hands down and so does the clone tool, you can also flip images horizontal and vertical which you still can’t in PL, many software have LUTs but really limited in PL because it’s not their bread and butter. what about color grading that still doesn’t exist in PL but in many other software. i could go on with many things but enough for me, that’s just to prove that our needs are different, people learned differently and use software differently, I’m not giving reviews of stuff i spent few hours trying to learn them or couldn’t pass the presets view of them, because every software has presets, which are for those not willing to learn how to use the software and for quick results.