Is it really possible that the basic “flip” function is not available in PL9 and that you have to buy DxO ViewPoint separately for it?
Yes, these features are only available within PL if you enter a VP activation code, which you have to buy.
ViewPoint and FilmPack are integral parts of PhotoLab. Without them PhotoLab is incomplete. Granted the complete PhotoLab suite is very expensive, but without all three pieces you’re not getting the full package in a number of very significant ways. One of the reasons that PhotoLab was broken up into three parts in the first place, and that the PhotoLab piece was available in an Elite and Essential version, was to allow entry into the DXO ecosystem at various price points. I have owned and updated the entire suite since version 1 in 2017. I’ve never regretted it. If you want all that PhotoLab has to offer, there’s only one way to do it.
Both FilmPack and ViewPoint are already completely built into to PhotoLab. Many people erroneously think they’re add-ins. They are not. A license for them unhides those features in PhotoLab. Additionally, those licenses allow you to download standalone versions of that software primarily for those users who do not just use PhotoLab as their primary raw editor. Many PhotoLab users, myself included, do not download or install the standalone versions.
I have always felt that there should only be a single version of PhotoLab with everything included at a reasonably higher cost. That would avoid so much user confusion and frustration.
Mark
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The functionality is built into PL and cannot be accessed, unless a valid ViewPoint License has been entered in PhotoLab.
Currently, there is a sneaky access if you e.g. rotate the image and save the sidecar. Open the sidecar and edit the orientation tag value and save the sidecar. Import settings (file menu) if the image has not been flipped automatically.
Orientation tag values can be found in the ExifTool documentation. The easy way to find the correct value is to create virtual copies and set the values to 1, 2, 3,…respectively.
Alternatively, one can use ExifTool to change the orientation tag.
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@Dogbone, would you like to have the title of this feature request changed to “Flip image horizontally or vertically without needing ViewPoint”? Otherwise, it appears that your question has been answered - in which case I’ll change this topic from a feature request to an ordinary discussion topic.
Thanks for your replies!
It’s really disappointing that such a standard feature, included in every cheap tool, has to be unlocked at an additional cost. We call that “banana tactics.”
I’ve also been a PL licensee for several years now and own the Elite version because I don’t want to worry about extra features. Now I need this feature for the first time in a project. It’s just incredibly disappointing.
Be honest and make a product that includes the basic and most important features. Then you could charge extra for the ultra-specialized noise reduction or other highly specialized features that not everyone needs. But this tactic really rubs me the wrong way. I don’t know if this translation accurately reflects my opinion.
@Egregius: I don’t care whether this is a request or a discussion. Just do what you have to do. Thank you.
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The Elite version of PhotoLab is not a complete full featured version and never has been. It has been poor marketing on DxO’s part if potential users think that PhotoLab Elite by itself will give them all the features they think should get. Besides the film emulations in Filmpack there are a couple of dozen other features in both FilmPack and ViewPoint.
Mark
I don’t think there’s a lot of difference between rotating and flipping. Just a matter of where to start reading the image and in what sequence. So I don’t know why it’s disabled in PL. The carrot on a sick before the monkey?
George
There is one: orientation. Think about (co)homology.
If you want to flip freely, just use ImageMagick or anything similar, and you can do it batchy (wonder if it’s still in propa British English).
I mean orientation.
Rotating in 90 degrees segments.
Start reading the canvas in a different way and/or different sequence. Pixelvalues are not changed.
George
You sound even more strange than me
Why???
George
From a math point of view, flipping is even simpler than rotating. It does not matter though, because it’s already built into PL, so the only thing to do is to make PL accept your input.
- Official version: Get and activate a license for DxO ViewPoint
- Workaround: Edit the orientation tag in the .dop file
Use this as a reminder of how to set tags values.
Example: Flip a landscape
* change tag value from 1 to 2 (horizontal flip)
* change tag value from 1 to 4 (vertical flip)
Note: Images in cameras are always stored in “normal” (1) orientation and the exif orientation tag tells the software (in camera or on computer) what to do by setting the exif orientation tag value to what it needs to be.
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Sorry, I meant another meaning of “orientation”, used in maths, e.g. in the context of manifolds. Think of flipping the photo makes the clock going backwards.
No. It’s mirroring in a vertical or horizontal mirror. Different result as from rotating.
@platypus I remember trying that before but also that it didn’t work. But I’m not sure. The code just tells the software how to read/change the image. Flipping 1 tells to start with row 1 and place that in row y etc. Flipping 2 the same but then with the columns.
It’s just a matter of reading. Pixelvalues don’t change as with a rotation of non 90 degrees values.
George
It works here, on Mac, and only if the sidecar is saved and closed.
Then, a manual import of the sidecar should make PL flip and/or rotate as directed.
As of now, PL does not disable all functions that need FP or VP licenses to access and that, together with the easy human-readable and editable form of sidecars makes this workaround possible.
An alternative way to make things happen is to use the .xmp sidecar file.
XMP files written by Lightroom Classic v14 present the tag as tiff:Orientation
Again, edit the file, save and close it and have PL read it.
Note that the full set of flips and rots has not been implemented in PL from its beginnings. Early versions of PL can’t flip.
For me, the reason that I flip images is because I use my camera to copy 35mm negatives. When doing this, I photograph the emulsion resulting in a required flip during processing which I do with Photolab.
As Photolab is not a pixel editor, I open the processed images in a pixel editor - in my case, Photoshop CS6 (quite old but sufficient). Photoshop does the flip with ease.
I do think that it is very poor of DXO not to include the flip function in the Elite version when they include some film simulations.
Twisted logic in my opinion.
Allan
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This thread discusses the technique of mirroring and possible workarounds. The fact that this truly fundamental function isn’t simply integrated into PL Elite is grounds for cancellation.
If I want to mirror an image horizontally and/or vertically in Affinity, which is now even free, I can do it easily—without understanding the technical details. The program just does it. Just like every old version of Photoshop, as @Allen points out, even a free program like Apple Pages, or presumably any program that allows even basic image editing.
I really like PL, but this is a complete deal-breaker for me. I honestly don’t understand the logic behind it either.
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In the windows world, donation type tools like Faststone and IrfanView do it with ease.
I suppose that the logic behind this is the want or need to generate income. Imo, other and less happiness killing ways exist than the challenging one chosen by DxO. I accept the challenge by exploring workarounds.
I really wish that DxO accompany their technical excellence by less irritating sales and marketing tactics and the workarounds also help to work around the frustration caused by DxO’s current ways.
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