I Would like to have this in DXO Photolab too

DxO PhotoLab
1

Capture One just got another productivity centered update called “Retouch Faces” :

I would very much like to see something like this in Photolab too.

I think the thing that strikes me most when comparing DXO with Capture One in particular is that Capture One during the last five years has had a very strong focus on boosting the users productivity - a thing that really gets Capture One to stand out from the rest of the whole industry, as the most professionally oriented tool among all RAW-converters. I would very much like DXO to focus on the users effeiciency too. Today in these AI-powered days, no one is prepared to pay for unnessessary inefficciency in photographers work flows and I think even DXO has to start to pay real attention to these questions now.

We have also seen a long row of improvements to workflows and layer management and AI-driven masking for example in Capture One that have absolutely no parallell in Photolab. I think DXO really have to get updated on what is taking place in the rest of the industry. Superior RAW-based image quality is worth a lot but it is not everything anymore. It is also very important to be able to offer the users a modern and effective set of tools to carry out all the tasks they have to do and sad to say, DXO Photolab do not offer that to day in many respects.

I can see just after using Retouch Faces a few minutes that a tool like this could save me a lot of time compared to using Photolab or almost anything else for the same task. There are voices out there saying this might be the most important improvement and time saver ever, coming from Capture One and everybody having tried to retouching faces know that it might be the most demanding tasks we can undertake with any motif as photographers. Of course, this function might not please everybody or solve all high-end face retouching demands people might have but for many of us it definitely will produce results much better than “good enough” for most needs without sacrificing a high degree of user control.

What this is all about is to give the CO users a real chance to remain focused in Capture One instead of open Photoshop for some extra polish and that will save us a lot of time not needing to perform these now unnecessary manouvers. More than 10 years ago I installed presets from SLR Lounge in Lightrooms Adjustment Brush that gave Lightroom Face Retouch brushes just to obtain the same effects (to remain focused at the converter) and that helped a lot but this Capture One takes it a lot further and very much faster.

I would very much appreciate if DXO could give us something like this Retouch Faces even in Photolab.

2 Likes
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Yes, a tool like this in Photolab would be very useful and big time saver for me.

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I also keep a subscription of Capture One and the last years we have got some absolutely fantastic tools and they just keep coming often very unexpectedly any time of the year so so far I´m fine with subsribing. This surprices me a little since even Capture One these days are owned by venture capitalists that definitely not are known to prioritize R&D and a high pace and frequency of innovation deliveries.

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I think AI subject/background mask would be more useful to more users than this feature.

“Retouch faces” would still be nice to have though.

1 Like
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It is all a matter of how you look on productivity and the concept of “good enough”. Retouch Faces is much more effective and gives surprisingly good results in seconds rather than many minutes. While the other AI-masking tools gives better detail control to a higher cost.

I guess Retouch Faces is tailored to suite the needs of wedding photographers and for more general purposes and needs.

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“I think AI subject/background mask would be more useful to more users than this feature.” Absolutely. CaptureOne seems more geared towards studio photographers (hence their outdated noise reduction I guess). Would be nice to have, but subject / persons detection would be far more useful for most DXO users I guess.

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Well I´m not one of them. I will not sit there for hours with picture after picture and nor will wedding photographers that have to make a living. I do that more often with my animal portraits but hardly never with humans.

I have coved one wedding for quite a few years ago and that will never happen again :slight_smile:

But the good is that we now have another tool for the ones who might need it.

Agree about the denoising in CO. It is really strange that nothing has happened there for many years.

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I agree Re: the retouching features. If my business were photographing people I would seriously consider CO. I don’t believe that is PL’s niche. Re CO NR: If CO NR were improved it would become my sole image processor. However, I do not believe they plan to work on it. I suppose the DXO and Topaz front ends obviate the need - same for image stacking and Helicon.

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Photolab doesn’t even have an auto adjust feature so good luck with this. I left capture one as the pricing got predative for me and as non people photographer capture has added nothing of use to me since I left. I like photolab and really like the rendering and noise reduction - something capture has no intention of improving it seems. Capture one has become a specialist tool for studio and wedding photographers whixh obviously must be profitable for them - and with AI might be the only long term professional photography business that’s financially viable.