Bacardi

I am preparing a complete review of two plugins: ColorWasher and Focalblade ( www.thepluginsite.com ).
I can tell you folks already that they are much better than I dared to imagine! If you read my chautauqua on sharpening (see these forums, tutorials section ), you know how I search for techniques that improve the Unsharp Mask tool. Well, Focalblade does all this, but much more. Ranging from automatic (and with good quality!) to an interface with more options than I knew were possible.
Colorwasher is also much more than a photographer's plugin.
Both are, and by far! my favourite plugins. Time-savers, but also offering quality that I can only compare with micro-surgery.
I'm still trying things out, but I can already say that they are more than worth the investment. Highly recommended!

An example tells more than a thousand words: this African gentleman is the father of the girlfriend of a friend of mine. The poor man joined his forefathers last year, and this washed out, unsharp pic is all she has. She asked me to try and make something out of it, and I saw in it a perfect chance to test these plugins in a rather difficult situation.
It took me less than twenty minutes to sharpen (complete with edgemask!!!) and colour correct the photograph (scanned at 200%, 300dpi for print from a 4x5inch original), and then one hour of cloning three hundred thousand and fifty four specks of dust, fingermarks and cracks. The printed result is even better than this jpg.

I am impressed!

Blinky2004

Keep us updated Erik, this looks like some interesting stuff. [righton]

Lee

Thanks Erik.

HaraldHeim

Thanks for praising our plugins, Eric. But for the posted example I would use a bit different settings in ColorWasher. Your corrected image has too much contrast and saturation, doesn't reveal the dark leaves and turns the blue color cast more into slight red cast.

Here's what I did in ColorWasher to produce the image below: I used Auto 3 to make the skin color more natural by removing the blue color cast (you can also do that by creating a sample area), I set Auto Contrast and Exposure Fix to Intense and increased the shadows slider.

I didn't activate the Chroma check box, but that is an option if you want to keep the original saturation and avoid an increase in saturation that is produced by the necessary contrast adjustment that is done by ColorWasher.

Of course, it is more or less a question of taste if you like a stronger or weaker contrast or exposure better, but I think you did the contrast too extreme in your example.

Bacardi

I see and respect your point, but these leaves are more saturated, the skin is darker and the lines on the fabric are as good as black. Which is why I decided to "go for it". When I would print your version and present it to her, she would probably still prefer mine.

From a restorer's point of vierw, you are totally correct: what I did is interpret personally without real respect for the original artwork.

Ahh...this is always the big discussion: can I paint a new nose on that damaged painting, or should I fill the gap with a neutral tint?

This said, your example shows the power of the presets. Me, I still have to get used to using them as in Photoshop or whatever application, I never use anything that begins with "smart", "intelligent" or "auto".

More results soon.
And my enthusiasm stays at the same level.
[righton]

Bacardi

Part two: a photograph taken in a museum.

Bacardi

Colorwasher can't handle this alone as the bottom is clearly darker than the top.
Therefore, I copied the background and tried to do the top correctly, this time using a sample area on the background right of her (our view). The result still needed a bit of correction, but the sliders were there to do so.
Then a layer mask was needed to blend with the original (gradient from black to white, and a bit of painting), and a curves adjustment layer to enhance the whole.

The result comes very close to the original:

John1

Erik, it's good to see that you kept all the details in the dark/light areas visible, well done. That shows again how important it is to calibrate your monitor to avoid making mistakes when you work with an image like this.

Bacardi

Indeed, John, that is the difficulty here. The bottom part easily becomes too dark when trying to do the correction in one go. The painting does have a Rembrandtesque golden glow over it, including the master's use of darks, but no painter would ever use the kind of blackness the single layer adaptation offers.
Is this a weak point of ColorWasher? In my opinion: no.
I could obtain the same results without the plugin, but it would be a lot more work, and as many tools would have to be used in sequence, I'd be forced to use several adjustment layers. In CW it's all there in one go, which makes this kind of adjustment easier and less time-consuming.
BTW: the manual includes a good overview on monitor calibration and general settings.
Indeed: the three quarter darks here contain many hues.
Plus, I usually work in AdobeRGB as I want to print this out. (the original is much larger). Converting to sRGB or no CM at all (it is for the web) also loses some intensity.

Bacardi

This is the result of ColorWasher in Sample Area mode, and FocalBlade standard (no tweaking, nothing).

Even my aversion against all things intelligent and automatic must be reviewed. For most "simple/normal" casts, this gives excellent results. To obtain something similar in Photoshop itself, I have to apply a lot of tweaks in series. Here I have all the tools on one interface, and, if wanted: far more and with better algorythms than PS has.

BTW: OlympusOM4Ti, Zuiko lens, Kodak Gold 100,
Pont Aven, Chapelle de tremalo, the yellow Christ Paul Gauguin painted