#Viveza workflow full#
#Viveza workflow pro#

To finish the image a Curves Adjustment Layer was created to emphasize the grassy area and the sky. If a slight change does occur, just set a control point in that area and do not make any changes – that part goes back to the original state. The really nice thing is that the changes you are doing will not affect colors that are not in its range where the point is set. The circle indicates where these settings will be applied and they can be applied by pulling out the lines on the image or adjusting the sliders on the right. You can set the control point circle size by just dragging out the bottom bar to fit. These settings show what ones were used where the dot is placed. The second image shows how the image looked once all five control points were turned on and gives a much closer look to the final. The settings indicate what settings were used on the blue sky area but is not turned on in the view screen. The top window shows how the image looked as it was brought into Photoshop at this point.

Here is what my dialog box looked like before applying and after applying Viveza. Next a composite layer (CTRL+ALT+SHIFT+E) of the image was created and converted into a Smart Object, and then opened up in Viveza 2. Noise and clean up corrections need to be done first before applying the beautiful color and light effects that the Viveza plug-in adds. Brown’s Edit Layers with ACR script to get rid of noise in the sky and blue water. (It gave a great result since it lets you pinpoint exactly where the problem areas will be.) The tone-mapped image was processed in Photoshop and the first thing done was to use Dr.

#Viveza workflow pro#

The final result was processed with PhotoMatix Pro 4. It was very windy and I had to really work hard to get a good HDR shot since the tree leaves and waves were moving so much. This image was taken on the road up to the incredible Waipi’o Valley – it represents how the Big Island of Hawaii felt and looked to me while I was there. I only used the plug-in after I had processed an image in Lightroom (or ACR) and could not get back to make adjustments*.

I have owned Viveza since it first came out and never used it that much since I thought it was like Adobe Camera Raw. In his excellent workflow, that is discussed in my earlier blog, he talked about using Nik’s Viveza 2 plug-in, a powerful plug-in to selectively control color and light in your photographs. (See my blog “ Digital Landscape Effects with Nik Software.”) Don Smith runs a great website called Nature’s Best by Don Smith Photography.

#Viveza workflow full#

Insights Members can login to read the full article.A while back I listened to a really good webinar at the old Nik site called Incorporating Nik Software into your Daily Workflow with Don Smith. Think of Structure as occupying the visual territory that lies between Unsharp Mask and High Pass. When Structure is applied, luminosity contrast increases, more so in shadows than in highlights where very high values stop just short of compromising shadow detail. Structure accentuates texture somewhat, which can enhance noise as well as detail, but not as much as Unsharp Mask. In contrast to High Pass, Structure enhances contours with a line that is not as pronounced as Unsharp Mask (Structure is almost incapable of producing artificially hard contouring.) and thinner than High Pass (Structure can’t be used for enhancing planar contrast like high values of High Pass.).

Like Photoshop’s High Pass filter, Viveza’s Structure provides a single slider but offers more options with the inclusion of negative values for soft focus effects. So what specifically are the visual differences? Consider them both useful variations of the types of effects you can produce with Photoshop’s High Pass filter. Viveza provides Structure while Color Efex Pro provides Tonal Contrast. Both NIK’s Viveza and Color Efex Pro offer useful additions to a digital artist’s set of detail enhancement tools.