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Alien Skin releases Exposure 4
Alien Skin releases Exposure 4
Alien Skin Software yesterday announced the immediate availability of Exposure 4, the new version of its photography effects plug-in for Adobe Photoshop, Photoshop Elements, and Photoshop Lightroom. Exposure provides accurate film simulation and a wide range of creative effects in a simple interface.
Exposure 4 is a great tool for photographers and high-end designers, and carries a rather hefty price of $249 ($99 upgrade). I’m a huge fan of Alien Skin’s plugins for Photoshop. I have not used Exposure 4 yet, but I’ll be testing it out and posting a brief review very soon.
Adobe Photoshop CS6: Sneak Peek
Adobe Photoshop CS6: Sneak Peek
Adobe has released two preview videos to date, showing off a few features of their upcoming version of Photoshop (CS6) due out in the spring. The videos cover the Liquify and Background Save features (I love that they’ve added this to Photoshop), the new Camera Raw capabilities, and a little more of the new dark interface option.
Easily remove a white background from your Photoshop images
Easily remove a white background from your Photoshop images
I’ve linked to a lot of free textures here at The Graphic Mac over the years, and there are tons more to be found with a simple Google search. Quite a few of them are paint splatters or textures that you wish you could drop a white background out of. This can be quite tedious to do manually. Thankfully there’s an easier way that works pretty darn well.
MediaMelitia has a fantastic Photoshop Action set called Background Removal that’s free to download and use. The set includes three different actions to achieve different results. One version maintains the color of the foreground image, the other two remove the white background using the color parts as a black mask, as seen above. They offer clear instructions on the download page, along with when you might want to use the different action files.
Download Background Removal Photoshop Actions.
Turn your Photoshop images into comics
Turn your Photoshop images into comics
Simple to use Photoshop action to turn your images into comics
Photoshop actions can save you lots of time by automating tasks. Aside from productivity, they can also be used to create some really cool effects. This action turns your images into colorful vintage comics, complete with oversized halftone dots.
Download Comics Photoshop Action.
Easily improve the performance of Photoshop without buying more RAM
Easily improve the performance of Photoshop without buying more RAM
Last August I wrote a brief post sharing some of my favorite tips for speeding up Adobe Photoshop. If you’re new to the site, or using Photoshop, I encourage you to read through the article.
If you want more information, you can read a rather lengthy post directly from Adobe on how to optimize Photoshop that mirrors what I said, as well as adds more in-depth coverage on the topics.
Adobe Photoshop CS6 to bring new interface, upgrade policy
Adobe Photoshop CS6 to bring new interface, upgrade policy
Adobe Photoshop's new appearance
While in early beta stages, Adobe appears to be working on a new, darker interface for the next version of Photoshop that resembles Pixelmator. In addition to the new appearance (which in beta stage at least, offers an option to revert to the existing platinum appearance), Photoshop will feature new 3D tools, healing brush and red-eye reduction enhancements, and a perspective cropping tool. AppleInsider has more details and screenshots here.
Blow Up 3 makes stunning image enlargements effortless
Blow Up 3 makes stunning image enlargements effortless
The situation is all-too familiar, and frequent. You’re working on a large poster and your client sends you a 3×5 photo to work with. Using Photoshop’s image sizing tools are of no help, and other 3rd-party options are overly slow and complex. This situation is where Alien Skin Software’s Blow Up 3 shines.
Blow Up 3's simple interface offers a very Mac-like simplicity
Blow Up 3 focuses on simplicity, as evidenced by a quick look at the interface of the Photoshop plug-in. A large preview window, and an input area with just a few controls are all that is necessary to enlarge your images with stunning results (see image later in this article).