Black & White Studio
Black & White Studio is a versatile converter of digital images from full color to black-and-white. It offers masses of options: two pages of them in the Windows version, three pages on Macintosh. Its presets simulate professional films such as Kodak Tri-X and T-MAX, but it also lets you create your own light sensitivity curves and store them for later use. Its color filters imitate the effect of standard camera filters, while giving you full control over exposure, highlights and shadows. A set of zone controls lets you make adjustments to three selectable zones.
Comment
Of all Jan Esman's great plugins, this is arguably the best. Widely acclaimed by reviewers and users, it is a sophisticated program that can match all the multigrade levels of traditional photographic paper, from 00 to 5. It even has an extra level at each end, proving, once again, that digital photography pushes the boundaries in unexpected ways. Its zone controls, used in conjunction with an eyedropper tool, are particularly well implemented with different colored crosses that remain in position to indicate the three selected zones.
Many photographers are still wary of using digital to produce black-and-white, but those who try this B&W converter are usually converted to this method of doing it.
Tech info
- Plugs into: Paintshop Pro, Elements, Macromedia Fireworks, Corel Draw and other editors
- OS: Windows (all current and most early versions); Mac OS X
- Price level: Approx. $75
Power Retouche
Jan Esman's
Some are much more fully featured than others, the most highly praised being Power Retouche Plugins need little introduction to experienced digital photographers. Esman, a native of Copenhagen, Denmark, is primarily a figurative artist, prominent in the European art scene.
From the same vendor:
- Golden Section
- Film Grain
- Graduated Color
- ...and many others
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