Three questions - first, how can I be sure that PhotoLab 4 is not doing any processing of an image when I first open the image?
Related question - is there a “history” panel, where I can open an image in PhotoLab 4, and clear out any and all changes that have been made to the image, either by myself or by the software?
Finally, when I’m in a hurry, and I’m working on images that aren’t all that important to me, is there a place to select “AUTO” and PhotoLab 4 will do its best, automatically, to correct for suspected errors?
apply the “non-correction” preset. You can apply any preset at any time you want. You can also choose in preferences the preset you want to have applied when DPL sees a file for the first time.
Once you’ve opened an image with a pre-set in preferences you can only change that preset manual. By example: you first opened a raw image with dxo-standard in the preferences and later on you changed the preset in preferences to black-white and you reopen that image again it will not be black-white. A new fresh image will.
And there’s no way to see what preset was used. I didn’t find it anyway.
That button is always blue.
I set in preferences preset to no-corrections and opened a picture that has not been used in pl. Apply preset is blue. Even when I click on it I can’t tell which preset was used.
I’m on pl3.
When opened once an image with a preset, it’s stored in the database. A reset will go back to that situation. A change in preferences will not change that. The only way to go back to a no-correction situation is either to manual change that preset per image or to change the preferences and to delete the database.
I don’t think it’s different in pl4, you can tell me.
Sigi, I am new to a lot of this. Sorry if what I’m asking here is too simple, but I don’t know how to do the things you’ve suggested. I don’t want to give up on PL4, but I find I am “stuck” on the simplest things.
Specifically how do I apply a “non-correction” preset?
You’ve told me there is a “history panel” where I can view all the corrections done to an image (and hopefully I’ll be able to un-do them), but were is it? I expected to see something like what Lightroom has, a list of everything done to an image. I haven’t been able to open such a view.
For my third question you send me to your first answer, which makes sense, but I don’t (yet) know how to do this.
My plan is to load a new image into PL4, and make one simple change, maybe cropping. Then I will search for this “history” list, and presumably the last item on it will be cropping. In my opinion, there ought to be a single “reset” button, that clears out EVERYTHING that has been done, and goes back to the image as it was first imported. Apparently that’s not the case - my goal for today is to get this one thing figured out.
Thank you, but maybe you or someone can elaborate? …or better yet, is there a video that shows someone doing all these things that I can watch?
Thank you George - I think you’re telling me that there is no simple way to get to a “history” window, to view everything that has been done to an image? If you don’t know how to find what preset was used, I’m unlikely to ever find what I’m after. Maybe someone else has found a way.
It doesn’t help any that anything I type here has to be moderated before it gets posted. After buying all this software, I would think that alone proves I’m a real person. Oh well, I can live with that - none of this is “urgent”. I’ve resisted the idea of just going back to Lightroom which I do understand, but if I was in a hurry for answers, I would now be very frustrated. Thank you.
For moderation, I also had this problem, it’s probably a bug.
Ask the staff to resolve this.
The history palette is located on the left, for more info here.
If you can’t find it on the left side, you may need to select the DxO Standard workspace.
To save doing that every time, you could create a custom palette and save it in your own workspace but, for the moment, at least you will be able to play with it this way.
Once you’ve selected that workspace, you should see the history on the left side
However, if what you really want to do is to reset everything since the image was loaded, the easiest way is to go back to the top right of the window and click on the Reset button there. This will take you back to the preset that was applied when you first opened the image.
No problem - and welcome to the world of DXO. As a first step I highly recommend to read the manual - you find the online version in “Help”. On top there is a very good “manual” written by a forum member - Pascal - see here: http://dxo.tuto.free.fr/
Thank you Joanna, you just made life much easier for me.
Now that I’m looking in the right places at the right time, I went to the top right as you indicated, found the selection for PRESETS and for now, I first selected “5 - No Correction”. I know PL4 uses the information for what camera and lens I shot with to adjust the image. To have it do that, am I correct that I should use “2 - DxO Optical Corrections Only”? Unless you tell me otherwise, that is what I have now selected.
Next, to make this the default from now on - as you suggested, I go to the top of my screen, DxO PhotoLab 4 and scroll down to PREFERENCES. In the window that opens up, I have selected “2 - DxO Optical corrections only”.
(Looking at the window, I have no idea what a “SuperRAW” image is…???)
Finally, at the top of the screen, I found the header for “Workspaces”. Until now it has been set at “What’s New in PhotoLab”. For now, I have changed it to “DxO Standard”. Once I understand more, I might change that to “DxO Advanced”.
Regarding your comments at the end, can I say that starting with right now, the changes I have made are “permanent”, meaning this is how images will be imported into PhotoLab 4 starting right now? I’ll ignore images that I’ve already worked on (but I understand the “RESET” will be able to bring them back to how they were first loaded into PhotoLab before I messed with anything.
One final thought - is there a page that explains what the DxO Standard Preset is and does? Once I understand PhotoLab better, that might be a better choice for me - but I’ve got a lot to learn first. THANK YOU!!!
Thank you Franky, but WHAT switch turns blue? I am too new to this stuff to understand what you mean. Please treat me as if I’m a complete “newby” (which I mostly am). I don’t know what or where the “palettes” is/are, to look for the current settings.
If I don’t find a video on how to do this stuff, I’m lost. It would help me tremendously if you pointed me to something online that describes how to do these things you’re suggesting.
On the other hand, I’ve been muddling my way through PL4 enough to eventually get images I like. My biggest problem is I over-do things, and then the images start to look “manipulated”. I would love to have a button that un-does everything I have ever done to an image, clears all the presets and anything else, so I can try again with a fresh start.
I just now got a message explaining how to reply to several posts at once. Great idea, but now that I’ve already replied to all these individual messages, it’s a little late.
Is there a button I haven’t yet seen, that replies to the entire topic, rather than replying to individual people? I’ll try to find that next time, if I can find out how to do so. Sorry for all the clutter I’ve apparently created. Maybe I should resort to contacting DxO for support, instead of using the forum…
The palettes are the windows of each function.
To return to the original settings, you must reset the settings (red oval).
When an adjustment is made, the sliders at the top left of each palette turn blue (red rectangle).
