I’m a new DxO Photolab user (for about a week). I had been using Lightroom for 8 years prior. Here are my thoughts:
Wow, the Lens Sharpness (sharpening) and Prime Noise Reduction is just incredible. It puts Lightroom to shame.
I enjoy using DxO. I didn’t with Lightroom.
It’s nice not having to use a catalog.
I’m re-doing a lot of my old Raw files in DxO that i had previously done in Lightroom. Every single time when i compare the results the DxO versions are so much better.
Editing an image in DxO is a lot faster.
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I wish there was a way to nudge the crop rectangle left/right or up/down by a pixel at a time, i.e with the arrow keys.
I wish with the automatic healing tool that if it samples from an area that doesn’t give a good result that you could tell it to chose an alternative source.
Those are my initial thoughts after a week of testing.
Welcome! I’ve been a PhotoLab user for 18 months. I agree completely with points 1 to 6. It is almost like you’ve read my mind from when I was a new user. I left Lightroom shortly after acquiring PhotoLab. I have never regretted it and have never looked back. With regard to your point regarding cropping, that is a good suggestion but I doubt it will happen anytime soon. Finally with regard to the healing tool, there has been a lot of discussion regarding the need for a clone tool which would work as you suggest. I believe its on DXO’s backlog. Finally,If your don’t have DXO Viewpoint, the perspective tool, you also might want to consider acquiring it.
Endorsing Mark’s recommendation - - ViewPoint is a very powerful tool … and, when you own both PhotoLab & ViewPoint, VP is installed as a fully integrated component within PL (such that I never actually use VP in stand-alone mode).
I’m of that same mind. It truly is a fantastic RAW developer. I started with Optics Pro 11 and jumped on Photolab 1 when it first came out. I also got Elite versions of FilmPack 5 and Viepoint 3. Very happy with all of it. It just keeps getting better too.
1 yes, can’t say about LR don’t used it, but migrated from Silkypix and as m43 shooter its great to have such enhancement.
3 Yes LR i heard that it’s very forcing you to use the LR catalog, with DxO you can ignore all the other features if you only want to use folder structure.
4 yes it’s addictive, redoing old rawfiles. And i don’t want to bring more workload on you but when you get the feeling of the local adjustments tools and more control over the other general tools you try again to improve the same image.
In ref to #7 crop tool ~ apart from your mention of the nudge clicking. The one hurdle I hit and have yet to find how in PL2 I can do this:-
If I have a landscape orientation image and wish to crop in 3/2 ratio a with a vertical (portrait orientation) crop, I can’t do that in PL2. What I have had to do is select a manual non ratio constrained crop and “pull it” into the right ratio!
So, if someone can point out my error and it can indeed be done…don’t be shy, tell me how and what I ma missing If however it cannot be done now, this IMO is an important ommision and hopefully will be corrected sooner rather than later?
Cropping is a pain at times. The way to get round it is using unconstrained add 3/2 and the cropping will be set on what ever ratio you add. The only way of keeping for further use is to add it as a preset on its own (otherwise any other changes will be added as well). I have the A ratio added to my default preset so it can be used which is another way. You can’t use other presets though as they usually lose an cropping added . Which is why cropping is a pain at times, better that there were the ability for users to add there own cropping ratios in cropping but this has never got anywhere.
There can be unwanted implications, Laurence - but there are plenty of “finessing” options available with the tool to adjust the degree of correction … One can also use the “Volume deformation” tool to address issues with people at the edge of the image.
Regards, John M
Like any tool, it can be used effectively or over used. Unlike most other tools of it’s type it’s capabilities go beyond just straightening verticals, as John has shown you. Clearly he was not showing you how to correct a problem in his example, but rather how effective the tool is when modifying perspective. But it must be used with a plan in mind. Haphazard use will give you haphazard results. Once fully understood, the tool can fix a variety of perspective issues.
Exactly! It’s in a backlog.
And about Crop frame transition from landscape to portrait and vise versa - the tutorial proposed by @Pieloe is a great help.
You can - at least I can. Select the 3/2 crop, drag one corner handle horizontally over half-way across the image and the marquee flips to portrait orientation.
And i don’t want to bring more workload on you but when you get the feeling of the local adjustments tools and more control over the other general tools you try again to improve the same image.
