newbie Q: how do i modify the values of an effect without deleting the layer in photoshop?

Nik Collection Nik Color Efex topics
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i’ve applied pro contrast+brilliance/warmth+polarization simultaneously to my psd file as a layer, but now i want to go back in to nik to change the ‘warmth’ slider on the brilliance/warmth effect. is there any way to do this without having to destroy the layer, and hence eliminating all the effects? i want to keep the other two effects but i don’t remember the values i chose so i can’t just delete the layer and reapply all the effects again. it seems like this should be pretty straight forward but i can’t seem to find a way to do it. if i go back in to the nik from the filter menu, it no longer shows all the effects i applied in the layer.

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As far as I am aware, you cannot. PS is happy to use the results from NIK and creates a new layer compositing the original PS layer and the input from NIK into a new layer, but it can’t separate out the different aspect that created that layer itself i.e the various settings that you used in NIK to achieve it.

At least with PS it creates a new layer. With Affinity it writes straight to the layer you are working on :open_mouth:

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As I remember, in PS, If you make adjustments in a ‘smart’ layer, you can go back in later and change adjustment values. Not sure that’ll work with NIK plugins, but maybe(?) If not, yeah, you’re stuck re-doing the NIK adjustments. But if you do it that way, don’t delete the old NIK layer, turn it off with the ‘eyeball’ so PS creates the intermediary TIFF without it - and then you can use the eyeball to switch from one NIK adjustment layer to the other, or blend with opacity. Sorry, but it’s been ages since I used NIK with PS.

Oh - and welcome here!

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I don’t use PS. However, in all the videos I watch on the NIK Collection when the person starts in PS they create the object as a Smart Object and they say then you can go back in and edit each of the settings you made in Color Efex.

Butch

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That’s certainly true of native PS adjustment layers. I was dancing around the issue as I’wasn’t certain a SO with NIK adjustments remained re-adjustable. Sounds like that’s the way to go.