Most host applications will have perspective correction tools of their own, but not volumetric correction.
Perspective Efex offers automatic and manual perspective correction, plus volumetric distortion correction, where wide-angle lenses elongate objects near the edge of the frame. It has some of the DNA of DxO ViewPoint, the perspective correction tool built to work alongside (and within) DxO PhotoLab, and the little-known DxO Perspective Mac application.
It’s limited in a way because it’s based mainly around control point adjustments and does not offer any creative effects beyond that.
It’s likely that whatever host program you use will have better sharpening and noise reduction tools than these old-timers, but they may still prove useful. Sharpener Pro 3 and Dfine 2 are perhaps less useful these days. Until the arrival of Aurora HDR, this was arguably the most comprehensible and effective HDR software on the market, and it’s still pretty good even now.
Individually these filters are useful collectively, their scope and potential for creative image effects is huge. What’s more you can combine these filters any way you like to create processing ‘Recipes’.
See also: Best image editing software – what to look for, how to choose.Īctually, although they’re usually described and used as plug-ins – in other words, launched from a ‘host’ program like Photoshop or Lightroom Classic, they can also be launched as standalone programs, so they can also be used with programs like Capture One, which work with external editors rather than plug-ins.
The Nik Collection 4.2 update has made the Nik plug-ins work with Photoshop running in native M1 mode on M1 Macs, fixed a compatibility issue with Capture One and the new versions of Silver Efex Pro and Viveza, and has made Silver Efex Pro’s U-point adjustments more responsive.