Ansel Adams was part of a group of San Francisco realistic landscape photographers who called themselves Group f/64. The name came from their desire to achieve maximum depth of field (DOF). However, attaining maximum DOF can be challenging, especially in macro photography. Stopping a lens down to its smallest aperture extends DOF but introduces diffraction. Enter Helicon Focus software. It produces an edge-to-edge focused image by combining partially focused areas from multiple files of a scene.

The Helicon Focus interface and process is amazingly simple to use considering the task. The hardest work is taking the pictures. A tripod is a must. It’s important to take enough pictures of a scene, incrementally changing the focusing distance with each consecutive shot. Small incremental movements of the focus barrel work best for macro shooting, while broader focusing is fine for most landscapes. It’s very similar to taking a successful panoramic by carefully overlapping shots.

Helicon compensates for change in object size that occurs from refocusing. Files for the image are imported in consecutive order and appear as small thumbnails in a source palette to the right side of the preview window. You can delete files but the thumbnail size and the order they appear in can’t be adjusted, which is frustrating for proper editing. For optimization of your image, the Smooth and Radius sliders adjust the transitional areas of the multiple files.

I loaded 25 RAW files from my Canon EOS-1Ds Mark III, and in a little more than a minute, I had a stunning image. You can remove artifacts using a retouching brush that allows you to clone from a selected source file to the resulting image. Images can be saved as JPEGs, TIFFs, PNGs, or PSDs. Maximum DOF has a profound image impact, and Helicon Focus does a wonderful job.

Company: Helicon Soft Ltd.
Price: $250
Web: www.heliconsoft.com
Rating: 4
Hot: Solves shallow DOF problems; 64-bit mode
Not: Lack of flexible image culling

Snap Art 3 is Alien Skin’s latest version of their painting and drawing effects plug-in software for Photoshop, Lightroom, and Elements. And it’s exactly what the name implies—software for quickly transforming photographic images into stylized art. There’s a comprehensive collection of preset styles to get you started such as crayon, oil paint, pencil, comics, and watercolor that are further broken down into subgroups for landscapes, portraits, abstracts, etc. You can globally adjust the preset style using sliders to modify brushstroke, surface texture, color, light, etc., or locally use a layer mask to modify your image.

At any point in your exploration you can save and name your modifications. Snap Art processes large files relatively quickly and renders your image in a large preview window. The tools and controls are easy to use and the process is intuitive, but just in case, the interface has mouseover tooltips and there’s a collection of video tutorials on Alien Skin’s website.
For some, Snap Art’s quick results might be a legitimacy issue. Making art is supposed to be a difficult, time-consuming process. However, within minutes of opening one of my pictures in Snap Art 3, I was struck with the effects and couldn’t deny that I liked what I saw: complex brushstrokes, clean edges, delicate pointillism, and more. I made several prints on canvas paper that appeared natural without a manufactured look.

Snap Art is made to order for busy wedding photographers who need to deliver that special moment in a unique artistic manner. Snap Art lets us explore our images and expand our vision. It’s well worth trying out.

Company: Alien Skin Software, LLC
Price: $199
Web: www.alienskin.com
Rating: 4.5
Hot: Quality artistic effects
Not: No written manual

X-Rite’s i1PhotoPro is a comprehensive package that calibrates and profiles your camera, display, printer, and projector. It’s aimed at professionals whose work demands accurate and consistent colors, from camera to print.

The heart of the package is its spectrophotometer and new i1 Profiler software, which has basic and advanced modes for monitor profiling/calibration and paper profiling. The workflow for both is guided and each step is accompanied by excellent onscreen Help. And, you can save all essential settings and measured data.

Creating custom paper profiles is straightforward. The software generates a printed target of color and black-and-white patches (the user determines the number of patches and I found 400 patches built excellent profiles). The spectrophotometer, which scans and reads the patches to build the profile, sits on a device that smoothly glides over the patches. X-Rite provides a backboard to hold the printed target. The process is quick and easy and the software notifies you if you make a mistake. The glossy and matte prints I made with the X-Rite profiles were spot on, matching the display that I calibrated and profiled with the spectrophotometer. Colors were accurate, with smooth transitions, and full of detail in both shadow and highlights.

Included with the i1PhotoPro package is an effective way to create a custom camera profile: a 24-patch color checker that fits in a shirt pocket—perfect for location work. Photograph the checker in the same light as your subject, drop the file into X-Rite’s color-checker software, and it builds the profile and automatically places it under camera calibration in Adobe Camera Raw or Lightroom. It works beautifully. For those who demand complete critical color management of their work, i1PhotoPro won’t disappoint.

Company: X-Rite, Incorporated
Price: $1,399
Web: www.xrite.com
Rating: 5
Hot: Comprehensive precision package; good tech support
Not:

DxO Optics Pro Elite 6.6 is a rich and deep RAW and JPEG image processor/editor. It begins with a unique approach that gives you a big “leg up” on improving the quality of your images. DxO Labs technicians test, measure, and analyze manufacturers’ DSLR camera sensors and lens combinations and group them in modules—there are presently more than 4,512 modules. They find the inherent defects (such as barrel and pin cushioning, vignetting, chromatic aberration, fringing, noise, and much more) and then create precision algorithms that specifically correct for them.

When you select an image to work on, DxO Optics Pro Elite 6.6 recognizes the equipment used in shooting from the EXIF data. It automatically applies the corrections and optimizes your image. I know of no other RAW processor that gives you this much of a timesaving head start; for example, I found it especially effective in correcting lens distortion in architectural shots. Aside from these core corrections, DxO Optics Pro Elite lets you select from a list of additional presets to apply to one image or a batch of images for processing. If by chance your equipment isn’t supported (the website lists supported equipment) or you just want to control the process, the software includes comprehensive manual adjustments.

With each new version, DxO Optics Pro improves its integration with Photoshop and Lightroom, and you can send files on a roundtrip to either application for editing. The current version doesn’t have a print feature but it lets you send processed images to Lightroom or Photoshop for printing.

DxO’s customizable interface allows you to rearrange the palettes and create your own workspace. From the navigation window on the left side of the interface, you access your image folders from your hard drive. DxO Optics Pro Elite 6.6 separates the process into a four-step workflow—select, customize, process, and view—with onscreen help to guide you through each step.

First, you select images that are grouped into a project and appear in filmstrip fashion at the bottom of the interface. Corrections will be applied to these images.

Next, you proceed to the customize step where you can preview the corrections from the presets you’ve chosen. Selecting a single image from the filmstrip lets you view it in the large preview window above the filmstrip. By pressing the D key, you can visually compare this corrected version with the original. You can continue to manually adjust the image with a broad range of editing tools from basic white balance to DxO’s advanced precision multipoint color-correction tool. (This step is analogous to Lightroom’s Develop module.) As you make adjustments, you can create virtual copies.

DxO’s luminance and chrominance noise reduction are particularly good at maintaining detail without softening the image. I shot freely at ISOs higher than 6,400. The single-shot HDR feature does wonders for contrasty images, opening blocked shadows without creating noise, and recovering highlights while maintaining a realistic look. I found it very helpful with interior real estate shots; effectively recovering the bright, exterior landscape seen through windows that otherwise would have been blown out.

When you’re through making edits to your image, the next step is processing, where the corrections are applied. Then you format your files for output as TIFF, DNG, or JPEG, and assign a destination folder. Processing times can be slow—it’s a function of how many files and corrections are being applied. When processing is complete, you can view your files.

DxO Optics Pro Elite 6.6 does an exceptional job of maximizing image quality, from adjusting inherent defects in your equipment to accurately processing colors with rich saturation, smooth transitions, and lots of detail. It’s well suited for RAW processing and worth exploring. Download the 30-day free demo and see for yourself. There’s also a Standard edition available for $169. The Elite addition covers “high-end” cameras, so check the site to see which version you need based on the camera you use.

Company: DxO Labs
Price: $299
Web: www.dxo.com
Rating: 4.5
Hot: Automatically corrects images based on lens/camera data
Not: No printing or tethering capabilities

A big difference between the digital and traditional darkroom is the wider variety of paper surfaces available for the digital darkroom and the probability you’ll find a paper that best matches your vision. Epson just released three new inkjet canvas papers from their high-end Signature Worthy paper collection. They come in three different finishes: satin, matte, and gloss.

If you’re a wedding or fine arts photographer and selling prints is part of your income, the distinct canvas surface might be a perfect fit. The surface texture is like traditional painter’s canvas with its distinct tactile feel, and by convention, meant to be stretched, framed, and displayed without glass. All three contain elastic polymers to provide flexibility and to resist cracking when stretched. All three papers are also water resistant and made from an acid-free, lignin-free cotton-polyester blend. The white point is quite bright, especially on the Exhibition Canvas Gloss, and I was able to confirm with Epson that optical brightener agents (OBAs) are used on the papers. The issue is that OBAs deteriorate with time, resulting in a change in the appearance of the original print.

I printed using Epson’s UltraChrome HDR ink set. Dye inks aren’t recommended. Epson says that either matte or photo black ink can be used on canvas, but that matte black ink gives a higher Dmax. Epson posted ICC profiles for all three papers on their website. All three showed a surprisingly wide color gamut, contrast, and the ability to reproduce rich colors with accuracy. Gloss and Satin worked particularly well printing black-and-white images with good tonal gradation and deep blacks. (I don’t know how other manufacturers’ inks would work with these papers.) All three papers are available in roll widths of 13, 17, 24, 36, 44, and 60″ with limited availability of 17×22″ cut sheets.

Choosing the right paper is highly personal. These papers might change the way you see your work and serve as a welcomed addition to your paper arsenal.

Company: Epson America, Inc.

Price: Varies with stock and size

Web: www.proimaging.epson.com

Rating: 4.5

Matte: 4

Hot: Wide color gamut; Dmax

Not: Use of OBAs

The Epson Stylus Photo R3000 printer is for professional photog­raphers and fine artists in a low-volume production setting who demand exhibition-quality color and black-and-white prints.

The R3000 is essentially a smaller tabloid-size version of Epson’s highly regarded Stylus Pro 3880. Some of the benefits handed down are nine-cartridge UltraChrome K3 inks; an eight channel, ink-repellent print head to prevent nozzle clogging (it does); and screening technology.

For the first time in an Epson A3 printer, both photo and matte black ink cartridges are housed together. No more time-consuming, ink-wasting cartridge swapping. The switch is done at the new color control panel that guides you through this and other processes. Epson also added high-capacity 25.9 ml ink cartridges, as well as wireless and Ethernet connectivity. The R3000 prints sheets up to 13×19″ or 13×44″ on roll.

The solid-feeling, 35-lb R3000 has a relatively small footprint. Prints are full of detail due to the screening technology and precise placement of variable-size ink droplets down to 2 picoliters. The R3000 printed my reference target with precision, producing smooth color gradients, a wide rich color gamut, deep blacks with plenty of shadow and highlight detail, and accurate flesh tones. Installation includes excellent ICC paper profiles; however, you must calibrate and profile your monitor to benefit. An A3 print takes approximately 2 minutes 40 seconds and ink swapping from 1 minute 40 seconds to 3 minutes depending on which black ink you’re switching to.

In addition to the top-loading paper input tray, there’s a new front-loading paper path for single sheets of thick paper. It’s much more reliable than the past rear feeder but still lacks simplicity. It necessitates opening and closing the feeding tray, and over time, I wonder if it will hold up. A single path for all paper would be great. That said, this is a great printer.

Company: Epson America, Inc.

Price: $849.99

Web: www.epson.com

Rating: 4

Hot: Color gamut; print quality; control panel

Not: Hidden front USB port

The Epson Stylus Pro 4900 represents a major redesign of Epson’s 4000 series that can handle roll or cut-sheet paper up to 17″ wide. It uses proven technology from their high-end 7900 and 9900 printers, including UltraChrome HDR inks; precision screening technology; a 10-channel print head with an ink repellent coating, preventing nozzle clogging; and a built-in rotary paper cutter. The 4900 produces remarkable rich color and black-and-white prints.

The solidly built 4900 weighs 115 lbs and stretches the definition of desktop printing. It houses 11 ink cartridges, including both photo and matte black ink. It eliminates swapping black ink cartridges by automatically switching to the correct one based on your paper selection.

There are four paper feeds: roll, cassette, rear, and front. All work well with the following caveat. The front paper feed is for single sheets of thick stock. It requires your full attention passing paper through a path that’s poorly described and illustrated in the user manual. It’s challenging to consistently line up 8×10″ sheets of paper squarely on the paper path because the printer’s design lets A4 and letter-size paper hover above—not on—the indication marker on the paper cassette cover. This leads to occasional misfeeds. The rear paper feeder’s back paper support inadequately extends only a few inches, and thin paper stock that’s 13×19″ or greater flops down instead of being held upright.

I made prints including a standard reference target using Epson’s excellent ICC paper profiles. Ink droplets as small as 3.5 picoliters with a maximum resolution of 2880×1440 produced dynamic prints with rich accurate colors, smooth seamless gradients, and lots of shadow and highlight detail. The use of green and orange ink cartridges extends the color gamut accurately, delivering hard-to-reproduce yellows.

If your end product is prints, the 4900 will put your best foot forward.

Company: Epson America, Inc.

Price: $2,495

Web: www.epson.com

Rating: 4

Hot: Print quality; 2.5″ color LCD

Not: Minor problems with front and rear paper feed

Nik Software recently released Silver Efex Pro 2, updating their powerful black-and-white conversion software with impressive new features and special algorithms for finer tonal control and faster processing. They’ve added new presets with image thumbnail previews, and now there’s a well-designed History Browser to let you compare your current image with previous states and possibly pick up from an earlier point. Emulation of classic film types has been expanded with more controls for increased accuracy. The finishing section has been updated—you can now add borders and endlessly adjust them until you’re content. New stylized print tones have been added, and along with Vignette and Burn Edges controls, you can effectively direct the viewer’s eye to any part of your image.

But the main refinement is a higher level of tonal control and quality. Photoshop and Lightroom have very good black-and-white conversion tools but not like Silver Efex Pro. The new algorithms target specific areas both globally and locally increasing tonal separation, giving your image more depth, and all with a remarkable ease and precision that’s truly user-friendly. The amazing U Point technology that allows you to create precision masks has been expanded with new sliders that now let you amplify black-and-white contrast or add color back into your image with the creative Selective Color slider.

Silver Efex Pro plugs into Photoshop, Lightroom, or Apple Aperture. The interface looks essentially the same. The large centered preview window can be configured to let you compare before and after views. On the left are 38 thumbnail presets of your image, which are now organized by styles: Vintage, Classic, Modern, etc. These are excellent as a point of departure. You can also create and add your own presets or download new ones from Nik’s website, which also offers frequent webinars and teaching videos. Their Web support is exemplary.

On the right side of the image window are the goods—an expanded, all-inclusive toolset for manipulating your grayscale images. Formerly Brightness, Contrast, and Structure (detail) were uniform controls that globally adjusted the image. This has been expanded, with subsliders that refine specific areas. Brightness can now be applied separately to highlights, midtones, and shadows, adjusting a specific tonal range with precision. The new Dynamic Brightness slider allows adjusting the overall brightness without loosing detail and blowing out the highlights and shadows.

Contrast has also been broken into finer increments with sliders that let you amplify and accentuate highlights (Amplify Whites) and shadows (Amplify Blacks) separately without clipping while preserving the midtones. The new Soft Contrast slider looks for specific tones and increases the contrast separation dynamically. The Structure sliders are all about bringing out texture and detail in an image by looking for fine lines and increasing the contrast. Now Silver Efex Pro’s Structure sliders let you separately control highlights, midtones, and shadows. And the new Fine Structure slider goes down to an even finer level to create texture without discernible artifacts. More than before, Silver Efex Pro milks an image for more tonal separation and dimensionality.

My only criticism of version 2 is that there’s a visual lag time when moving many of the tonal sliders. There’s a pause as you wait for the image in the preview window to catch up to your adjustment. Silver Efex Pro 2 is a beautifully designed, comprehensive start-to-finish, professional black-and-white laboratory with all the tools you need for global and local tonal adjustment—download the trial version and see for yourself.

Company: Nik Software, Inc.
Price: $199.95 (Upgrade: $99.95)
Web: www.niksoftware.com
Rating: 4.5
Hot: Increased level of tonal control; easy to use
Not: Sliders could work smoother

On the heels of the E-P1, Olympus released its latest Micro Four-Thirds camera, the Olympus PEN E-P2. Like the E-P1, the E-P2 is an homage to their 1959 35mm film rangefinder Pen camera series. The E-P2 uses the same 12.3-megapixel Live MOS sensor and 3″, 230,000-dot LCD as the E-P1. And, like the E-P1, it has no prism or mirror assembly, so light travels directly to the sensor. The result is a relatively light, compact camera that supports interchangeable lenses.

There are several new features, including two new art filters, anti-reflection coating on the LCD, and the ability to automatically lock focus and track your subject in both still and video. The key new improvement over the E-P1 is the addition of the accessory port under the hot shoe. The port supports a newly designed Electronic Viewfinder (EVF) that helps to make the E-P2 a pleasure to use. The high-res EVF is bright, sharp, covers 100% field of view, displays all the pertinent data, and is more practical for composing and viewing in bright outdoor light than the E-P1’s low-resolution LCD. The accessory port also supports an optional external microphone.

The metal body feels solid and is light enough to carry around all day. Visually, the relatively slim E-P2 looks similar to the E-P1 but now sports a black body with a raised leather grip that helps to give the camera a nice balance. Dust removal and image stabilization are built into the camera and work well. The controls are well placed and I especially like the accessible design of the mode dial at the top left and the thumb wheel on the top right for selecting settings of menu items. A super control panel allows quick access to frequently used features. The EVF’s design lets it articulate to a 90º angle for waist-level shooting, and it has a large diopter ring that’s much more practical than the traditional minuscule adjustment wheel. My only criticism of the new EVF is that it’s too bright with no option to adjust the color level. Colors appear slightly washed out and there’s a discrepancy when compared to viewing your subject with the naked eye.

The E-P2 shoots continuously at 3 frames per second (fps) RAW and up to 9 frames before the buffer is full. Autofocus in daylight seems snappier on the E-P2 but remains slow in dim light and with low-contrast subjects, often necessitating switching to manual focus and using the 7x magnification feature. The E-P2 has an ISO range of 100–6400 with noise becoming a factor at ISO 800.

The autofocus system now can track a subject across the viewing area, whether you move or the subject moves. The tracking rectangle jerks occasionally with rapid subject movement but generally works well.

The E-P2 captures in RAW, JPEG, standard video, and 720p high-definition (HD) video. The manual video mode lets you control exposure, enabling you to adjust both the shutter and aperture. The video mode also lets you incorporate the zoom lens and any of the eight art filters. The image quality of both the RAW stills and HD video is good.

The two new art filters are Diorama (which makes your subjects look like miniature models) and Cross Process (imitating effects of various traditional films). The art filters can be effective if used judiciously, but overuse runs the risk of becoming gimmicky.

The camera’s exposure system is accurate and shooting in RAW resulted in accurate color rendition and a good dynamic range with plenty of shadow and highlight detail. The bottom line is that the E-P2 is solid, a pleasure to use, and worth looking into.—Steve Baczewski

Company: Olympus America, Inc.
Price: $1,099.99 (w/14–42mm lens and viewfinder)
Web: www.olympusamerica.com
Rating: 4
Hot: Image quality; new EVF
Not: No custom mode setting; no built-in flash

Canon’s G-series PowerShot cameras consist of high-end point-and-shoots. They’re often used by professional photographers as a second camera because they produce quality images, are relatively compact, and capture both RAW and JPEG formats. The G11 succeeds Canon’s popular G10. It has a new Vari-angle 2.8″ LCD and a new CCD sensor. The G11 is slightly bigger but otherwise looks remarkably similar to the G10. It shares the same DIGIC 4 Image Processor and 5x optical zoom lens, with an effective range equivalent to 28–140mm, supported by Canon’s Optical Image Stabilizer.

The main change is that Canon took this opportunity to break with a mindless marketing trend of adding more megapixels with each successive camera. The G11 is a 10-megapixel camera compared to the G10’s 14-megapixels. The reason for the resolution downgrade is simple: cleaner image quality at higher ISOs and less noise in low light. Canon claims to have gained as much as two stops over the G10. I compared the two cameras and paid special attention to low-light situations and noticed on my display at a 1:1 enlargement, a definite one-stop improvement. The standard ISO range has been extended to 3200 and a new automatic Low Light mode has been added. This mode adjusts the ISO up to 12,800 relative to the available light, but at a reduced resolution of 2.5 MBs. It’s insurance that you’ll get an image.

For the best quality, if you shoot RAW and don’t go over ISO 400 you can make excellent 17×22″ prints. Canon decided not to add HD video capability but stuck with the standard 640×480 resolution. The video quality is quite good but, for some, this omission might be a deal-breaker.
The black metal body is solid, large enough to get a good grip, and small enough to fit in a large coat pocket with the lens retracted. A hot shoe is located on top and a built-in flash at the top-left corner. The back-right side has a four-way navigational control dial surrounded by buttons. While shooting, your thumb naturally falls across the controller, so photographers with large hands might unintentionally push a button. You view and compose your shots using either the optical viewfinder or LCD. The optical viewfinder adjusts as you zoom but it’s undersized and the coverage is too small to be practical for viewing or composing. Happily you can view and compose on the LCD in bright light, and the articulated LCD makes it easy to compose shots at acute angles. It definitely trumps a fixed LCD. The lens zooms smoothly for the most part, but I found it difficult to stop precisely at the desired focal length.

Kudos to Canon for a straightforward design that improves performance. On top of the G11 are three large dedicated analog control dials that use precision click stops for adjusting shooting mode, exposure compensation, and ISO. I prefer the dials to an LCD interface and hope Canon will include dials for apertures and shutter speeds in the future. Scrolling the menus is simplified by a guide that appears at the bottom of the LCD giving clear explanations for each feature. Using dedicated buttons, such as metering (spot, evaluative, and center weighted), flash, and macro photography for various functions also enhances performance. A function button displays a control panel on the LCD for quick access to frequently used features like white balance, bracketing, and image quality. The G11 is a solid, compact camera that delivers quality images and has sophisticated features. It’s well worth your consideration.—Steve Baczewski

Company: Canon U.S.A., Inc.
Price: $499.99
Web: www.usa.canon.com
Rating: 4
Hot: Solid build; quality images; unique features
Not: No HD video; optical viewfinder