Plugins
RadLab has a number of interesting effects you won’t find anywhere else and, as with Color Efex, users can create recipes by combining effects.
Browsing Plugins
Filter Forge provides graphic artists, 3D modelers, Web designers, and photographers with the ability to create a wide variety of photo effects, as well as abstract and realistic textures that you can use for pretty much whatever your creativity can come up with.
Smooth Skins from Digital Heavens offers a lot of options, with a lot of support. It teaches all levels of Photoshop users a better way to clean up even dramatic skin imperfections but also gives the pros the natural results they want.
NoiseControl 1 is a plug-in for Photoshop and compatible programs (both Mac and Windows) that’s remarkably effective at reducing image noise while keeping edge details and natural grain. It can also sharpen a noisy image without increasing noise, and even add simulated film grain to an image to make it appear more natural.
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.
PhotoCopy is an interesting, one-trick wonder plug-in that is easy to use. Essentially, it adjusts an image’s brightness, color, tone, detail, grain, and texture to match either a built-in preset or another loaded image.
Topaz Labs recently released Lens Effects, a plug-in that offers the ability to add a wide variety of lens-type effects to your photos.
