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Alien Skin Releases Exposure 6
10 June 2014
Alien Skin Software has released Exposure 6, its photo effects software that emulates film emulsions and adds extensive creative effects like paper textures, aging, light leaks, borders and more. The new version stuffs a few more tricks up its sleeve, including a faster imaging engine, texture control and bokeh simulation based on sample lenses.
We've been kicking the tires on the new release for a few days and have been impressed with the new features. And just impressed. They're a lot of fun, too.
Exposure 5 left the orbit of mere film emulation on a quest for yet more creative effects -- and Exposure 6 continues the journey with a more powerful engine and bigger payload.
New Image Engine. Preset display no longer has to be small thumbnails.
First, the new imaging engine is fast. Where other programs, for example, show a set of small preset thumbnails whose effects are applied to your main image, we started enlarging the presets preview and minimizing the main image.
Bokeh. More fun in post.
As we scroll through the presets, they are applied to these large displays of the image, in addition to the main image, as you can see in the screen shot below.
Second, we really enjoyed playing with the new Bokeh tool that lets you select a lens and aperture. There are actually three Boken preset collections to pick among: Creative Aperture, Motion and Traditional Lenses.
Creative Aperture provides a set of shapes while Motion lets you choose among various motion effects.
And those are just the presets. There are sliders and a couple of other controls to refine the effect, too, as the tool panel at the right shows.
Third ... well, you'll have to wait for our review for that. Let's just say it's an impressive upgrade that puts even more useful creative tools in your toolbox.
As always, Alien Skin provides entertaining video tutorials to help appreciate what you can do with Exposure 6.
Exposure 6 can be downloaded from the Alien Skin Web site for $149. The upgrade price for owners of any previous version is $69 with free upgrades available for purchases in March or later.
For more information see the news release below and look for our upcoming review.
Alien Skin Software Announces Availability of Exposure 6
Now includes Bokeh functionality -- Updated image processing engine for instant previews -- Enhanced user interface for quick workflow -- Unlimited creative texture control
RALEIGH, N.C. -- Alien Skin Software today announced the immediate availability of Exposure 6, the latest version of its flagship photography effects software. Exposure 6 enables digital photographers to quickly achieve accurate analog film emulation and creative effects in a simple interface. Exposure 6 can be used as a plug-in with popular host software or as a standalone program for even greater flexibility.
Exposure 6 brings all the creative tools of a traditional photographic darkroom to the world of digital, such as the look of discontinued films, printing techniques and borders and textures. Popular classic films like Kodachrome, Polaroid and TRI-X have been carefully analyzed in order to faithfully simulate their characteristic tonal ranges and grain structures. Over 450 preset effects can be applied with a single mouse click, helping photographers achieve their desired look quickly. Exposure 6 integrates both color and black-and-white processing so there is no need to switch between tools.
Continuing the theme of integration, all the powerful functionality of Alien Skin's creative focus and lens simulation program, Bokeh, has now been rolled into Exposure, thus eliminating the need to jump between programs. As such, Exposure now provides simple tools for photographers to draw attention to their subject by manipulating focus, vignette and depth of field. From fast lens simulation through to tilt/shift and motion blur looks, Exposure 6 offers an endless array of creative options.
"With Exposure 6, not only have we worked to enhance the rich feature set available to photographers, but also to streamline the software to help them focus on creating extraordinary images faster than ever," said Alien Skin CEO, Finley Lee. "It's about understanding a user's workflow and helping photographers realize their artistic vision as quickly and easily as possible".
Along with the inclusion of Bokeh, Exposure's user interface has been refined and enhanced in order to provide better esthetics and functionality without compromising user-friendliness. A new basic control panel contains sliders for global adjustments to areas such as exposure, contrast, clarity and vibrance for faster editing. The image processing engine has also been rewritten and now offers full-sized instant previews. This makes it easy to visualize subtle differences between presets and facilitates rapid experimentation to find the right look.
Based on user feedback, Exposure 6 offers limitless variety in the ability to add border and texture overlays. Out of the box, Exposure 6 includes many new lighting effects such as realistic sun flare and authentic vintage borders developed by world-renowned photographer Parker J Pfister. Users are also now able to import their own custom borders and textures using the built-in importing tool. Likewise, sharing and syncing presets, textures and borders across multiple computers is also now easy to do in Exposure 6.
Exposure 6 integrates with the popular tools many photographers use in their professional workflow: Adobe Photoshop , Lightroom and Apple Aperture . Exposure 6 can also be launched as a standalone application.
To help users get started and for advanced techniques, the Alien Skin Web site has a library of tutorial videos and example images.
Pricing and Availability
Exposure 6 will be available for immediate download from June 10th through http://www.alienskin.com for $149 USD. Owners of any version of Exposure may upgrade for $69 USD. Free upgrades will be automatically sent to everyone who purchased Exposure 5 directly from Alien Skin Software in March 2014 or later.
Host Requirements
Exposure 6 may be used as a standalone program or a plug-in. When it is used as a plug-in it requires one of the following host applications:
- Adobe Photoshop CS6 or newer
- Adobe Lightroom 5 or newer
- Apple Aperture 3 or later
System Requirements
- Apple Mac users need OS X Mountain Lion (10.8) or later
- Microsoft Windows users need Windows 7 or later
- An Intel Core 2 processor or compatible
- A monitor with 1280x768 resolution or greater