Boca do Inferno

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This time photo from the Boca do Inferno (location near Cascais Town, near Lisbon). Post-processed with Photomatix Pro 4.2 beta. I really like colour of the water in this shot.

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Photomatix Pro 4.2 beta goes public

Today at HDRsoft we released first public beta of Photomatix Pro 4.2.

The new version includes many changes and improvements over 4.1 and here are just a few of them with a short description from me:

• Many changes related to preset thumbnails
• Addition of several new built-in preset thumbnails (eg. 3 more black & white presets, a few realistic and artistic ones)
• Ability to toggle between normal (as in 4.1 and earlier versions) and large thumbnails size. This makes it much easier to decide between the presets
• Ability to display preset thumbnails in two columns so more thumbnails appear on one page
• Ability to import presets with just one click. In the "My Presets" tab just click "Import Presets..." select files and you're done :) No more need to manually copy the presets into the Presets directory. So if you had problems importing my presets for instance you can now do it easily.
• Ability to group presets into categories, eg. I now have categories like Winter, Warm, etc. It makes selecting appropriate preset a lot easier.
• Preset thumbnails should load a bit faster now.
• Addition of Finishing Touch window. This window, which by default shows when the tone-mapping/fusion finishes, allows you to make basic edition of your photo including contrast curve adjustments, color saturation adjustments, sharpening. Finishing Touch can be also used from Batch Bracketed. Just open Batch and then "Naming & Output Options".
• Redesigned GUI in case of Windows version. Now the windows have custom title bars which in my opinion look a lot better than default OS ones used in previous release
• Differences between preview and final image has been minimized.
• Instead of size ratio like 1/4, 1/8, 1/16 etc. now there are zoom buttons.
• Improved multi-monitor support
• New processing method Fusion/Realistic (available only in the Batch Bracketed photos for now). It should work especially well for real-estate photographers.
• All EXIF data should be now properly transferred from the source images.

Hope you like it :)

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River Bend

This photo was taken in Royal Baths Park in Warsaw, my favourite place in this city. Hope you like it and expect some very interesting stuff on this blog in the next few days :)

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My Photomatix Pro presets

Hi guys!

Note: you will find even more presets here.

No new photo today as today I decided to release some of my favourite Photomatix Pro presets for you to use.

Presets are important part of photo editing workflow and Photomatix Pro is no different here. In case of spending half an hour moving the sliders I just choose preset adjust one or two sliders (most often saturation and temperature) and I can click "Processs button".

1. Click download to start downloading presets.
2. Then unzip them.
3. Copy folder contents to C:\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\HDRsoft\PhotomatixPro\Presets where UserName is your user name.

Below there is a list of all presets from this archive with a short description for what I use each of them. I decided to add a thumbnail showing the difference between the presets.
Also be sure to check out my HDR tutorial.

Preset Thumbnails	Preset Name	Preset Description
	BlackWhite	This preset I use when I want to create Black & White HDR images.
	Castle	I use this preset when shooting architecture shots.
	Cemetery	I use this preset when creating some dramatic mood in the architectural shots. It also works quite well for me when shooting cemetaries.
	City	I use this preset when shooting in the city and it's quite shadowy.
	Fountain	I use this preset when shooting all kinds of fountains and sculptures.
	GoldenHour1	I use this preset when shooting HDR architectural shots during the golden hour. It makes images even more warm and golden.
	GoldenHour2	I use this preset when shooting HDR architectural shots during the golden hour. It makes images even more warm and golden. Note that it's a bit softer than GoldenHour1 preset.
	Lake1	I use this preset when shooting sunsets over lakes or seas.
	Lake2	I use this preset when shooting sunsets over lakes or seas.

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Looking back

I'm not very happy with my old HDR photos (and I'm also not happy with my old non-HDR shots :) ) but sometimes I like to look at them to check if I'm making any progress and yes I think I've made great progress in the last two years (although some people may disagree :) ). There are, however, a few shots which I like even after such a long time.

This one was one of my first attempts in using Photomatix Pro. I really like the mood in it. This photo is special for me for one more reason. It was the first photo I took with Canon 10-22 lens which since then became one of my favourite glasses.

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Having fun in Barcelona

This time photo taken in Barcelona in 2010. People are having fun in front of the Magic Fountain.

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Just ocean

Another one from Cabo da Roca, Portugal. Processed with Photomatix Pro 4.1.

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