A New HDR Contender? Nik Software’s HDR Efex Pro

This HDR image comes from Nik Software's HDR Sneak Peak. Image rights are retained by the original copyright holder.

UPDATE: The Nik Software FOCUS Newsletter for October says the release date for HDR Efex Pro will be October 11.

UPDATE: Details about Nik Software’s HDR Efex Pro have been released, including a slightly more targeted release date (October 2010) and a price point ($159). The site mentions that if you purchased the Nik Complete Collection in July 2010 or later, you get the HDR product for free. The site does not mention that if you purchased the complete collection before July 2010, you can get HDR Efex Pro for $99 if you pre-order (I confirmed this when I made my purchase of the software). Additionally, they created an announcement video which is embedded at the end of this post.

UPDATE: Rick Sammon was recently on an episode of Nik Radio talking about Nik’s HDR Efex Pro. I’ve put in a few notes from his appearance.

Today I attended a Nik Software webinar on their upcoming HDR product. There is currently no official news as to what the HDR product is going to be called, but the title bar did say HDR Efex Pro (which would make sense as it would fit in well with their other products like Color Efex Pro and Silver Efex Pro) [UPDATE: Rick Sammon referred to the product as HDR Efex Pro in his interview]. The instructor was using the Lightroom version of the plugin, but mentioned that it would be available for Photoshop and Aperture as well (he also mentioned that the plugins would be in 64-bit.) There was a question about a “stand alone” version like Photomatix offers, but the instructor seemed to think that was not in the works. I have not used Lightroom to any large degree, but it looked like the process for opening the plugin is very similar to the process I use for creating a HDR with Photomatix from within Aperture (namely, just select the group of images you want to use and then select the plugin). The instructor was unable to answer a question about how the interface for selecting images would work in Photoshop, but speculated it would probably be under the “automate” menu (much like Adobe’s HDR Pro is). You can also use the plugin on a single RAW file (the examples of this turned out quite well).

The HDR Efex interface looks like a “best of” from Silver Efex Pro and Viveza 2. There are the presets from Silver Efex on the left side and then a control point / slider interface on the right that looks very much like Viveza 2. Of particular note are two sliders: (1) structure, which is something that is creeping into all NIk products and that I frequently used in Silver Efex Pro (it’s also available in Viveza 2); (2) warmth, which I specifically asked about and the instructor demonstrated (it provides an effect very similar to the “Brilliance and Warmth” filter found in Color Efex Pro; the instructor did not know off hand if the algorithms are the same, but he demonstrated the effect and it looked very similar).  HDR Efex also includes some advanced vignetting controls (including some vignetting presets) and Nik’s familiar “Control Points” interface, that provides the ability to make very targeted adjustments without the use of masking (Anyone who’s used any of Nik’s products, especially Viveza 2, knows how powerful these are).

This is the HDR Efex interface that was used during the webinar. As with any piece of software that hasn't been released yet, there is still a chance this interface could change.

The initial preset that was applied to the first image was very much a “realistic” HDR. In fact, the image looked just like a well exposed, well lit, standard image. There were a number of presets that the instructor previewed, some of them looking better than others The “subtle HDR” preset looked very similar to the Trey Ratcliff inspired style of HDR that I frequently used. [UPDATE: Rick mentioned how both realistic and surrealistic HDR images are easy to create with HDR Efex Pro] Additionally, there was a black and white preset (I’m not sure if it would be better to create the HDR image in color and then take the image into Silver Efex Pro for black and white conversion, but I have a feeling that I would use that workflow) and then a “vintage” preset that created a really interesting effect that combined both HDR and a faded, desaturated look. The instructor mentioned that the plugin would have “anti-ghosting” functionality (pretty much a “must have” feature now), but did not give any demonstrations of it. [UPDATE: Rick mentioned that the anti-ghosting in HDR Efex Pro is very strong. He mentioned that you can take out the ghosting "quickly" and "easily". Additionally, he said the alignment features of HDR Efex Pro were good.]

The biggest question of the webinar was, as expected: What is the release date? Apparently the company line on this is “late summer” (I’ve heard it from 3 Nik represenatives). The version of the software being used by the instructor was listed as “Alpha 2”, and there were a few performance hiccups present, so it seems likely that there is a bit of work left before it’s released to the public. Also, there was no information available on the pricing of the software.

Ultimately, the webinar left me really excited to try out the software. The early rumors I heard were that the software was going to be really geared to “realistic” HDR images instead of “surrealistic” ones, however, the instructor demonstrated that the software could be used to create images of both styles. Out of the HDR programs I’ve used, Photomatix is still my clear favorite, however, HDR Efex Pro looks like it could be a strong contender. For me, it will probably all come down to how it handles lights at dusk…

An example HDR image, processed with Photomatix, to show how nicely it handles lights.

UPDATE: Nik’s HDR Efex Pro announcement video, featuring Trey Ratcliff