In the standalone, the available adjustments are Basic, Crop and Rotate, Color, Tone Curve, Vignette, Overlays, Focus, Grain, IR and Bokeh.
With a preset chosen, you are ready to move on to the adjustments. Adjustments are made using panels on the right. Presets are previewed on your selected image. Rolling your mouse over a thumbnail displays the preset effect on the main image in the workspace. Thumbnails in the presets panel show your image with the preset applied. There are 15 categories of color presets from which to choose, and 12 categories of black-and-white presets. If you make adjustments and then choose a preset, the adjustments you made are replaced by the adjustments contained in the preset. It is essential to choose a preset once you have opened your image file. Workflow in Exposure 7 remains the same as in previous versions. The other adjustment panels are unchanged, although new textures are included in the Overlays panel.
The standalone version includes a rotate tool and crop options with common crop ratios as well as unconstrained crops. What’s missing is a histogram, or at the least some way to see if your adjustment is clipping the highlights or shadows of your image. The Basic panel, which is included in both the standalone and plug-in editions, provides all of the sliders needed to adjust image tonality for all file formats supported by Exposure. Image adjustments are made using panels on the right side of the interface. Support for older cameras is promised for the future.
A list of supported cameras is available on Alien Skin’s website. Since RAW support is new in version 7, the number of supported cameras is fairly limited at the moment, with an emphasis on newer models for both enthusiasts and professionals. RAW files as well as TIFFs and JPEGs are all visible in the browser. Version 6 marked a major speed increase in Exposure, and it carries over into all aspects of version 7. There is no need to import images into the program, and image thumbnails load very quickly. The new file browser panel is found in the left pane below the Presets panel in the standalone version. Sadly, you’re still not able to automatically close one tool panel when you open another to save mouse clicks on disclosure arrows or when dragging vertical edge sliders. The interface of the standalone as well as the plug-in editions have the same attractive look and functionality that Alien Skin introduced in version 5. I worked primarily with the standalone edition of version 7 to make the most of the new features. It’s enough to make one cry, “Why can’t we all just get along?”
If you prefer to use those Adobe products for file browsing and RAW file processing, be warned: while Exposure 7 performs non-destructive processing by storing adjustments in sidecar xmp files, it does not read xmp changes created in Adobe software, nor can Adobe software read the xmp file changes made by Exposure 7. New film stocks, texture overlays and a bokeh tool are included in both the standalone version and the Photoshop and Lightroom plug-ins. Version 7 moves Exposure closer to becoming a complete image editor by adding non-destructive RAW file processing for the latest cameras along with file browsing and a crop and rotate panel to the standalone edition of Exposure. With the level of new functionality in version 7 it would appear that it has been a busy six months indeed.įrom its inception, Alien Skin’s Exposure has excelled in its ability to let photographers create and save a custom look for their images from its ever-expanding presets of black-and-white, color, cross-processing and Lo-Fi film emulations, as well as the ability to customize these presets with tonal adjustments, vignettes, texture overlays and control over film grain.ĭaguerreotype (used in this portrait) is one of many historical film emulations found in the program, which also features the latest color film emulsions. It’s only been six months since the release of Exposure 6, but the folks at Alien Skin Software have already given us Exposure 7.