NX 2 discussion & (hopefully) tips

[Don Hoey]

I have not tried that brush yet Chris. After seeing your results I must give it a go. Looks to be a handy tool.

So for retrieving detail in the end wall did you use Highlight protection in Quick Fix or go another route.

Don

Originally Posted by Don Hoey

I have not tried that brush yet Chris. After seeing your results I must give it a go. Looks to be a handy tool.

So for retrieving detail in the end wall did you use Highlight protection in Quick Fix or go another route.

Don

In this case I started with brush as pic would be useless cables could be got rid of. Thereafter all quick-fix, but exp com -.67 then shadow prot 20% and a tweak of the curve; I usually start by getting the sky right and near zero highlight using double threshold, then look at rest of image - if it had been a more problematic one, I would have gone to LCH rather than tweak curve in quickfix.

New(er S/H) box came this morning so expect more who knows what further improvements. Was dreading OS10.5, but it is the first OS since 10.2 where the interface has actually improved, whereas 10.4 was a trough of despond. Speed will allow me to set NX2 so the adjustments stay active when one backtracks.

[Don Hoey]

Originally Posted by Chris

New(er S/H) box came this morning so expect more who knows what further improvements. Was dreading OS10.5, but it is the first OS since 10.2 where the interface has actually improved, whereas 10.4 was a trough of despond. Speed will allow me to set NX2 so the adjustments stay active when one backtracks.

Have fun with your new toy Chris.

My machine is not up to Foxy's powerhouse , so I have not set active adjustments on a backtrack.

Don

2 features I hadn't noticed prior to faster box:

1: starting off with a small 'trial selection' using +brush (a bit like the flower in Nikon tutorials), you can then set the adjustment (or a series of linked adjustments) on the basis of the trial. You can then carry on brushing ad lib and/or check the extent of the mask using mask or overlay. Trying to add or subtract after choosing an adjustment was the surest way of crashing the programme before! You can also dab/undo/redo and use pressure settings. Never realised how accurately a PP 'brush' could replicate real one. Nice when choosing exactly how much/little of an image actually needs sharpening. (Don't tell me, all Photoshop users learnt this in the cradle).

2: used to think the temorary reset of individual panes within LCH was something that just didn't work - it does, toggles between before and after

Originally Posted by Don Hoey

If you are short of desktop space or prefer an uncluttered layout this could be a solution.

Presentation View is initially activated from the top menu bar. View - Presentation. To alternate the view with the standard screen hit P on the keyboard. P again will return to presentation view.

Presentation View gives a larger screen view than Full Screen view. Its background colour is black rather than grey though. To move the image around the screen drag the Birds Eye view around inside its box.

Initially in the Presentation View, all tools are hidden. They will appear when the curser hovers over their normal position. Tools can be undocked and moved around the screen to suit and will then remain visible. Undocked tools loose visibility when the mouse curser moves off them.

The F is very useful and a nice way of working as I do usually have a pretty messy desktop. It makes no difference to the the tool & support windows, they stay put quietly. In P, once tool boxes are invoked, they stay, and although the tools can be shown/hidden with tab key, once touched, the programmers have forced them to the front & only re-start will get them back to normal. In the meantime both menus and dock get part hidden behind them; useless (Bit of OS difference? Must get some feedback in to them as it is definitely incorrect for OS 10)

With both F & P the image can be moved with both scroll wheel (shift for L-R) or direction arrows. F also reverts with escape key and the near microscopic arrows at bottom useful for toggling between 2 or more pics for comparison. Getting rid of horrid scroll & header bars also actually increases size of the actual pic. Nice.

Thanks for drawing my attention to it Don.

[Don Hoey]

Originally Posted by Chris

The F is very useful and a nice way of working as I do usually have a pretty messy desktop. It makes no difference to the the tool & support windows, they stay put quietly. In P, once tool boxes are invoked, they stay (Bit of OS difference?).

Probably right about the OS Chris.
When I get a mo I will post a screen grab of the Windows view of F

Don

Originally Posted by Don Hoey

Probably right about the OS Chris.
When I get a mo I will post a screen grab of the Windows view of F

Don

I have amended previous post as the occlusion of dock also extends to covering menus after invoking tools and pallete in P. Interested to see if that is the case with PC.

[Canis Vulpes]

Originally Posted by Chris

I have amended previous post as the occlusion of dock also extends to covering menus after invoking tools and pallete in P. Interested to see if that is the case with PC.

Is this the case if the dock has 'automatically hide and show the dock' selected?

Picture 1 = F
Picture 2 = P

OS 10.5.4

I do have the dock 'automatically show & hide' checked. But for clarity here is a dump of the worse effect on menus. It is in F mode for clarity, but after showing tool bar etc while in P mode. (no menu bar in P whatever you do, in fact not really a working environment at all IMO, just to see pic with black background)

[Canis Vulpes]

I see, it not THE dock but a dock!

If the tool tile is left in its default position instead of the default position for NX(1) there is no issue, see screen grab.