In a previous posting I have cited how much Adobe and Photoshop dominate the 2D photo editing world. Now the same dominance does not extend to animations (despite Flash), 3D graphics, and video editing although Adobe is a major player in all three arenas especially with new 3D offerings in Photoshop Extended. However there is another category back in the 2D photo editing world that is vibrant and does not have Adobe as a major player – Adobe Plugins.
Plugins have allowed users to fill in the gaps on their Photoshop programs when masking selections or brushes were weak. Now plugins fill in for faithful image enlargement, noise reduction, finetuned sharpening, and artistic finishing among other areas. And Adobe plugins are an open standard so that other programs like Corel Painter, PaintShop Pro, and PhotoPaint, Ulead Photo Impact and Xara Xtreme can use. In fact one of the criteria I use to decide whether to review a photo editor is its support of Adobe plugins.
But the most important point here is that there is a very vibrant and prolific market for plugins. Check out the links here or the plugins here for some very fine plugins from the like s of Flaming Pear or Nik Softwarer among others. There is a lot of freeware as well as reasonably priced commercial pplugins that can add frames or new styling to your images. Well worth the while.
(c)JBSurveyer 2007 – If you liked this, let others know:
