VeprIT Photo Sense - User Guide
This is the Photo Sense for Mac OS user guide. If you are interested in the iOS (iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch) version, see the Photo Sense for iOS user guide.
This User Guide is based on the full Photo Sense version. It is mostly relevant also for Photo Sense Lite, except for parts on working with multiple photographs simultaneously and the manual adjustments. See Photo Sense Lite limitations for more information.
User interface overview
The following figure presents the main VeprIT Photo Sense window and its parts (click to see larger size):
Adding photos
To add photographs to Photo Sense for processing, do one of the following:
- Drag items from another application that supports drag & drop functionality.
- Click the Add Images toolbar button
(
). - Use the File → Add Images... menu item.
- Press "Cmd"+"O" on the keyboard.
In cases other than using drag & drop, the standard file open panel will be displayed. Choose the image files and/or directories and click the Open button.
Note that you can drag or select both individual image files and directories with image files. When a directory is added, Photo Sense scans all its contents (including subdirectories) and adds all the image files.
Also note that you can drag items not only from Finder, but also some other applications. For example, you can drag & drop both individual images and complete events from iPhoto.
As soon as some photographs have been added, Photo Sense starts processing them with the default processing options. In fact, if a large number of images have been added, Photo Sense starts processing the first ones in parallel with importing the other ones.
Exploring results
Once (some of) the photographs have been processed, it is time to explore the results Photo Sense managed to achieve automatically. At this step, the user decides which photos became better and which did not. This is a very individual process, because what one person sees a better photo might not be such for another person.
Photo Sense provides two convenient ways to compare the result of its work to the original image:
- The image browser normally shows processed images (if they are already available). When the mouse hovers over an image, it changes to the original.
- The preview shows the original and processed photographs side by side.
The first option is good for a fast shallow comparison, because the image thumbnails shown in the browser are usually relatively small and lack details. Also note that mouse hovering only works if the corresponding user preference is not disabled (by default it is not).
The second option provides a convenient way to perform in-depth comparison of an image before and after processing. It allows to explore the whole photograph at up to 100% zoom.
To see the preview, select an image in the browser with a mouse or using the arrow keys. If preview is enabled, it will open automatically. If not, enable preview using one of the following methods:
- Double-click an image in the browser.
- Click the Preview toolbar button
(
). - Choose the View → Preview menu item.
- Press the Return key on the keyboard (after choosing an image in the browser).
Preview shows the original photo on the left and the processed one on the right. It shows a complete photograph by default (the zoom is at the minimum). You can zoom in until the maximum, which shows the actual image size (every image pixel is represented by one pixel on the monitor). To configure the zoom level of an image in the preview:
- Use the preview zoom slider (under the processed image).
- Click the zoom buttons around the preview zoom slider.
- Use the Zoom tool discussed below.
- Choose the menu items View → Zoom In Preview, View → Zoom Out Preview, View → Fit Image In Preview, and View → Actual Pixels In Preview.
- Press the keyboard shortcuts corresponding to these menu items: "Cmd"+"=", "Cmd"+"-", "Cmd"+"0", and "Cmd"+"1".
- Use the Trackpad zooming gestures (on Mac OS 10.6 and later).
- Double-click an image point to show it at the actual size. If the image is already shown at the actual size, a double-click will fit the image in preview.
Preview supports three tools:
Move, Zoom, and
Crop & Straighten. To choose the active tool, use the buttons
(
)
to the left of the preview zoom slider (under the processed image). You can also choose the active
tool using the items in the Edit → Preview Tool menu, or the
corresponding keyboard shortcuts.
When the Move tool is active
(
), click and drag the image (either original or
processed) to move it around. Note that it only moves the images if they do not fit in the preview.
The Synchronize image positions in previews button located below and between
the previews
(
when the synchronization is on and
when the synchronization is off) defines if the position of the other image should be automatically
synchronized with the position of the dragged image.
When the Zoom tool is active, click on the photo (either original or processed) to zoom and center the clicked point, if possible. Normally, it zooms in. Hold the Option key on the keyboard while clicking to zoom out.
The Crop & Straighten tool is described in Cropping and straightening.
For convenience, there is a shortcut allowing to temporarily change from the Zoom or Crop & Straighten to the Move tool. While the other tool is active, press and hold the Space bar on the keyboard. While it is pressed, the Move tool is active. The previous tool activates again when the Space bar is released.
The zoomed photo in the Preview can also be moved, even when the Move tool is inactive, by scrolling in any direction with a mouse or Trackpad (with two fingers).
Customizing processing options
To customize the processing options applied to particular photographs, select these photographs and open the Processing Options panel in one of the following ways:
- Click the Processing Options toolbar button
(
). - Choose the Window → Processing Options menu item.
- Press "Cmd"+"Shift"+"O" on the keyboard.
If you change the image browser selection while the Processing Options panel is displayed, it will update accordingly.
Choose the operations to perform in the Processing Options panel and click the Apply button. Note that these options will be applied to all the photographs selected in the image browser, not only to the one displayed in preview. See processing options for a description of all the available processing options. See the Quick Tips (Processing Options Recipes) for advise on how to choose processing options in several common cases.
Click the Reset button to reset the Processing Options panel. The processing options currently applied to the selected images will become selected.
If some settings differ in the selected images, or manual adjustments are applied to
some of the selected images, these operations are shown with the "mixed" state (a minus
sign in the selection box,
)
in the Processing Options panel. Click the selection box to change the "mixed" state to the
"on" state (a check mark will be displayed in the box,
).
If you now click the Apply button, this automatic operation will
be performed on all the selected images (discarding manual adjustments, if they are present).
Click the check box again to change to the "off" state (the box will be empty,
).
If you now click the Apply button, this operation will not be
performed on all the selected images (manual adjustments, if present, will be discarded).
Click the check box again to return to the "mixed" state. If you now click the
Apply button, this operation will remain unchanged in all the
selected images. Clicking the check box again starts another iteration of the same cycle.
Photo Sense allows to copy & paste (synchronize) processing options, as well as other image settings, between photographs. See Image Settings Synchronization for more details.
If you want to change the default operations applied to all images added to Photo Sense, this can be done in user preferences.
Applying manual adjustments
To adjust image settings manually, select a single photograph. Click the
Adjust image manually button (
) underneath the preview, choose the
Window → Manual Adjustment menu, or press
"Cmd"+"Shift"+"M". The Manual Adjustment window shown below will open.
Adjust the image to your liking, and close the window, or go to another photograph.
The Manual Adjustment window contains four groups of controls for color, exposure, contrast, and saturation adjustment. Several controls are discussed in more detail below. Every group has an Auto button, which lets Photo Sense adjust the corresponding aspect automatically. In addition, the image histogram is depicted, which can be set to show any of the RGB and LAB color channels, or the combination of the RGB channels.
There are two separate color correction tools:
- Gray color point picker (
). Click this button,
the mouse cursor should become a dropper. Find a point on the image which must
have a gray color. Any shade of gray should be appropriate, although it is
preferable to avoid completely black and white colors. Click this point. The
image colors will be shifted to make sure that the chosen point is gray.
Sometimes, due to color noise etc., it takes several attempts before the
desired effect is achieved. Try a different gray point if having no luck with
the original one.
To dismiss the active dropper without clicking a gray point, click the gray color point picker button again, or press Esc. - Color shift sliders. The sliders surrounded by color names shift the image colors towards the chosen one. There are two pairs of opposite colors: blue - yellow, and green - magenta. For example, when sliding the blue - yellow slider towards yellow, the balance is shifted from blue to yellow, making the image "warmer". This would be useful for the photo shown on the screenshot above, because it has an obvious bluish color shift.
- Brightness slider. This slider changes the overall image brightness.
- Highlights slider. This slider recovers image highlights (makes them darker). Use it when the image has too bright areas, so bright that some details are invisible.
- Shadows slider. This slider recovers image shadows (makes them brighter). Use it when the image has too dark areas, so dark that some details are invisible.
Unlike the processing options customization, manual adjustments can be applied only to a single photograph at a time. It is, however, still possible to save time by copying & pasting processing options, including the manual adjustments, between images (see image settings synchronization). For images taken in similar conditions (having similar exposure and color problems), synchronizing manual processing options may be very useful.
Cropping and straightening
Unlike other operations, cropping & straightening can only be applied to a single image at
a time in Photo Sense. It is achieved using the Crop & Straighten tool,
which can be activated when the preview shows a processed image. To activate the
Crop & Straighten tool, click the corresponding button in the Preview
toolbar (
).
You can also choose the active tool using the items in the Edit → Preview
Tool menu, or the corresponding keyboard shortcuts.
Once the Crop & Straighten tool is active, click on the processed photo and drag to define the crop rectangle. You can move and resize the crop rectangle with the mouse after it has been defined.
You can constrain the aspect ratio of the crop rectangle. For that, select one of the presets and previously used values, or select Custom... to enter a new value. Photo Sense remembers the last 10 custom values. You can also choose Original to make the crop rectangle proportional to the original image. Choose "Free" to cancel any aspect ratio constraints. Note that when defining the aspect ratio, you do not specify the crop rectangle orientation, if it should be portrait or landscape (in other words, the ratio 2×3 is considered the same as 3×2). To change the crop rectangle orientation, drag one of its corners with a mouse.
To straighten the photo (rotate by less than 45 degrees), hold the Option key on the keyboard while dragging the mouse. You can also use the Trackpad rotation gesture when the mouse pointer is over the processed preview to activate the straighten mode. When straightening, make sure that the crop rectangle is entirely within the photograph.
To apply the changes, press Return on the keyboard, or the
Apply Crop & Straighten button (
) on the Crop & Straighten tool panel.
To cancel the crop & straighten operation, press Esc on the keyboard, the
Cancel / Restore Crop & Straighten button (
) on the bottom of the preview,
choose another Preview tool, or select another image.
Like everything in Photo Sense, the Crop & Straighten tool performs non-destructive editing. When you activate the Crop & Straighten tool for an image which has already been cropped or straightened, Photo Sense restores the previously selected crop rectangle and rotation. You can easily adjust these settings, or cancel them to restore the image.
Applying artistic effects
To apply one of the available creative effects to particular photographs, select these photographs and open the Effects panel. To open the Effects panel, do one of the following:
- Click the Effects toolbar button
(
). - Choose the Window → Effects menu item.
- Press "Cmd"+"Shift"+"E" on the keyboard.
Click the desired effect in the Effects panel to apply it to the selected photographs.
Several monochrome effects are available. Their normal versions take the luminance information and apply color (black in the case of black & white). The "Red Filter" versions are based on the image red channel. They tend to brighten human skins and darken blue skies, often creating a pleasing dramatic look. The "Pencil" effects mimic pencil drawing, black & white or colored.
Saving photos
Select the photographs you like and save the processed versions using one of the following ways:
- Click the Save Images toolbar button
(
). - Use the File → Save Selected Images... menu item.
- Press "Cmd"+"S" on the keyboard.
If only one image is selected in the browser, the standard file saving panel will be displayed, extended with the file format and size options. Choose the name, location, and other options and click the Save button.
If multiple images are selected in the browser, the Saving Options panel will be displayed. You can choose between saving the selected photographs in a user-specified directory and saving them in the original location. If you want to save to a specified directory, select (or create) the target directory using the Choose... button. In both cases, you can choose to append a suffix to all the generated filenames. If saving to the original location, it is highly recommended to append a filename suffix to avoid overwriting the original files. If you choose to overwrite the original files, you will not be able to recover them after saving! In any case, if Photo Sense discovers that any file will be overwritten when saving, it will warn you, proposing to generate a unique filename, to overwrite, or to skip saving this file.
When saving, Photo Sense allows to choose the image format and JPEG quality (when the JPEG format is chosen). The higher the percentage for the JPEG quality is, the better the image quality will be, and the larger the file size will be. You can also constrain the image dimensions while saving, in which case Photo Sense will down-sample the saved photographs if needed (see resizing photos). Photo Sense provides several presets controlling the image format and size options.
The saving options enable Photo Sense to play the role of a batch image format converter and/or resizer (down-sampler). To use Photo Sense for this purpose, open a number of images, disable all the processing options for them (so that the images are not altered), and save them, adjusting the format and size as required.
Processing options
The Processing Options panel allows the user to define how photographs should be processed. It lists the operations which should and should not be performed on the selected images (see customizing processing options for more information on the panel usage). If you want to change the default operations applied to all images added to Photo Sense, this can be done in user preferences. See the Quick Tips (Processing Options Recipes) for advise on how to choose processing options in several common cases. Below the processing options currently available in Photo Sense are described, with examples.
Adjust Colors
When this option is selected, Photo Sense attempts to correct the image colors, if it thinks they are wrong. Note that technically correct colors are not always what the user wants to see in a picture. For example, consider a photo with snow. Photo Sense will try to make snow white, while someone might prefer it to have a blueish cast. As another example, the user might prefer night shots with lamp illumination to have warmer colors (more yellow) than is technically correct, as discussed here. The screenshot below demonstrates how the Adjust Colors option removes a blue color shift:
Adjust Exposure
When adjusting exposure, Photo Sense tries to brighten images if it finds them to be too dark, and vise versa. Photo Sense also brightens dark image parts separately if it thinks this is necessary. A possible negative side-effect of this operation is a diminished contrast. If you face this problem, enabling the Adjust Contrast option presented below is likely to fix the problem. The screenshot below gives an example of what the Adjust Exposure option does:
Adjust Contrast
With this processing option enabled, Photo Sense tries to improve the image contrast. This option is a good candidate to apply when a photograph looks washed-out, as shown in the example below:
Increase Saturation
With this processing option enabled, Photo Sense boosts the color saturation, at the same time trying to avoid over-saturation. The screenshot below shows an example:
Preserve Skin Color Saturation
With this (and the Increase Saturation) processing options enabled, Photo Sense only increases saturation of colors that, in its opinion, cannot represent a human skin. This is useful when human skin colors on the processed photographs look over-saturated, too red or purple. Instead of disabling saturation of the whole photograph, this option allows to disable it only for skin tones. It is recommended to enable this option for all photographs with people, and to disable it for all photographs without people.
The screenshots below compare a photograph processed without and with the Preserve Skin Color Saturation option:
Perform Sharpening
Enabling this option lets Photo Sense sharpen the image. To be able to see the result, it is best to zoom the photograph in Preview as much as possible.
Sharpening might create artifacts in the image. Moreover, the nature of the sharpening process is similar to one of the processing operations which the Adjust Contrast option applies, and thus images with adjusted contrast might already look sharpened. This is why the Perform Sharpening option is disabled by default in Photo Sense. You can of course enable it, if you want, in user preferences.
The screenshot below shows a sharpened image at the 100% zoom:
Reduce Color Noise
Color noise (also called chroma noise) is a fine-grain hue variation (colored dots) usually seen in dark parts of photographs. Color noise can be expected in photos taken in dark conditions, and/or in images whose brightness was significantly increased in software. Color noise is more likely to be visible when a high ISO sensitivity is set in the camera when taking photographs.
Unlike luminance noise reduction, the color noise reduction is generally considered harmless in Photo Sense. It is only likely to lose image details if there are some small but significant colorful objects present in the image, which is a rare case. The color noise reduction process is also relatively fast. Thus, the Reduce Color Noise processing option is enabled by default in Photo Sense.
To be able to see the result of color noise reduction, it is best to zoom the photograph in Preview as much as possible. The screenshot below shows the Reduce Color Noise setting applied to a noisy image (at the 100% zoom). It might be hard to see, but there are many reddish stains in the original photograph:
Reduce Luminance Noise
Luminance noise is a fine-grain brightness variation (dark/bright dots) usually seen in dark parts of photographs. Similar to the color noise, luminance noise can be expected in photos taken in dark conditions, and/or in images whose brightness was significantly increased in software. Luminance noise is more likely to be visible when a high ISO sensitivity is set in the camera when taking photographs.
Luminance noise reduction is likely to lose some fine-grain details and to create artifacts in the photograph. Moreover, this is one of the most time-consuming operations in Photo Sense. For these reasons, luminance noise reduction is disabled by default in Photo Sense. You can of course enable it, if you want, in user preferences. In addition, because luminance noise is likely to appear when a high ISO speed is used, Photo Sense has an option to only enable luminance noise reduction for photos taken with the ISO speed above the predefined threshold value.
To be able to see the result of luminance noise reduction, it is best to zoom the photograph in Preview as much as possible. The screenshot below shows the Reduce Luminance Noise setting applied to a noisy image (at the 100% zoom):
Image Settings Synchronization
Photo Sense allows to copy & paste (synchronize) image settings between photographs. You can copy & paste processing options (including manual adjustments), effects, and (for images of the same size) even the crop & straighten settings.
To copy the desired image settings from a photograph, select it in the image browser (only one image must be selected) and do one of the following:
- Click the Copy Settings toolbar button
(
)
and choose the appropriate item in its drop-down menu. - Choose the appropriate item in the menu Edit → Copy Image Settings.
- Press "Cmd"+"Shift"+"C" on the keyboard to copy processing options and effect.
- Press "Opt"+"Cmd"+"Shift"+"C" on the keyboard to copy processing options.
- Click the Paste Settings toolbar button
(
). - Choose the Edit → Paste Image Settings menu item.
- Press "Cmd"+"Shift"+"V" on the keyboard.
User preferences
The User Preferences panel allows the user to choose the default processing options applied to all images, and to configure application performance parameters.
Default image processing options
The Image Processing tab of the preferences panel defines the processing options that Photo Sense applies by default to all the added photographs. The options are the same as those in the regular processing options panel, they are described here.
It is convenient to set the default processing options to the setting you usually use. For example, if you rarely photograph people, it is recommended to disable the Preserve Skin Color Saturation option which prevents increasing saturation of skin-like colors. If you often find processed photographs to be over-saturated, you might want to disable the Increase Saturation option by default. Then you can enable it for individual photographs using the processing options panel.
In addition, the Image Processing tab in the preferences panel allows configuring Photo Sense to apply luminance noise reduction only to photographs shot with the ISO speed higher than the specified value. Luminance noise reduction might destroy some fine image details. Moreover, it takes more time than most other operations. Hence it is only recommended to apply it to very noisy photographs. Digital cameras tend to produce noisy images when the ISO sensitivity value is high. Taking this all into account, Photo Sense enables the user to only apply luminance noise reduction to photographs shot with the ISO sensitivity value higher than the specified threshold value. The correct operation of this setting of course depends on the correct ISO sensitivity specification in image files. Most modern digital cameras can be expected to fulfill this requirement.
Performance settings
By default Photo Sense uses all the processors available in the system to process photographs in parallel as quickly as possible. If you prefer Photo Sense to run on the background and leave some system resources for other applications, you can limit the number of processors involved in image processing. The smaller this number is, the more processors are available for other applications, and the slower image processing will be in Photo Sense.
This tab also allows the user to disable showing the original when the mouse cursor hovers over a photograph in the image browser. Normally the image browser shows processed photographs as soon as they are available. Disabling this option might help if the application feels slow.
Click the Restore the Recommended Configuration button to restore the default (recommended) settings on the currently selected tab.
Filtering photos
To filter (search) photographs shown in the image browser, enter the search criteria in the
Filter Images field
(
)
at the right part of the application toolbar. Only images whose filenames contain the entered string will be
displayed. The string comparison is performed in the case-insensitive mode.
To disable the filter, do one of the following:
- Click the cross button within the Filter Images field
(
). - Click the Filter Images field with the mouse to set the focus there, and press the Esc key on the keyboard.
- Search for an empty string.
Removing photos
To remove photographs from Photo Sense, select them and do one of the following:
- Click the Remove Images toolbar button
(
). - Use the File → Remove Selected Images menu item.
- Press Delete on the keyboard.
Note that with this, you only remove images from the Photo Sense browser. The image files on the disk remain untouched. You can add them to Photo Sense again if you change your mind later (only the custom processing options, if any, will be lost).
Rotating photos
To rotate photographs by less than 45 degrees (to straighten them), use the Crop & Straighten tool, as described in Cropping and straightening.
To rotate photographs 90 degree either left (counterclockwise) or right (clockwise), select them in the browser and use one of the following options:
- Click the Turn Left
(
)
or Turn Right
(
)
toolbar button. - Use the Edit → Turn Left or Edit → Turn Right menu item.
- Press "Cmd"+"[" or "Cmd"+"]" on the keyboard.
- Use the corresponding Trackpad gestures (on Mac OS 10.6 and later).
Note that all the selected images are rotated, not only the one shown in preview.
Resizing photos
The resizing (to be more precise, the conditional down-sampling) function in Photo Sense is available in the saving panel (see saving photos). When saving, it is possible to constrain the long image edge size in the saved files. When the size is constrained, Photo Sense proportionally down-samples the image, if needed, to ensure that the long edge of the saved image fits within the requested limit.
There is no up-sampling (increasing the size) functionality in Photo Sense, because it degrades the image quality, and it is not what most photographers need.
Photo Sense Lite limitations
Photo Sense Lite implements the same automatic image enhancement algorithm, and provides the same semi-automatic tools, as the full version of Photo Sense. However, it only works with a single image at a time, and allows no manual adjustments. The full version of Photo Sense differs in the following:
- Enables batch processing. Add, apply custom processing options and effects, and save multiple images at a time.
- Supports manual photo adjustments.
- Enables copying & pasting image settings (processing options, effects, and even crop & straighten settings) between images.
- Processes images in parallel on computers with multiple processors. For example, on a dual-core system, processing of multiple images happens about twice faster.