HF Not Recognizing Raw Adjustments

[DrDane]

I sent the following message to Helicon about 10 days ago and have not received a response, so I decided to post it here:

"I just downloaded the Lite program and gave it a try with an 8 file series - impressive focus results!

I have some initial questions that I did not find the answers to in the documentation.

HF Not Recognizing Raw Adjustments
I installed with Canon Raw add-on. I had already tuned these CRW images with ACRaw 4.0, but Helicon didn't recognize the updated raw settings, and apparently just used the original raw data, rather than the adjusted versions. Is there a way to get your program to recognize the adjustments made to raw files? (I've now updated to ACR 4.1 and use this with Photoshop CS3)

File Browser Hard to Use
Under the file browse, all images in the folder are checked by default, and there seems to be no way to clear the checkmarks except one at a time, which isn't very functional. I found I could use the File>Open command to select the ones I wanted, but it would be easier if the browser could deal with those checkmarks as a batch - is there a way to do that?

I haven't seen a price for the Lite version. What is it?

Thank you for your assistance!"

Blessings,
Dane
http://www.inner-light-images.com

[Ariel]

http://www.heliconsoft.com/purchase.html says that for Helicon Focus lite, 30 for one year, 115 dollars forever (including upgrades).

I agree that the file browser isn't so good. I wish there would be a window fill the middle of the screen letting you quickly select the photos to use.

About raw, I don't know, did you save it properly? Or maybe it would be better to work with original raws and then only fix one picture? Or maybe you could just save to TIFF or JPEG and work on that with Helicon Focus?

[Dane]

http://www.heliconsoft.com/purchase.html says that for Helicon Focus lite, 30 for one year, 115 dollars forever (including upgrades).

I agree that the file browser isn't so good. I wish there would be a window fill the middle of the screen letting you quickly select the photos to use.

About raw, I don't know, did you save it properly? Or maybe it would be better to work with original raws and then only fix one picture? Or maybe you could just save to TIFF or JPEG and work on that with Helicon Focus?

Thank You Ariel (That's also my wife's name

Regarding the raw files (Canon CRW), I found that if I run a set through HF first, then save the result as a tif, I can bring that into Photoshop Raw converter (only with CS3) and make use of its extra adjustment goodies.

The only catch is that the raw converter (v4.1) will not recognize the HF tif file, so I have to open it in Photoshop, then save it as a tif before the converter will open it.

I've attached a file I had good results with the process I just mentioned. The flowers were shot from a tripod, with the flower stem lightly clipped to a stake for stability. Some halos required retouching, but the rest went very well.

[Ariel]

Nice work.

Now, your wife and I do not share the same name. We share the same spelling of our names. Ah-re-el vs. Eh-re-ul