DxO has announced the latest PhotoLab 6.3 version of its popular photo editing software. The new update brings with it a new DxO Wide Gamut colour space, new soft proofing with paper and ink simulations, an easier way to install DxO Optics Modules for new camera and lens combinations you shoot with and a better cropping system for optically corrected images.
The DxO Wide Gamut colour space was introduced in PhotoLab 6. Until now, though, it’s only been able to support raw files. The new update sees its capabilities expanded to JPG and TIFF files, giving greater flexibility when adjusting them in post. The new paper and ink simulations will also allow you to more accurately preview how your images will look when printed using standard ICC profiles.
DxO says that the DxO Wide Gamut colour space provides full coverage of all the colours that can be captured in nature. They say it also supports all of the wide gamut display technologies out today so that it will always show you the best possible colour for your display devices. Naturally, you’ll want to switch this over to some other profile at some point, perhaps sRGB for display on the web or a custom profile for printing, but while working, it lets you see the maximum possible colours available to you.
And speaking of printing, the next new feature in PhotoLab 6.3 are the paper and ink simulations. This is an extension to soft proofing. Soft proofing allows you to simulate the look of another display device or printer or colour space without actually having to convert the file. It figures it out on the fly to give you a rough idea. It’s handy for photographers when making sure that their images are going to look as good in print as they do on-screen. The new paper and ink simulations take this a step further to give you the look and feel of an actual print on your monitor, as well as showing accurate colour.
PhotoLab 6.3’s Optics Modules are now easier to install than ever. When you load up an image using a camera and lens combo the software hasn’t seen before, it will automatically try to figure out exactly what camera and lens you used. When the Optics Module pops up on your screen, it’s automatically filled in with the most likely options for the images selected. You can, of course, override this. But no longer do you need to manually hunt through DxO’s 80,000+ optics modules.
On the topic of optics modules and correcting lens distortion, cropping has seen a change in order to take such corrections into account. Previously, when you cropped an optically corrected image, it wouldn’t let you extend the bounds of the crop outside of the now-distorted image and into the gaps left where the image used to be around the edges. Now, you can crop right out to the edge of the corrected image, allowing you to fill in the gaps with content-aware fill methods.
DxO PhotoLab 6.3 is available to buy now in Essential or Elite versions. DxO PhotoLab 6.3 Essential costs $139, while DxO PhotoLab 6.3 Elite costs $219. A 30-day free trial is available, and existing PHotoLab 6 owners can update to PhotoLab 6.3 completely free.
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