Industry News


DxO’s Nik Software Celebrates 25 Years With 25 Presets

November 20, 2020

By Jacqueline Tobin

© Nik Collection by Dxo

To celebrate 25 years of great success creating popular plugins for Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom Classic, and DxO PhotoLab, Nik software just released an update to its current Nik Collection 3.0 with this anniversary edition, Version 3.3, which includes a pack of 25 new presets for Color Efex Pro and Silver Efex Pro.

The new presets are divided into five series, each with five presets, that focus on five photo genres which Nik says are the most popular among both expert and amateur photographers. The series are: Classic Portrait Color, Classic Portrait Black & White, Light & Bright [for a colorful take on landscape photography], Wildlife, and Street. (This collection’s update is also compatible with macOS Big Sur and the 2021 versions of Adobe’s host applications.)

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The first ten presets categorized under “Classic Portrait Color” for both Color Efex Pro and Silver Efex Pro include fun and intuitive naming conventions such as  “High Key Bright”, “Hint of Color”, “Hollywood Glamour” and “Rugged” to name just a few. The High Key Bright preset, for example, brings out the whites and brightness in color portraits, while Hint of Color, says the company, creates “a more dramatic look that nonetheless remains soft through the addition of a color tint.”  On the flip side, the Hollywood Glamour preset for Classic Portrait Black and White produces images with high contrast but controlled darker tones; the Rugged preset provides a more nostalgic, film-like, fine grain look.

The Street series for Silver Efex Pro takes an approach, says the company, that is poised between “classicism and modernism by playing up contrasts, grain, and tints simultaneously.” The “High Contrast” within the Street series preset recreates a classic street photography look by producing dense blacks and stark whites. “Street Gritty” adds a slight grain over the top; with “Street Dramatic” the background of the photo is darkened, and the depth of field is shortened.

First launched by Nik Software 25 years ago as an expensive premium priced suite, it was later developed (and distributed) by Google, and was then bought by DxO and brought back to life as a fully updated plug-in suite.

If you purchased the Nik Collection 3 after June 2020, you can upgrade your software for free. The Nik Collection 3.3 by DxO (Windows and macOS) is now available for download on the DxO website for $149 for the full version and for $79 for the upgrade. You can also get a one-month free trial version of the software here.