The Plugin Site - B/W Styler


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Version History

MacOS X Version 1.05 (January 2013)

Support for Photoshop Elements 11
Support for GraphicConverter 8.2 and higher

MacOS X Version 1.04 (July 2012)

The plugin now appears on "The Plugin Site" sub menu of the Filter menu. Previously it appeared on the PhotoWiz sub menu.
Bug Fix: Damaged .ini files do not produce crash anymore.
Bug Fix: Program error in Photoshop CS6 is fixed
Fit and 100% zoom buttons were added at the left of the zoom controls. To comply with Photoshop the - zoom button is now on the left and the + zoom button on the right.
Bug Fix: Entering "-" in a slider edit box previously changed preview zoom
The preview background is not white anymore. It is gray as the window background.
The last opened preset is displayed in title bar
Pressing the Esc key cancels the plugin
The blue focus rectangle now vanishes from a slider text box when you click on a slider or other control.
The Reset button now activates the Preview check box
Bug Fix: The ND combo items in Photography Mode were truncated to "D"
The arrow down buttons have a more modern look
Bug Fix: The filter settings are not saved anymore if you click Cancel (unless you change the Prefs settings).
Bug Fix: The Split View options are now names correctly.
Bug Fix: When you enlarging the window the Split View combo and the Multi check box moved away from each other.

Windows Standalone/Lightroom Version 1.06b (November 2011)

Support for newer camera raw formats
Support for external editing in ACDSee. The installer automatically adds it to the External Editors menu of ACDSee and ACDSee Pro.
No preview flicker when switching between images
The Colors histogram is better visible on a white tab sheet background.
The Prefs > Histo Zoom check box zooms 1.5 times stronger
The Reset button now activates the Preview check box.
Bug Fix: Entering a minus sign in a slider edit box does not changes the zoom anymore.
Bug Fix: Resizing the window with displayed Images tab caused preview to scale below the Images tab.
Bug Fix: The ND combo items in Photography Mode were truncated
Bug Fix: The split view items were renamed to correctly indicate the position of the actual effect
Bug Fix: No control mess up anymore when starting up in Photography Mode or Quick Mode.

Windows Version 1.06 (June 2011)

Plugin improvements:

Avoids artifacts when processing 16-bit/channel images in PSP X3 SP3.

The plugin now appear on "The Plugin Site" sub menu of the Filters menu (and not on the "PhotoWiz" sub menu anymore).

The window cannot be made smaller than 800x600 pixel.

No more black check box backgrounds in PSP X2 and X3.

Standalone improvements:

Support for newer camera raw formats

Opening a logged preset with "Logged Settings" works now.

The Log Settings function is performed after each image saving. Previously it happened on exit.

Batch processing does start anymore in the case of an nonexistent output folder.

Wrong error message texts were displayed on some occasions.

UI improvements:
- Shift clicking on a tab button resets all control of the tab sheet to default values.
- New standard tab controls instead of custom ones
- New standard title bar instead of a graphical one. The last opened is displayed in the title bar.
- The window width was reduced by a few pixels.
- Smoother and faster window resizing
- The position of the + and - zoom buttons were swapped to be conform with Photoshop.
- New Fit and 100% zoom buttons
- Press and hold flick under Vista/7 is deactivated
- The arrow menus are now positioned correctly under Vista/7
- Selected color boxes have a better visible frame
- The Instant Slider check box is deactivated by default again.
- When typing in the edit box of a slider the preview is updated after half a second.
- Double clicking a slider label only updates the preview if the slider value was changed. Additionally the focus is set to the slider.
- New label on Info tab sheet which displays image size and bit depth.
- Help texts are now displayed when moving the mouse over labels and edit boxes of slider controls.
- Improved visual color box selection in Expert Mode > Selective > Expert.
- New image for the arrow down buttons.
- The number of CPUs was added to the "Multi-CPU Off" check box on the Prefs Tab sheet.
Bug Fixes:
- The settings were previously saved when canceling the plugin without changing the Prefs controls.
- Pressing the ESC key sometimes caused the plugin to not update the preview anymore.
- Double clicking the appropriate slider label now resets the color of the color box.
- Double clicking the slider label while the edit box was in focus did not update the edit box value.
- No progress bar flashing anymore.
- Zero division error when Amount slider of Lab > Posterization effect was set to zero
- Zero division error when Intensity slider of Grain effect was set to zero
- German locale: Deactivating the Kontrast check box displayed "H-Kontrast" instead of "L-Kontrast".

Installation:

One installation for the 32-bit and 64-bit plugins.

Plugin Installer now detects PSP X2 Ultimate, XnView, FixFoto, Imagelys Picture Styles as well as Photoline 32-bit on a 64-bit system.

The installation now creates a new folder, start menu group (and desktop icon) for each new version. This makes it easier to have multiple versions installed and allows you to remove older versions without problems after installing a newer one. Please manually remove older versions from the Start > All Programs > The Plugin Site menu.

The installation now supports 8 more languages and a total of 46 languages.

MacOS X Version 1.03 (January 2011)

New 64-bit version for Photoshop CS5
Only one version of B/W Styler 1.03 is offered. This universal binary contains PowerPC 32-bit, Intel 32-bit and Intel 64-bit plugins. It works with Photoshop CS2-CS5 and Photoshop Elements 6-9. Not supported anymore are Photoshop 7/CS and Photoshop Elements 1-4. But we still provide Version 1.02, which works with them as well as other old applications.
Support for images larger than 30,000 pixels in width or height. You need at least 6 GB RAM to process such images with B/W Styler 64-bit. The Windows version does not support such large images yet.
Selections are shown in the preview. This means that the effect is not applied to pixels outside the selection in the preview.
Bug Fix: The Soften effects of Expert Mode as well as the Black Mist and Blur Vignette effects are now correctly applied after pressing OK.
To unify the UI of all PhotoWiz plugins the following changes were made:
- A new tool bar above the preview for choosing the following tools: hand, eyedropper and split view.
- New maximize and exit buttons on the title bar.
- New Instant Preview check box on the Prefs tab sheet that makes the sliders react instantly. It is activated by default.
- New key shortcuts: H/Space for the hand tool, I for the eyedropper and S for the splitdrag tool, + and - for zooming, R for reset.
- Double clicking the label of a slider resets it to its default value.
- The Reset button now deactivates the Show Blown Highlights check box.
- On the Info tab sheet only 8-bit pixel values are shown (even for 16-bit images).
- The "Auto Preview" check box was renamed to "Preview".
- The "Multiple" check box was renamed to "Multi"
- "Deactivate Multiprocessor Support" was renamed to "Multi-CPU Off".
If the zoom ratio is set to "Fit" and you maximize the window, then the image in the preview is also zoomed.
The background of the preset icons blends with the window background and is not white anymore.
The demo version renders less opaque watermarks faster to the image.

Windows Standalone/Lightroom Version 1.05b (October 2010)

Support for color management, which means that embedded profiles in JPEG, TIFF and PNG files are used for displaying an image.
The RAW Options dialog was renamed to "Options" and now contains RAW and Color tab sheets. The Color tab sheet contains color management options.
A Color Space option for raw files was added to the Options dialog. You can now choose to convert raw files to sRGB, AdobeRGB or ProPhotoRGB.
Improved handling of profiles and meta data:
- New label on the Info tab sheet which displays image size, bit depth and profile
- Embedded profiles in JPEG, TIFF and PNG files are preserved when saving them as JPEG, TIFF or PNG.
- If a JPEG, TIFF or PNG file does not have an embedded profile, but mentions sRGB as color space in the EXIF data, an sRGB profile is embedded when saving it as JPEG, TIFF or PNG.
- A profile is embedded when saving a RAW file as JPEG, TIFF or PNG.
- The metadata of JPEG files (EXIF, IPTC etc.) is preserved when saving the image again as JPEG.
- XMP, IPTC and Photoshop tags are preserved when opening and saving TIFF files. This means that the EXIF information is correctly displayed in Lightroom for processed images.
- Automatic rotation is now also supported for TIFF and PNG files.
New "Use Source Folder(s)" check box on the Batch dialog, which lets you save the batch processed images in the same folder as the original image.
New Minimize button in the title bar for hiding the main window.
Improved Lightroom Installer, which is more reliable and sets ProPhotoRGB as the color space for processing images.
The Batch button on the Batch dialog was renamed to "Start".
The Instant Slider check box is deactivated by default, because of user complaints.
Bug Fix: the Color values on the Info tab do not flicker anymore when moving the mouse over the preview.
Bug Fix: File dialog was sometimes displayed at start up
Bug Fix: Memory access error in the standalone when using the Diffusion > Mist presets or the Dark/Bright Mist effect.
Bug Fix: No memory access error message anymore if you close an image and move the mouse over the preview with the Info tab sheet displayed.
Bug Fix: The preview is not redrawn unnecessarily anymore.
Bug Fix: Fixed the color of the labels on the Options dialog under Vista/7
Bug Fix: When the demo version started up at maximum dialog size, an unnecessary message was displayed.
The manual was updated with explanations of the new features.

Windows Version 1.05 (September 2010)

Standalone and Lightroom versions of B/W Styler are now available. Both can open multiple images and support images with 8-bit and 16-bit/channel.
- The Lightroom version can be used as an external editor in Adobe Lightroom 1, 2 and 3.
- The Standalone version is a program that runs on its own. It offers a batch processing feature and opens the following image formats: Camera RAW (including DNG), JPEG, TIFF, PSD, PNG, BMP, TGA, PCD, PCX, WMF. It can save JPEG, TIFF, PSD and PNG files.
Selections are shown in the preview. This means that the effect is not applied to pixels outside the selection in the preview.
The split view line and focus point can be moved smoother and faster over the preview.
Please move your self-saved presets to the Presets sub folder at the following location to make them appear on the arrow-down menu:
2000/XP: c:\Documents and Settings\<user>\Application Data\ThePluginSite\BWStyler\
Vista/7: c:\Users\<user>\AppData\Roaming\ThePluginSite\BWStyler\
To avoids write permission conflicts the .ini, preset and log files are now saved in this folder.
To unify the UI of all PhotoWiz plugins the following changes were made:
- A new tool bar above the preview for choosing the following tools: hand, eyedropper and split view.
- New maximize and exit buttons on the title bar. When maximizing the window the task bar is respected. When clicking the maximize button again the normal window size correctly is restored. Double clicking the title bar logo does not maximize the window anymore.
- No cursor flicker anymore when moving sliders with Instant Preview activated.
- New key shortcuts: H/Space for the hand tool, I for the eyedropper and S for the split view tool, + and - for zooming, R for reset. If the input focus is on an edit or combo box, you need to additionally hold down the Alt key to make the shortcut work.
- The key shortcuts now also work all the time and not only if the mouse is positioned over of the preview.
- Double clicking the label of a slider resets it to its default value.
- No cursor flicker anymore when moving sliders with Instant Preview activated.
- The Reset button now deactivates the Show Blown Highlights check box.
- On the Info tab sheet only 8-bit pixel values are shown (even for 16-bit images).
- Under Vista and 7 the height of the sliders is slightly larger to avoid cutting off the arrows buttons.
- A size grip was added in the bottom right corner.
- The "Auto Preview" check box was renamed to "Preview".
- The "Multiple" check box was renamed to "Multi"
- "Deactivate Multiprocessor Support" was renamed to "Multi-CPU Off".
If you change something on the Prefs tab sheet and press Cancel, all settings are saved. Previously you needed to press OK to save changes on the Prefs tab sheet, which meant that you would need to apply the effect to the image even if you did not want that.
The preset icons are displayed faster.
The rendering time is measured more accurately.
Bug Fix: A scroll bar was added to the Film combo box in Photography Mode
Bug Fix: Several sliders are not colorized anymore when visual styles are active
Bug Fix: Deinstalling the demo version after the full version was already installed, causes no problems for the full version anymore.
Bug Fix: When the Histo tab sheet was displayed, the preset icons vanished after resizing the window
Bug Fix: Preset icons are now redrawn after a file dialog was displayed
All files are now installed in the "The Plugin Site" sub folder of the Program Files folder by default. Additionally "The Plugin Site" sub menu of the Start menu is now used for installation items.
Support for silent installation: If you run the installer with the /silent or /verysilent command line parameter, the installation will run automatically and require no click. Plugin Installer will then automatically install the plugin in every supported application that it can find.
Plugin Installer supports more applications, e.g. Sagelight and Fireworks CS2 to CS5, and displays less options during installation.

MacOS X Version 1.02 (May 2010)

This is mainly an installer update. The installer now detects the plugin folders of Photoshop and Photoshop Elements and offers these as installation options.
Bug Fix: Some sliders did not appear in Expert Mode.

MacOS X Version 1.02 (January 2010)

A Universal Binary version is now available that works with PowerPC as well as Intel processors in Photoshop CS2, CS3 and CS4. There is also a PowerPC version for Photoshop 7, CS and other old applications.

The ini files are now stored in a folder (at /Users/<user name>/Library/Preferences/PhotoWiz/) that always has write permissions. This avoids reoccuring error messages and lost settings. Different settings are stored for different versions of Photoshop.

Windows Version 1.03 (November 2009)

A 64bit version of B/W Styler is available. It can be used with the 64bit version of Photoshop CS4.

The plugin file size was reduced to 50% of the previous version.

The installer now supports a total of 38 languages. Plugin Installer supports Photoshop Elements 8, localized versions of Photoshop CS2 and CS3 and several new applications.

The demo version renders less opaque watermarks faster to the image.

MacOS X Version 1.01: (October 2008)

Support for multiple processors and hyperthreading processors. But only for the following effects: (Film) Grain, Paper Grade / Multigrade, Diffusion / Soften, Vignette Blur and Dark Mist. If one of these effects is used, the rendering will be 7% faster (hyperthreading), 20% faster (dual core), 30% faster (quadcore). In case of problems, you can deactivate this feature with the Deactivate Multiprocessor Support check box on the Prefs tab sheet.

The simulation the B/W films is more precise now.
22 new B/W film presets in Photography Mode and on the arrow menu of the Selective tab sheet:
- 17 new B/W Films: Adox CHS 50, Adox CHS 100, Adox CHS 100 PL, Adox CMS 20, Classicpan, Fomapan Classic, Fomapan, Fortepan, Kodak Tech Pan, Kodak PORTRA, Kodak Copy Film, Maco Cube, Maco PO, Polaroid 54, Polaroid 55, Rollei Ortho, Rollei Retro
- 5 new B/W Infrared films: Ilford SFX, Kodak HIE, Konica IR, Maco IR, Rollei IR
7 new presets
German Language Support: The dialog and the help texts are now availabe in German language. You can switch between English and German with the Language combo box on the Prefs tab sheet.
The language files are now included in the plugin itself.
Switching between modes works faster.
Bug Fix: Using Cloak Mode does not produce a crash anymore.
Bug Fix: Having the Intel as well as the PowerPC version in the Photoshop Plug-Ins folder does not create a crash anymore
(Bug Fix: Opening a preset file does not change the dialog language anymore.)
(The the .ini files are now saved in the user's application data folder in case the folder of the B/W Styler plugin is not accessible. This avoids problems with restricted user permissions.)

Windows Version 1.02 (May 29, 2008)

DEP Compatibility: Even if Data Execution Protection (DEP) is activated in the Windows Control Panel, B/W Styler still works.
B/W Styler now supports the Photoshop memory management which avoids memory shortages in Photoshop.
Improved compatibility with some applications, e.g. color dialogs now work in GIMP and PhotoBrush and preview scrolling now works in SignLab and Image Analyzer.
The the .ini files are now saved in the user's application data folder in case the folder of the B/W Styler plugin is not accessible. This avoids problems with restricted user permissions.
Bug Fix: Opening a preset file does not change the dialog language anymore.
Bug Fix: After maximizing the window (by double clicking the B/W Styler logo), exiting and running B/W Styler again, it was not possible to minimize the window (by double clicking the B/W Styler logo). It works now.
Bug Fix: A scroll bar appears for Film combo box in Photography Mode so that the list is not cut off anymore at the bottom of the screen.
Bug Fix: Exiting the plugin with the ESC key does not cause a messed up dialog anymore when running the plugin again.
Updated Plugin Installer tool and installation

Windows Version 1.01 (April 6, 2007)

The simulation the B/W films is more precise now.
22 new B/W film presets in Photography Mode and on the arrow menu of the Selective tab sheet:
- 17 new B/W Films: Adox CHS 50, Adox CHS 100, Adox CHS 100 PL, Adox CMS 20, Classicpan, Fomapan Classic, Fomapan, Fortepan, Kodak Tech Pan, Kodak PORTRA, Kodak Copy Film, Maco Cube, Maco PO, Polaroid 54, Polaroid 55, Rollei Ortho, Rollei Retro
- 5 new B/W Infrared films: Ilford SFX, Kodak HIE, Konica IR, Maco IR, Rollei IR
German Language Support: The dialog and the help texts are now availabe in German language. You can switch between English and German with the Language combo box on the Prefs tab sheet.
The historgrams, hue bar (from Expert Mode > Selective > Expert) and icons are drawn faster. The difference is probably not noticable with your bare eyes.
Bug Fix: Previous versions of B/W Styler crashed under Windows Vista on some computers if there was 2 GB or more RAM available. This was fixed now.
Bug Fix: One side of the split view was displayed magenta colored for 16bit images if the Multiple checkbox was activated.
Bug Fix: The Own Default feature did not work correctly in previous versions. It was deactivated now and will be fixed in a future version.

MacOS X Version 1.0: (February 13, 2007)

First MacOS X release of B/W Styler based on the Windows Version 1.0b.

There are three versions included in the product:
- Standard PowerPC (for various applications on PowerPC-Macs)
- CS2/CS3 PowerPC (for CS2/CS3 applications on PowerPC-Macs, e.g. Photoshop CS2, Photoshop CS3, Illustrator CS2, ImageReady CS2 )
- CS3 Intel (for Photoshop CS3 on Intel-Macs)

Windows Version 1.0b (November 1, 2006)

The Amplify slider works logarithmical now, which means that you need to drag the silder much further to get higher slider values.

"BW Styler" instead of "B/W Styler" will now be displayed in the Filter or Effect menu in your application. This avoids a bug in PhotoImpact which creates a second sub menu if you use the / sign in a menu name.

Bug Fix: Expert Mode > Colorize > Enhanced did not work on 16bit images.

Bug Fix: Expert Mode > Colorize > Partial Toning did not work on 16bit images if one of the methods from the Selective tab sheets was activated. The same problem occured if you used some of the presets of Split Color mode and a preset from the B/W Films mode on 16bit images.
Bug Fix: The Contrast slider of Expert Mode > Selective > Expert produced too extreme results on 16bit images.
Bug Fix: The Highlights, Midtones and Shadows sliders from the Grain tab sheet of Expert Mode produced a stronger grain effect at other value than zero.
Bug Fix: The Shadow-Hue and Highlight-Hue sliders of Expert Mode > Convert > Split B/W were sometimes stacked above each other.
Bug Fix: The controls from Expert Mode > Mask > Frame did not vanish when switching to other tab sheets.
Bug Fix: If the Vertical Sliders check box from the Prefs tab sheet was activated, the sliders were arranged in strange ways when starting B/W Styler or switching to Expert Mode.
Bug Fix: The icons in some modes were not redrawn after using the Vertical Sliders check box.
Other smaller bugs were fixed...

Windows Version 1.0 (September 28, 2006)

First Release