Luminar 1.2 Neptune
An image editing app that takes presets to the next level
Accent AI uses artificial intelligence to fix everything it identifies as needing fixing
£64 FROM Macphun, macphun.com needs OS X 10.10.5 or later
Macphun’s ‘Neptune’ update to its impressive Luminar image editing app brings new tools, new filters and tweaks to the back end for increased performance with large image files.
The headline new feature is Accent AI, something that Macphun dubs ‘the future of photo editing’. What is it? It’s a filter in the new Quick & Awesome workspace that claims to analyse your image using artificial intelligence and fix everything it identifies as needing fixing. We assume it’s actually doing this rather than just raising the midtone contrast and sharpness, as the filter acts very quickly even on a low-end Mac. Results are acceptably good – sunny images become sunnier, and any overcooked processing can be toned down by reducing the opacity of the layer every new filter can be placed upon.
Elsewhere, there’s support for all other Macphun apps as round-trip plugins, so aficionados of Noiseless Pro can send an image there for cleaning up (Luminar has its own noise reduction routines, of course) and return the edited image to Luminar to continue working on it.
Workspace wonders
Luminar relies heavily on presets, but the huge range available, along with the ability to create your own and use the before/after slider to see exactly what’s changed, makes it an intelligent approach to one-shot image editing. There are clone and erase tools too, for scratch and blemish removal.
The workspaces, calibrated to support exactly the amount of work you want to put into fixing your images, mean you can walk away happy after just five minutes’ tinkering or half an hour’s, knowing you’ve made genuine improvements.
If there’s a downside, it’s that tooltips can take a while to appear, but that’s not an earth-shattering problem. We would also caution that being dropped into the app from a cold start can feel somewhat overwhelming. Macphun has thought of this, however, with handy video tutorials on its website which, along with the user guide, can be accessed from the help menu.
While it might take a few moments to get the hang of, Macphun is on to an image editing winner here. As long as you don’t want to get into compositing or special effects, Luminar offers everything you’ll want from a photo editor, and makes its changes quickly and reversibly. The ability to run it as a Photos extension adds to its versatility. And for a price that’s very competitive with Photoshop Elements, Luminar looks like a great choice for anyone who wants to fix their photos easily and effectively.