Aurora HDR 2018

Enjoyable image editor gets welcome improvements

£89 FROM Macphun, aurorahdr.com needs OS X 10.10.5 or newer

Aurora HDR last appeared in MacFormat about a year ago, and we liked it. It was a powerful piece of software with lots to like for landscape photographers.

Automatic blending of multiple exposures was married to some capable image-editing tools, albeit with a somewhat steep £89 price. Twelve months later and the price remains the same, but Aurora HDR has received a substantial facelift for 2018. The engine behind it all has been revamped, but it’s the additional image-editing tools that really impress in this new version.

Dodge and burn brushes allow a degree of per-pixel editing, and there’s a very useful history panel that enables you to step backwards through your edits – even more handily, the steps you’ve taken are descriptively named, so you can easily see where you’ve messed up.

There’s also a lens correction tool in the form of a relatively simple set of sliders for fixing barrel distortion, chromatic aberration and vignetting. The tool won’t auto-detect your lens and apply a range of presets like Lightroom does, although you can save a group of settings as a preset. Quick-hit or in-depth There have been tweaks elsewhere, but ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ applies here nicely. The things we liked about the app’s previous version, such as its appeal to HDR enthusiasts (whether those looking for a quick-hit preset or those who prefer more in-depth editing), remain. Aurora HDR 2018 isn’t the only piece of software you’ll ever need – Lightroom is still better at organising a photo library – but it’s great value, and particularly good for landscape enthusiasts.