Topaz Clarity in Studio

I’m a longtime user of Topaz Clarity and Adjust, which I have used for years as plug-ins in Photoshop (currently in 2017 CC). Topaz has become a bit bewildering and confusing to me in terms of choice for updating my apps. Do I now need to download the entire Topaz Studio? Can I use it as a PS CC plug-in? Or can I just update my Clarity and Adjust versions? I’m thinking that the Topaz Studio package is a bit of overkill for my targeted photo-editing needs. I’d prefer to cherry-pick the Topaz apps I’m most likely to use. Can I still do that these days?

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You can answer the majority of these questions by reading this article:

Really!

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Okay, now I would love to know what is contained in Topaz Studio? Is it just Clarity? Where are Remask, Adjust? Are they still updated as separate downloads apart from Studio. The Topaz website could certainly use an overhaul for explaining things to dummies like myself.

If you want to use your plugins with Studio, you need to make sure you’ve downloaded the latest individual version from our Plugins Downloads Page. They are currently only available as plugins. Clarity in Studio is comprised of two Adjustments in Studio: Precision Contrast and HSL Color Tuning.

The latest updates for all our plugin products are at the link above. We’ve been busy creating a number of videos, articles, webinars, and other various content types, to explain and effectively deliver Studio to everyone. We’re a much smaller crew than everyone realizes (there’s only 10 of us!), so while we can be responsive, we also need time to develop the content our customers request. We address basic, intermediate, and advanced uses of the tools with that content, as well as picking the best suggestions and ideas that our customers send us for specific workflow types (portraits, cats, flowers, landscapes, quick edits, creative edits, etc.). You can see what each Adjustment is capable of, from the main Studio website, under the Adjustments submenu. There is also a Learn submenu with links to the content I just mentioned. We also provide an overview video of Topaz Studio on that main page. The Studio interface was recently updated, so we’ll need to re-record a few videos, but you can still grasp the application with the content created earlier than “right now”.

The application itself is only a few months old, and we made the interface changes as early as we could, so we did not cause too much of a disruption to our customers. Of course, we knew we’d have to re-record those videos, but we put the time in to make them anyways, because we knew our customers valued having that content from us. We’ll update as quickly as possible, and we’re working at a breakneck pace responding to feedback about Studio, Clarity, and every aspect of our customers experience that we can. Studio will enable us to do more of these rapid releases to fix problems, iteratively improve features in a substantive way, and be more responsive to our customers.

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Found this article very informative! Thanks Joe.

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Joe’s Article posted here if you read all the way through will clear up many of the questions that are now in various threads.

Have a thorough read.

There’s a lot of information there - and more yet to be added. There are a couple of new sliders we haven’t had the chance to mention in that article yet. I’ll be updating it asap!

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Kudos to you Joe and the entire team…do you guys ever sleep?

I think the biggest issue is that we each have a workflow that we have become used to and what is being offered in TS breaks many of those schemes and old dogs have a hard time learning new tricks. As I explore TS I am just amazed at what it has to offer.

In the old version of Clarity the presets are organised in categories. Hovering over each presets brings up a preview of the effect very quickly. Both these features seem to have vanished in the new version, which for me makes it harder to use, particularly as for several of the presets the effect takes some time to be applied. For now I shall continue to use the old version

It sounds like the latest version of Clarity and Adjust ONLY work via Topaz Studio, is this correct? So if I want to use the latest versions of these, I have to download the Studio first and use that as a plug=in in PS CC 2017, correct? And how about Remask? Does it still work as a stand alone plug-in through the PS filters menu? That is currently how I use it. But if there is an update to Remask, will it also become accessible only through Topaz Studio?

Yep! But, we have a lot of places to cover, so we do our best.

We’ll be returning this feature :slight_smile: Sorry for the disruption

Currently, only Clarity in Studio requires Studio. I do see Adjust getting similar treatment.

Again, the majority of basic questions about the update can be answered by simply reading the article. However, here’s a direct link to the section in the article that covers use in Photoshop:

Clarity in Studio | What’s the Same?: Use as Plugin

If you want to use ReMask in Studio, it is supported, but you must do so from the Plugins menu within Studio. We’re considering implementing the masking technology in ReMask, into Studio in an appropriate manner.

We don’t have visibility on this right now.


While I understand the desire to resist change, these updates are for the best. Without them, we would not be able to sustain development. This is a necessary step to allow us to rapidly increase the value and exposure of our technology and our company. Unlike other companies, we have no intention of racing to the bottom - we are still confident our technology has value to our users, and we now have a vehicle to share every bit of it with anyone that wants to try it, for free.

Please remember, the Studio application is, and always will be, free to use.

You’re absolutely right! As much as we dislike change, if a product is to evolve and hopefully move toward perfection we’ll either have to accept some temporary inconvenience and grow with it or allow progress to slow and let Topaz’s work to stagnate without our participation in the process.

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Just to be clear, I am not trying to resist change, I only am trying to understand what I consider a very confusing and complicated series of layers and terminology that you’ve applied to Topaz over the course of many upgrades, updates and remakes in how it is presented, packaged and used over the course of several years.

Best regards,

Stuart L Gordon Photography
Dream. Pursue. Create.
www.chasingthelight.zenfolio.com
chasingthelight10@gmail.com
541-306-8711

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Andy, I was not a frequent user of Clarity as a plug in to LR/PS. I would offer the following.

After you have opened TS and invoked the new Clarity, which appears on the left side menu, go over to the right hand side where you have Basic Adjustments, Precision Contrast, and HSL Color Tuning. Open each in turn and you will find a plethora of possible adjustments you can make to your chosen image. Cycle through the presets in each tab, plus the multitude of blending modes and the opacity sliders not to mention all the sliders in the respective sections. In my opinion there are far more possibilities available for you to express your creativity than there is in the plug in which in and of itself is amazingly robust.

I played for several hours last night just with the new Clarity on two different images and was absolutely delighted with plethora of possibilities.

WHen I get time I will have a play with it, and I am sure it will prove to be better, but at the moment I think it would be better for the presets tp be grouped so that it is easier to find the ones you want to look at further. I have had a go with one photo, with good results, but I hadn’t investigated the options you mention on the right hand side. Shoud keep me quiet tonight!

@StuGordon , you may want to consider removing you email address and phone number from your signature. This is a public forum and as such that information is available to all and unfortunately there are some unscrupulous folks that may find such information very inviting. Just a suggestion.

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Thanks, Larry. Good advice.

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I can see Clarity in Topaz Studio has it’s uses- I have to work with it more to see the benefits for me over the Clarity 1.0 plugin. I really like the ease of use of the Clarity 1.0 plugin and often use the presets with the much valued previews. To me Clarity in Topaz Studio is like an entirely different program.

Stu, I’ve used the Topaz products for years with Photoshop. I decided to give studio a try when it came out and I really like it. You can still used the individual app - such as Remask if you are only doing one adjustment. In studio you can do as many adjustments using different products as you want before you return into Photoshop.