By Lila Thompsen
Photoshop plugins load into Photoshop's Filter menu when Photoshop launches. They add all sorts of extra functions to Photoshop. In the old days Photoshop plugins were just a bunch of weird effects.. Today, however, we find on the market a number of plugins that do very sophisticated image retouching that would otherwise have been difficult or time consuming in Photoshop. Recent version of Photoshop does what some of the older plugins did, like lens correction and black-white conversion.
Installing plugins into Photoshop is pretty easy. Inside the Adobe Photoshop folder, there is a folder called Plug-Ins. Simply place the plugins there. Launch Photoshop and the menu Filters will have your plugins listed. If Photoshop was already running, when you installed the plugins, you will have to quit Photoshop and launch Photoshop anew. Actually you don't have to install the plugin into Photoshop's Plug-Ins folder. To install in any folder you like, follow these guidelines:
1. First make sure you have an alternative plugins folder. Create it where ever you like and call it what you will.. 2. Launch Photoshop. 3. Go to the menu Edit and open it. Go to the bottom of the Edit menu to Preferences. This will load the Preferences sub menu. 4. Plug-Ins might be called "Plug-Ins and Scratch Disk" depending on your Photoshop version. Go there. 5. Check Additional Plug-Ins Folder to activate it. 6. Use the Choose button to browse to your alternative plugins folder.
That's it! You now have an alternative plugins folder where you can store all your personal plugins. Exit the preferences and relaunch Photoshop. When you relaunch Photoshop, the menu Filters will have the plugins in your alternative plugins folder listed at the bottom of the menu.
In general there are two kinds of plugins: 1. Plugins for photo retouching. 2. Effects plugins. Retouching plugins tend to manipulate what is already in the photo without adding anything new. On the other hand, effects plugins add, well, effects to the photograph. Sharpening, exposure or saturation would be examples of retouching. Effects examples could be lens flare, bokeh or raster. Of course there are cross overs. Is lens correction a retouch or an effect, for example? It is a retouch if you correct barreling or pincushion, but if you make a regular image look like a fish eye photo, it is an effect.
Third party plugin support was first introduced in Photoshop 2 in 1991. In 1994 Joe Ternasky released Filter Factory for writing third party plugins. In 1997 Alex Hunter released Filter Meister as an improvement over Filter Factory and many of today's plugins are written in Filter Meister. In 2007 a novel approach to plugin development was released as Filter Forge. Filter Forge plugins require Filter Forge to run and they are not stand alone. Currently Filter Meister plugins only support 32bit Photoshop. But Alex Hunter says 64 bit support will come some time in 2013. Filter Meister is only available for the Windows platform.
Installing plugins into Photoshop is pretty easy. Inside the Adobe Photoshop folder, there is a folder called Plug-Ins. Simply place the plugins there. Launch Photoshop and the menu Filters will have your plugins listed. If Photoshop was already running, when you installed the plugins, you will have to quit Photoshop and launch Photoshop anew. Actually you don't have to install the plugin into Photoshop's Plug-Ins folder. To install in any folder you like, follow these guidelines:
1. First make sure you have an alternative plugins folder. Create it where ever you like and call it what you will.. 2. Launch Photoshop. 3. Go to the menu Edit and open it. Go to the bottom of the Edit menu to Preferences. This will load the Preferences sub menu. 4. Plug-Ins might be called "Plug-Ins and Scratch Disk" depending on your Photoshop version. Go there. 5. Check Additional Plug-Ins Folder to activate it. 6. Use the Choose button to browse to your alternative plugins folder.
That's it! You now have an alternative plugins folder where you can store all your personal plugins. Exit the preferences and relaunch Photoshop. When you relaunch Photoshop, the menu Filters will have the plugins in your alternative plugins folder listed at the bottom of the menu.
In general there are two kinds of plugins: 1. Plugins for photo retouching. 2. Effects plugins. Retouching plugins tend to manipulate what is already in the photo without adding anything new. On the other hand, effects plugins add, well, effects to the photograph. Sharpening, exposure or saturation would be examples of retouching. Effects examples could be lens flare, bokeh or raster. Of course there are cross overs. Is lens correction a retouch or an effect, for example? It is a retouch if you correct barreling or pincushion, but if you make a regular image look like a fish eye photo, it is an effect.
Third party plugin support was first introduced in Photoshop 2 in 1991. In 1994 Joe Ternasky released Filter Factory for writing third party plugins. In 1997 Alex Hunter released Filter Meister as an improvement over Filter Factory and many of today's plugins are written in Filter Meister. In 2007 a novel approach to plugin development was released as Filter Forge. Filter Forge plugins require Filter Forge to run and they are not stand alone. Currently Filter Meister plugins only support 32bit Photoshop. But Alex Hunter says 64 bit support will come some time in 2013. Filter Meister is only available for the Windows platform.