It has been a great year for digital photographers as tools to perfect your picture have made great improvements in 2006 and for 2007. Oldies like PhaseOne are being virtually run over by DxO, Adobe, and Lightcrafts -- the youngest of the contenders. The almighty term "Photoshop" is often thrown into the match when people are either very professional or want to sound like it. For photographers, however, it would be an unnecessary burden to learn the graphics monster well enough to do adjustments that are much more intuitive and sometimes powerful in dedicated applications we call RAW Editors.


WHY LIGHTZONE?

Does the world really need another RAW editor? The selection may seem already great with CameraRAW/Photoshop, Lightroom, Aperture, PhotoPro, Bibble and CaptureOne. However, each has a few specialties to offer and Lightzone found its niche in remembering techniques of photographers liker Ansel Adams -- essentially bringing zone editing to the digital world.

But what exactly is zone mapping? Generally speaking it's not that different from histogram based editing and one will actually find four zones in Adobe Lightroom. Tone curves technically can be modified in virtually any software on the marked to manipulate the histogram distribution to the same effect. What sets Lightzone apart are the 16 zones (!) that can be freely compressed or expanded globally or limited to a masked region.

Not every picture needs such detailed editing, and neither zone nor tone mapping are easy to understand at first. In fact, I abandoned the v2.0 demo after a brief evaluation, conceding that it wasn't worth the time spent. However, a recent special offer for Lightroom owners (like myself) changed my mind and despite all the fuctionality provided in DxO and Lightroom, I am fairly often using Lightzone to process specific "problems" which would be impossible with the other two due to the global approach.


BUT ... WHAT's A ZONE ANYWAY?

By now you've heard about "zones" enough to make your head spin, but what is it really all about? After all, Adobe Lightroom offers already four "zones" called Highlights, Brights, Dark, and Shadows and generally speaking a tone curve could provide similar flexibility as the 16 zones in Lightzone.

Well, theory only gets you close since LightCrafts' idea indeed offers a much more powerful approach to the good old tone curve. Simply consider the standard histogram to be divided into 16 even "zones" (1/2 stop increments) and you're given the opportunity compress or expand each zone individually. What this means is that you can detail shadows or mid tones much better while barely touching the information in between.

Add the ability to apply changes only to regions (automatically feathered masks) and the true power of Lightzone becomes clear. For instance, it's very easy to lighten an eye region while darkening the background in the same process. You can even limit different degrees of modification to individual areas and apply the same twice if a single setting cannot achieve the same result.


DETAILS

Installation: [*****] - The download file (currently v2.3) is the same for both full and basic version, and initially works as a fully functional 30day trial version unless you have your serial number and then turns into which ever version you bought. Assuming you purchased the Basic version, the interface simplifies upon activating the final product. In this case file management, exif data and picture organizer are permanently hidden and would only be visible in the full or trial version. The download is a moderate 21 MByte small and activation requires internet access (like most programs these days). Overall footprint on your hard drive and memory use are relatively small.

Interface: [****-] - Windows users are presented with a unique look as the interface is apparently programmed in Java. Essentially it looks the same under XP as it does on Vista. Overall organization is relatively standard and in the basic version all you're working with is the palette area on the right, the work place on your left and the tools on top of the interface. Most icons convey the underlying effect well enough but also depart far enough from standard conventions to make the first contact a bit of a quest. Once you're past that, the interactive user interface makes it very easy to navigate each tool (once you understood how it works). The zone finder is a unique tool to quickly find the level to modify as the preview highlights related pixels that are included in the active zone (one of 16). Functions can be applied multiple times and overlay the original basically like layers in Photoshop. Each function can be global or limited to one or multiple regions. Since each can be applied multiple times with a different purpose, the tab representing each function can be renamed and that certainly helps to jog your memory. To change the order of which effects applied, simply drag the respective tab to the new position.

Performance: [****-] - For normal use, Lightzone feels about the same as other established editors. Make a change or add a function and redraw will take a few seconds. Conversion heavily depends on the complexity of the correction and can reach easily a few minutes. Since Basic is stripped of the workflow tools, only one picture is being processed at a time and hands-off batching is not possible. Yet, the interface is responsive and Lightzone 2 supports multi-core processors. It is possible to add a virtually unlimited number of effects and ultimately you're going to be faced with long process times. Restricting it to 5 - 10 steps, however, seems to keep conversion times per picture to under 1 minute (reference: 8 MPx RAW).

Functionality: [****-] - Building on the zone adjustments, both zone mapper and tone mapper are very powerful tools that are currently rather unique. Sure, you can do similar stuff in the picture editor of your choice, but this one is specifically geared towards photographers. Beyond the core expertise, Lightzone doesn't offer much out of the ordinary and White Balance as well as Sharpening are average in quality at best. Yet, most standard tools like blur, color balance, saturation, hue, noise reduction and b/w conversion are along the expected features. Slightly unexpected are red eye removal, spot removal (i.e. dust) and cloning (i.e. to hide unwanted objects). Missing are any geometry functions and not even horizon leveling is available ... unless you use the rotate tool and guess where it's level. Distortions cannot be corrected with Lightzone.

Quality: [****-] - Basic RAW conversion is nothing to brag about and limitations in geometry and color fringing as well as sharpening make Lightzone Basic more of a post-processing tool than a universal work horse. Three features in Lightzone earn a solid recommendation to purchase this as a specialty editor where others fall short. Typically that's in tough lighting conditions or when global corrections won't work. Given the extreme flexibility of the tone mapper, zone mapper and regions; the shortcomings of the remaining functionality almost becomes insignificant. With 16 bit per color internal processing it's best to start with RAW files or 16bit TIFF. Naturally, using 8bit (per color) JPEG may cause problems to surface quicker as there is less color gamut to work with. This is not Lightzone's fault, but an issue that needs to be considered.

Workflow: [n/a] - Lightzone Basic is pretty much sold as a plug-in or external editor for programs like Adobe Lightroom or Apple Aperture. As such, all workflow tools are disabled and not available in the Basic version. However, should you opt for the full version, you may still prefer to get another program since Lightzone doesn't support optical corrections, chromatic aberration and the sharpening doesn't yield the same quality as DxO and others.

Cost: [****-] - At under $150 introductory price ($99 for Lightroom users) Lightzone Basic isn't cheap and directly competes with similarly priced DxO Optics Pro Standard. Yet, the zone editing is a wonderful addition to other editors and in this case the lowe price a good argument for users of Lightroom (and in my case DxO as well) to extend the functionality of those editor by the unmatched zone editing and masked application. Given the restrictions in geometry and aberration, I would not recommend Lightzone as the only program in your toolbox, but it's a great extension of the capabilities of excellent tools like DxO Optics Pro and Adobe Lightroom.

© 2007, theuerkorn


RELATED REVIEWS

- DxO Optics Pro v4.1 Standard
- PhaseOne CaptureOne LE
- Adobe Photoshop Lightroom v1.0


[UPDATE: 01-May-2007] - The newly released version 2.4 sports several improvements. The ToneMapper is more user friendly and now directly addresses highlights and shadows. Lightzone now also provide vibrancy adjustment and a new RAW panel helps improve image quality by fine-tuning the RAW data regarding exposure and noise. The new Strength slider in the Black & White tool takes some getting used to as for its actual effect. While there are still a few things missing, the monthly updates show great potential and a high degree of determination.

[UPDATE: 27-June-2007] - Version 3 finally reached the Basic version as well in the release 3.0.5, a licensing bug prompted an immediate update to 3.0.6 just one day later. The improvements are mostly geared towards user friendliness and overall performance, but new presets alone might be worth the $40 for the upgrade (free if you purchased LZ2 after May 1st).


Recommended: Yes