[Eon]

Im on a mad search for ALL of the best Filter Plugins that I can find. But I need your guys' expert opinions. Which ones are the best and why.

[jesse-k]

Filters --> Video --> NTSC Colors

no, seriously, i don't really use filters at all, except for guassian blur, unsharp mask and maybe mosaic if i need to hide someone's face :P.

Mostly I just use the Image -> Adjust tools and a lot of hard work. Filters tend to be either ugly or cliche, IMHO.

[Frog]

Feel pretty much the same, filters are a little obvious and tend to have a cliched look to them. Avoid them.

Having said that I do use Gaussian Blur and Unsharp Mask.

[Hunago]

Might try Kai's power tools from Coral/Metacreations. you could do absolutely gorgeous things to a face, it's even animatable.

check this out if you're really interested. http://www3.corel.com/cgi-bin/gx.cgi/AppLogic+FTContentServer?pagename=Corel/Product/Details&id=CC1YKHVRBAC

[jesse-k]

ug, Kai's Power Tools

don't get me started on those: bloated, ugly, crappy interface and worst of all, nothing really useful. Plus, everytime you use KPT, it blatantly looks like you used KPT.

[ur0b0r0s]

If you're working on tiling textures the High-Pass and Offset filters can be really useful too.

Otherwise I generally agree: filters should not be used to "do the art" for you. Oh, did I mention they are evil?

Just my 2 cents.


|E|T|E|R|N|I|T|Y|

[Lunatique]

I think most digital artists(ones that draw/paint. Not designers) consider filters useless and gimmicky. The only filters that are usable are gaussian blur and unsharp mask. For textures offset and highpass are great for making seamless tiles. Other than those, no self-respecting digital artists would bother with them.

But, I've seen designers use tons of filters and turn out some great graphics.

[Sedone]

I only use filters if I'm very bored, or if I'm doing web stuff. Image > adjust is where it's at. It's almost a given that at some point during the painting I'm going to use levels, hue/sat, etc. Variations is actually a pretty good way of harmonizing your colors. Oh, and I'm addicted to layer modes.

[lowpoly]

Sometimes I use Soft Light on 3D output which can look rather clean when rendered. Soft Light allows to add some subtle grain when used with low values. It also seems to add some 'punch' to the lighting which seems suitable for skin tones.

example

[ March 21, 2002: Message edited by: lowpoly ]

[The Fritz]

Man,

I've the feeling things are getting very elite here. I'm an artist too, I work with real oil, watercolors and so on, but hey, I'm also using the computer and I also use some of these damn filters, but most of the time the people doesn't recognize it. I mean it is of course not usefull to start a filter and thats it. That is of course no art but you can use these effects to generate new effects. I think when you do art use everything that comes to hand. When I paint I use airbrush, pieces of wood to put the color on the canvas, brushes, my hands, and so on. Same thing for the computer. Well, thats my opinion.

[cheney]

I use KPT5 plugin with nearly a religious dedication. You people that never use filters are strange folks. I use filters in channels to create all my textures. If it were not for filters (mostly noise, KPT Shapeshifter, 4 different blurs, and bevels) my latest image would look completely flat and have about 5 or 6 colors.

[Pat]

Most of what you see in KPT can actually be made in Photoshop without the filter, if you know how. Once you achieve a base level of knowledge about channels, levels and curves it doesn't make sense to shell out the $$ for some prefab effects.

Add Noise has to be the best filter ever made. followed closely by Gaussian Blur. In the running are offset, unsharp mask and the highly underrated miniumum and maximum.

Just my .02 cents.

-Pat