Knoll Light Factory : Photoshop Lighting Effects

Frequent questions for Knoll Light Factory.

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Compare to Photoshop's lens flare.

Q

What is the difference between Knoll Light Factory and the Lens Flare filter that ships with Photoshop?

A

The Lens Flare that ships with Photoshop is sort of a one-trick pony. It's not particularly subtle or flexible, which means it's not good for creating a professional looking lighting effect. If you want to enhance a sunset or add a sun glowing through trees, you'll want to use a flare component that has light elements you can add, delete and edit the properties of.

Compare to other lighting filters.

Q

How does Knoll Light Factory compare with other lighting filters on the market?

A

Most lighting filters generate soft diffused glows which, to us, are good for situations like softening a human face. Knoll Light Factory is more of a special lighting effects package. It creates a variety of lighting effects to punch up your image, or add in lighting that should be there but isn't.

Knoll is best known for creating a lens flare, but you can also generate elements like generate xmas lights, street lamps, car headlights or planetary elements. This Adobe Photoshop plugin uses the same core technology that's found in high end Autodesk systems used for film and TV lighting f/x. (Actually, we create that particular product, Knoll Spark Pack, as well.)

Photoshop vs After Effects upgrade.

Q

I own Knoll Light Factory 2.5, which I bought directly from Red Giant Software. I am confused as to why Red Giant is still on Version 2.5, but you are offering Version 3.0 of the Photoshop-only product. Can you help me understand how the two products relate? Also, how do I go about upgrading? If I upgrade the Photoshop-only Knoll to Version 3.0, I would still be with Version 2.5 for After Effects?

A

The subject is a little confusing since there are two companies involved. Bottom line: The Photoshop and After Effects versions of Knoll Light Factory have been split into separate product lines.

Until recently, the Adobe Photoshop 2.5 version of Knoll was a bonus tool that shipped with Knoll 2.5 for After Effects. Both versions were distributed by Red Giant Software. Knoll for Photoshop was never developed robustly in terms of its tools, functionality or usability. That product also fell very behind in supporting the newest iterations from Adobe and Apple, such as CS3 and Intel Mac support.

Our company, Digital Anarchy, teamed up with Red Giant to re-develop Knoll for Adobe Photoshop. We have created a new, robust, interesting product that's fully supported by today's hardware and host software. Now Knoll 3.0 for Photoshop is being treated as a separate product that is purchased only through Digital Anarchy. The upgrade fee that you pay to us is exclusively for the Adobe Photoshop version.

The After Effects version of Knoll is still at version 2.5 and distributed only by Red Giant. An upgrade fee to them is exclusively for the After Effects version. We don't know what their plans are for re-development into a version 3.0. However, Knoll for After Effects has always been a pretty robust product (unlike its Photoshop counterpart) so another version may not be necessary.

Render flare on separate layer.

Q

I want to make a lighting effect which can be moved as a layer. Most of my work is done in a nondestructive manner and I don't want to apply the lighting effect to a layer with content.

A

To place the flare on a separate layer, you can render the Knoll lighting effect on a layer that was filled with black. Back in your Photoshop file, set that layer to Screen mode. This will produce the best results.

Alternately, you could render the flare on black and use Select Color in Photoshop to create a selection. Save that selection. Now render the same flare on a white background. Load the selection and delete the white background. You'll probably want to feather the edges. This won't produce great results, but depending on how you're using the flare, it may provide another solution.

Knoll is rendering pinpoint size image.

Q

When I render Knoll with a Marquee selection, I get a pinpoint size image. No matter what settings I try, the result is always that pinpoint of 2-3 bright pixels and that's it. What is happening?

A

Check the Obscuration Layer pop-up. Is it set to 'Layer 1'? If so, try setting that option to 'None'. That should fix your problem. There is currently an open issue with the Pop-up menus changing around. Initially, if you only have a background layer in the project and you apply Knoll, the pop-ups will be set to None.

If you add layers to the project, the pop-ups get forced by Photoshop to set themselves to Layer 1. We plan to address this issue in a future free update. NOTE: Knoll does crash if you use a Marque selection with a size dimension smaller than 9px.

Throw away Knoll Mac preferences.

Q

I have noticed that after installing OS 10.4.1, certain applications like Photoshop may get some "pref" or "default" settings toggled. Meaning, if an application is behaving weirdly post-OS upgrade, chances are that its prefs have changed. The only way to fix is to toss the pref file. Brings up the question: Where are the Knoll prefs hiding?

A

Knoll keeps its preferences internally and also stores them within the Photoshop settings. If you trash the Photoshop settings file, Knoll will be reset. Rather than manually digging through the Photoshop pref folder, you can reset the Photoshop Settings file by holding down Command + Option + Shift and then launching the app. Photoshop asks if you want to remove the settings file. If you say Yes, Photoshop goes back to its defaults and so does Knoll.

Set up multiple lights in a photo?

Q

 Can I add multiple lights into one Preview Window? Or do I have to create them one by one?
A

Currently, you can only add only one light at a time in the Knoll Light Factory interface. If you want multiple lights you have to apply the filter multiple times.

You can sort of get around this issue by adding individual light elements, then using their Position parameter to move the element away from the center of the flare. The elements are still constrained to the same invisible baseline but you can make multiple groups along that line.

This works especially well when 'Lock Lens Position' is selected. This will lock all the lens elements down to their current position. This allows the flare to be positioned globally; all of the elements will move as one. You can access that Lock function by Right-Clicking in Windows (Control-Clicking on a Mac) within the Preview Window to bring up a contextual menu.

Really though, the best way to create multiple lights is to use the Preset Manager to save and reapply on different layers. Create a light/flare that you like and save it as a preset. Render that light to your Photoshop layer, then reopen the Knoll interface and apply the preset again. You can do this as many times as necessary, of course.

Why is Knoll grayed out in the Filter menu?

Q

 When I go to the Photoshop Filter menu, I can see the Digital Anarchy submenu. But I can't select it or the Knoll Light Factory submenu.
A

Most likely, this is because your Photoshop file is set to CMYK mode. Knoll Light Factory currently does not support CMYK files. You must convert your file to RGB.

This conversion is easy to do. Just go to the Image> Mode menu and select RGB. You can choose to Merge or Not Merge your layers. This is an option for flattening your layers and most likely, you will not merge (and therefore not flatten).

The Knoll product originated for video and film effects and that industry only works with RGB. It's only recently that it's been specially developed for Photoshop. Writing support for Knoll in CMYK has fallen to the wayside as we've worked to keep up all of Apple, Adobe and Microsoft's OS/hardware changes. This is on our list of development tasks.