Pictured above is the basic dialog that comes up when you launch Filter Forge 4.0 from within Photoshop. In this particular case, it is showing the initial factory preset from the Creative > Tri-Color filter. Most filters come with several presets. You can see the first six presets available for the Tri-Color filter at the bottom left corner of the dialog box. You can scroll down in the preset area to view any additional presets for the currently selected filter. Before I get too carried away, all of the photos in this review are reduced resolution to allow them to fit neatly within The Gadgeteer’s layout. Click on the screen grabs like the one show above to see the text and other elements in their original resolution. Later in the review I will provide a bunch of examples and these can be opened in even greater resolution to see the fine details of the images and applied effects.
In general, Filter Forge filters are grouped into categories like Organic, Patterns, Creative, Distortions, Photo, etc. Some of these categories contain filters that provide various area fills: stone, woodgrain, patterns, etc. Because these fill textures are procedurally generated, they are resolution independant. This kind of filter could be used in a lot of different ways – creating a realistic environment for a 3D game comes to mind. As a photographer, these types of filters are really the least useful for me, but I did play around with some of them, and they are seriously cool to use. The Misc > Electricity pattern fill shown in the dialog captured above generates a variety electrical effects.
This review of the Filter Forge 4.0 Photoshop plugin, gives a generous preview into the program, itself. With all the usual transcripts of Photoshop, this plugin is stable, even with beta. But the best part of this, is the community which provides a place to share with others.