The Filter Gallery dialog box in Photoshop CS6, technically an editing window, gives you an alternative route to access and apply filters. To put it onscreen, choose Filter→Filter Gallery. In this window, you can apply multiple filters, as well as edit or delete them later. This feature has made filters more flexible, more user-friendly, and easier to apply.
Kai's Power Tools special effects filters were once considered a must-have plug-in suite for Photoshop-compatible graphics software.
Follow these steps to get up and running in the Filter Gallery:
Choose Filter→Filter Gallery.
The Filter Gallery dialog box appears.
Click your desired filter category folder.
The folder expands and displays the filters in that category. A thumbnail illustrating the filter’s effect accompanies each filter. To collapse the filter category folder, simply click it again.
Select the filter you want to apply.
Credit: ©iStockphoto.com/JLBarranco Image #7800556Specify any settings associated with the filter.
You get a large preview of your image in the left side of the dialog box. Use the magnification controls to zoom in and out of the preview. When you change your settings, the preview dynamically updates itself. To preview a different filter, simply select that filter.
If you want your custom settings to be the new default for the filter, simply hold down the Ctrl key (Command key on the Mac) while you are specifying your settings. The Cancel button changes to Default. After you have established your settings, release the Ctrl (or Command) key. Your new settings then become the new default.
When you’re happy with the filter, click OK to apply the filter and exit the dialog box.
If you want to apply another filter, click the New Effect Layer button at the bottom of the dialog box.
Clicking this button duplicates the existing filter.
Select your new filter, which then replaces the duplicate.
Photoshop lists each of the filters you apply to the image in the bottom-right of the dialog box.
When you’re done, click OK to apply the second filter and exit the dialog box.
You can apply as many filters as you want to your image. But, often, less is more.
Here are some other helpful tips to keep in mind when you’re using the Filter Gallery:
To delete an applied filter, select it in the list in the lower-right portion of the dialog box and click the Delete Effect Layer button at the bottom of the dialog box.
To edit an applied filter’s settings, select it in the list and make any necessary changes. Click OK to reapply. Although you can edit a particular filter’s settings, that edit affects any subsequent filters you’ve made after applying that particular filter.
You can rearrange the order of the applied filters. Simply select and drag the filter up or down within the list. This changes the resulting effect of the filters.
To resize the Filter Gallery dialog box, drag the lower-right corner.
To hide the Filter menu and provide the maximum real estate for the preview box, click the arrow to the left of the OK button.
You can choose any of the filters found in the Filter Gallery from the Filter menu itself. Choosing a Filter menu filter launches the Filter Gallery automatically — but not all filters are available in the Filter Gallery. You have to access some of them individually from the Filter menu.
Don’t be misled into thinking that the Filter Gallery is like layer styles, where the styles can be removed and the underlying pixel data is returned to its pristine, original state. Regular filters change the pixels of an image permanently, and after you apply one, you can’t remove it. Be sure that you really like what you’ve done and that you have a backup copy of your image.
That being said, if you do want your filters to act like layer styles, they can. You can apply a Smart Filter to any layer that you first convert into a Smart Object. Smart Filters enable you to apply a filter nondestructively, without altering any underlying pixels. Word 2016 for mac fileshare.
Smashing Newsletter
Upgrade your inbox and get our editors’ picks 2× a month — delivered right into your inbox. Earlier issues.
The Photoshop community is chock-full of many free resources, tutorials, tips and techniques, .psd files and even Actions. There is one area that it sadly lacks in, and that is free plugins, filters and panels. Of course, Photoshop has been the pioneer in graphic editor development for a long time now, and with each new version has added an endless supply of features and addons, and as a result, perhaps the need for free plugins or filters is no longer required. Or has it been ignored?
Further Reading on SmashingMag:
Traditionally plugins are an amateur photographer’s best friend, take your shots, fire up Photoshop, apply some well preset filters, and hey presto you have a reasonably professional image. Professional photographers have been known to use plugins as a base and then tweak and add effects to achieve a personal professional touch. Plugins are basically an indispensable tool that do not receive the attention they deserve. And that brings us back to our original mystery, why are there so few free plugins and filters? Do you know the answer? I don’t.
In this A-Z of free Photoshop plugins and filters you will find a few plugins that are (almost) as old as time itself, do not fear, they will work perfectly on all versions of Photoshop and the effect they produce are just as useful now as they were then. If you are looking for a simple and easy method to add effects to an image, this is the post for you.
A-Z of Free Photoshop Plugins & Filters
Watercolor Photoshop Action
Turn your photo — or only parts of it — into a watercolor painting that looks as if it comes straight out of an artist’s treasured sketchbook. To apply the effect, brush onto the areas you want to turn into watercolor art and play the action. More Details and Downloads (affiliate link)
Architectum
Clean edges, precise angles — this Photoshop action turns your photo into a technical sketch. More Details and Downloads (affiliate link)
Smoky Double Exposure
The Smoky Double Exposure add-on elegantly blends the original photo into a watercolor splash. A beautiful play with sharpness and blur. More Details and Downloads (affiliate link)
Spectrum
A sleek look with a subtle, handpainted effect, that’s exactly what Spectrum does. Simply fill in your subject with a color and play the action. More Details and Downloads (affiliate link)
3D Shadow
This handy plugin easily creates various types of 3D shadows from objects such as letters, numbers, shapes and so on. All settings are present in a single window - transparency level, perspective, shadow color and position, X/Y/Z angles, and many more.More Details and Downloads
Camouflage
5 gambar bitmap dan vektor bunga de. Use the Camouflage plug-in to make army, fashion and animal camo. The Camouflage plug-in creates seamless images, this means you can use them as textures and patterns for 3D models or as a background for web sites, they can even be used as a pattern for clothing.More Details and Downloads
Chalkaholic
Chalkaholic renders chalk and charcoal type effects with artistic style and flair. It creates a uniquely effective artistic rendering options, it is an essential addition to any digital artist’s effects collection.More Details and Downloads
Circle to Square
With this plugin you can convert any circle into a square.More Details and Downloads
Composer
Update multiple layer comps in Photoshop with just one click.More Details and Downloads
Craquelure 3D
This filter creates a wide range of well known craquelure (krăkloor´) effects, that is useful in designing various abstract patterns, decorative surfaces and construction materials.More Details and Downloads
CSS3Ps
Free cloud based photoshop plugin that converts your layers to CSS3.More Details and Downloads
Cut&Slice me
Use Cut&Slice me to export your assets to different devices in seconds.More Details and Downloads
Dreamy Photo
Dreamy Photo gives images a soft romantic feel. This is a superb effect for enhancing stock photography, digital camera photos and any image you want to add a warm feel to.More Details and Downloads
Duplllicator
Clone layer or group and shift it horizontally or vertically with this extension.More Details and Downloads
EasyMockups
Create Mobile App mockups in seconds. Select form the predesigned mockups, select your background and artwork layers and you’re off.More Details and Downloads
Fine Threshold
Unlike the traditional threshold command of Photoshop, Fine Threshold allows you to get quickly, anti-aliased and sharp shapes.More Details and Downloads
Focal Zoom Effect
Focal Zoom generates the proper perspective and depth creating a focal point or emphasizing a particular portion of your image.More Details and Downloads
Font Awesome
Font Awesome icons right inside Adobe Photoshop.
Fontea
800 Google fonts in your Photoshop. Don’t guess which font will fit in your design. Try it.More Details and Downloads
Harry’s Filters
The famous “Harry’s Filters” is a series of filters that contains up to 69 different image effects. The main effect categories are called Color, Artistic, Gradients, Patterns, Warp, Noise, En/Decrypt, Other and Nature. It also includes filters for changing the image color or mood, for creating artistic effects, producing colorful gradients or impressive patterns, warping images and adding special noise effects to image. Additionally they let you encrypt and decrypt images with 64 bit keys, produce zoom, mirror or paint effects as well as natural effects like lightning, tornado and polar lights.More Details and Downloads
ICO Windows Icon
This plugin gives you an easy method for creating your web site’s favourites/shortcut/bookmark icon in Photoshop.More Details and Downloads
IsometrIcon
IsometrIcon is a free Photoshop plugin that helps to transform shapes into isometric orientation.More Details and Downloads
Ink
More Details and DownloadsInk is a plugin that helps you providing few extra important informations about your mockups by documenting your layers, from typography to effects and shape sizes.
Kaleidoscope 2.1
Kaleidoscope 2.1 is a plugin which uses multiple symmetries to create beautiful patterns, it uses these three spinning effects: Mirror, Copy, Transition and Blend.More Details and Downloads
Layrs Control
Remove unused Effects, flatten all Layer Effects, delete empty Layers or rasterize Smart Objects with just one click.More Details and Downloads
Long Shadow Generator
Long shadow design is still popular. The Long Shadow Generator is an easy-to-use tool that lets you create that effect with just a single click.More Details and Downloads
Luce
Luce blends radial or directional light beams into your image. There is a text box for adjusting the intensity of the effect.More Details and Downloads
Mosaic
Mosaic makes your photos look as if they were created out of a mosaic tile. Photo-realistic depth and variable tile size and color options give this effect an infinite number of looks.More Details and Downloads
Mood Lighting Effect
Mood Lighting lets you apply a darkening effect enhancing the dark mood of any digital image.More Details and Downloads
Nik Effects Collection
Create stunning images faster. Add the power of the Nik Collection by Google to your workflow today.More Details and Downloads
Noise Reduction
The freeware version of Boundary Noise Reduction lets you remove noise.More Details and Downloads
ON1 Effects
Effects 10 Standard Edition includes a select number of stackable filters, presets, borders, and textures from ON1 Effects 10.More Details and Downloads
Pixel2Vector
This little Photoshop tool may save you a plenty of time. It converts your pixel shape in a vector shape or in a Custom Shape Tool.More Details and Downloads
Polar Projection
Photoshop Plugin for 3D 360-degree stereographic projections.More Details and Downloads
Retinize It
The best Photoshop tool for preparing designs for iOS or optimized for Retina-display websites.More Details and Downloads
Retrodots
Retrodots is a simple plugin that generates dot grids which can be based on selections.More Details and Downloads
Sharpen Details Effect
Sharpen Details brings out the highlights in your digital images and brings clarity to the details in seconds. Give photos a crisp clean look.More Details and Downloads
Seamless Textures
The free Seamless Textures Generator is a simple but time-saving photoshop extension. It generates with just one click a seamless pattern from your picture.More Details and Downloads
Sinedots
Old demo effect which uses soem simple sinus calculations to generate nice patterns like this one.More Details and Downloads
Skeuomorphism.it
Become a flat design pro in seconds with this simple photoshop plugin.More Details and Downloads
Swatchy
Folders for your swatches in Photoshop.More Details and Downloads
Vibrations 1.1
This plugin has two different methods (“Levels” and “Lines” ) for creating a streak effect of your images . The filter has an inbuilt blur, in order to ensure smoothness.More Details and Downloads
virtualPhotographer
virtualPhotographer lets you instantly apply high quality, professional photographic styles to your digital images…with just one click.More Details and Downloads
Water Ripples
The highly realistic water ripples effect designer has numerous options as well as an impressive 3D quality. The random settings generator produces unlimited variations of rippled surfaces.More Details and Downloads
Weaver
This plugin creates a weave effect of your images.More Details and Downloads
Plugin Development Resources
- Filter Meister This is another free plugin that allows users to create there own plugins. This plugin offers extensive documentation, step-by-step tutorials and free downloadable samples. This type of plugin is perfect for anyone with limited knowledge of any script language.
- Photoshop SDK If you are feeling really adventurous, you could develop a plugin using the Photoshop SDK. Previously you would have to pay just shy of $200 for the SDK, it is now free, the only thing you have to do is register with Adobe.
- Photoshop Scripting A script is a series of commands that tells Photoshop to perform one or more tasks, Photoshop CS4 supports scripts written in AppleScript, JavaScript or VBScript. Download the latest documentation on scripting here: Photoshop Scripting Documentation.