Skylum has released the latest version of the Luminar photo editor, and in addition to the expected performance enhancements and minor updates, Luminar 4.2 boasts a new feature called “AI Augmented Sky” that makes creating surreal photo composites the work of a few seconds.
As the name suggests, AI Augmented Sky takes advantage of computer vision and machine learning technology to help you composite elements into the sky in your photos. It’s basically an expansion of the AI Sky Replacement feature, but instead of replacing the real sky with a realistic alternative, you’re adding in elements like a massive moon and turning your photo into a piece of digital art.
Skylum claims that the feature will work seamlessly, even if your photo has “complex backgrounds” like trees or buildings, and there’s “no need to involve masking or layers” to get the job done.
Finally, the feature doesn’t HAVE to be used to create surreal composites. More subtle edits are also possible, like moving the moon to a more “pleasing” position in the sky or adding in some clouds without fully replacing the sky.
And here are a few before-and-after images and GIF provided by Skylum, showing the kind of composites you can achieve in just a few seconds using the new feature:
AI Augmented Sky is definitely the biggest addition to Luminar 4.2, but it isn’t the only update. Luminar’s AI portrait tools have received a boost, with “Shine Removal” added to AI Skin Enhancement, and the ability to more realistically slim down faces in the AI Portrait Enhancer thanks to “Slim Face 2.0 Technology.”
And since no update is complete without mentioning performance enhancements, Luminar 4.2 also includes some “under the hood” updates that should improve AI Sky Replacement, speed up all Machine Learning-based edits, and, for Windows users with multi-core CPUs, generating previews can now take advantage of multithreading.
Luminar 4.2 is a free update for all Luminar 4 users. Just open up the program and choose Luminar 4 > Check for Updates on Mac or Help > Check for Updates on Windows. They also recommend you re-run the plugin installer if you’re using Luminar as a plugin for Photoshop or Lightroom.
A new license of Luminar 4 will cost you $89. (Use "GANIDU" as promo code to get $10 discount)
To learn more about Luminar 4 and the latest Version 4.2 update, head over to the Skylum website by clicking here.
Source:PetaPixel
