AKVIS Decorator

Reviewed by Geetesh Bajaj, December 26th 2006

Introduction

It's certainly possible to change the color or texture of a surface in Photoshop using the available tools -- for instance you can change the color of a car, or the pattern in a dress or wallpaper within a picture. Not surprisingly, this process can be painstakingly slow, and is not very intuitive.

AKVIS Decorator, a Photoshop plug-in from AKVIS allows you to change the surface of a selected object easily with results that look very real. A self contained library includes a plethora of patterns that you can apply -- from fabrics to stones to metal and food -- as also natural elements. Decorator follows the underlying features such as the highlight, shadows, and texture of the original, selected object to make the applied color or texture look natural.

Decorator is from AKVIS, a company based in Russia that specializes in graphics programs and scientific research. Apart from Coloriage, AKVIS also creates other Photoshop compatible programs like Retoucher, Chameleon, Stamp, Sketch and Enhancer.

You can download a free 10 day trial version of Decorator from the AKVIS site...

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How To Use

Here’s how you can use AKVIS Decorator to apply a new texture:

1. Open any image in an image editor such as Adobe Photoshop.
   
   
2. Make the selections as required, and choose Filter | AKVIS | Decorator, as shown in Figure 1.
   
   
   Figure 1: AKVIS Decorator
   
   
3. This will open the Decorator interface that you can see in the Figure 2 below. As you can see, the selection made in Photoshop is visible in the Decorator interface.
   
   
   Figure 2 : AKVIS Decorator Interface
   
   The interface is explained below:
   
   
   1. Preview has two tabs -- Before and After, which show the original and changed images.
      
      
   2. On the top right, you'll find the Navigator.
      
      
   3. Color and Texture Library (see detail in Figure 3) provides color shades and the built-in Texture Library, including the ability to change textures and tweak parameters.
      
      
      Figure 3: Color and Texture Library
      
      The built-in Texture Library has huge collection of patterns, as shown in Figure 4. To access the library, double click the thumbnail of the active texture, as shown in Figure 3.
      
      
      Figure 4 : Texture Library
      

4. After selecting the texture or color, click the Run icon (see icon below).
   
   
   
   
5. This applies and creates a preview of the image. If you want to make more changes, you can select another texture as required. You can preview the changed image in the After tab, as shown in Figure 5.
   
   
   Figure 5: The textured Image
   
   
6. Once you’re done with the colorization and texturization, apply the result to the image by pressing the Apply icon (see icon below) to return to Photoshop, or another image editor.
   
   

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Specifications

Photoshop Versions:	5+
Platforms:	Windows, Mac
Site:	AKVIS
Price:	US$54 and above
Trial Version:	10 days

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