In the past I used Creo’s Powertone plug-in to create some pleasing duotones. The interface was clunky but usable. Anyway, what can anyone tell me about the current state of this plug-in. The old urls from the package don’t exist any more. Does Kodak still support? Does it run in OSX? etc. Also, is there a comparable plug-in or PS method to achieve the same duotone results? Anyone familiar with this plug-in will know how Powertone dramatically expanded the ink distribution possibilities for a given doutone. I have yet to find anything similar, but I’ve just started searching. Any feedback is welcome. Thanks, Peter
That’s too bad, it produced some nice effects. The closest thing to ‘painting’ in two printing inks that I have encountered. Sometimes I ‘powertoned’ a picture for the coloristic effect, even though it was printing 4c process inks. Oh well… Have you run into anything similar? Thanks for the response. Peter
Some time in 2000, at about the same time that I learned about the Creo plugin for PS 5.5, I also responded to some ad in a trade journal and then had phone contact with a fellow who had a very similar product called Markolor. He sent me a packet of samples and articles about his software, and I just dug that up. Turns out that it was Miles Southworth, professor emeritus from RIT.
I did not purchase it because his licensing arrangement involved a per use charge, and not a normal software sale. Then the Creo product appeared with a trial of a small number of separations before you had to pay for it. I did one or two conversions for customer jobs, and then call for that sort of evaporated.
The promotional stuff in the sample packet for Markolor listed the link www.markolor.com. But if you access that today, you get to a totally unrelated site. Searching Google did not pan out either.
My guess is that Miles Southworth’s patent was bought by Creo, and that he let his domain name expire (or perhaps sold it). I think this type of software had more appeal when 4 color printing was more expensive than it is today, and that Creo did not find much market for it to justify continued support for it.
That’s too bad because some of the 2 color samples in that packet are quite impressive.
Al, Thanks for the very interesting info. I agree, the samples in the Creo marketing were impressive. I wanted to keep the software for the effects only. yes, cmyk is more affordable making duotones less marketable as a cost saving approach – a little bit more and you have full color. Most clients make the jump. However, I wanted to produce the ‘Powertone effects’ for the sake of the effects. They stand on thier own aesthetically, even if I print them in 4c. There is still a webpage for the Powertone plug-in in the Adobe Plug-ins section of the Adobe website here… www.adobe.com/products/plugins/photoshop/powertone.html
In the bottom rh corner some before and after samples are shown. the bottom two photos show the extreme difference between PS’s doutone capabilities and Powertone’s.
Al, Yes. On a G4 still running OS9, I have the Powertone plug-in running in Photoshop 7.0. I have PSCS2 on a G5/OSX sans Classic. I am tempted to try and install in PSCS2. If it’s a drag and drop install – might work. If it’s a ‘classic’ installer – nope.
Did you go to the PS plug-in page to see the samples there?
A classic plugin will only work in a version of Photoshop that is running in Classic. A classic plugin will not work with CS2 even if Classic is installed.
The clarification was just because on the Mac-Intel machines you can run Windows and OS X in parallel. Different animal, though.
Every once in a blue moon, I need to view a multimedia CD-ROM that only runs in Windows. Well, what I do is run SoftWindows98 in Classic. That’s emulation within emulation. 😀
Buko, Are you saying Classic is not an option on the Mactels? Mactels are OSX only, as regards Mac OS’s? Interesting. I’m just going to keep my G4 running OS9. It comes in handy for retro-verting QX files to ver 4.0 for opening in InDesign. I know IDC2 says it will open QX5 but the QX4 opens go smoother for me. Also, Acrobat 5 running on OS9 will allow me to make some font alterations in a PDF without that ‘don’t have the same font’ restriction popping up. I can reset type, in a very limited way, regardless of whether I have the document’s font installed in the system. I just have to change the font to something I have. I don’t see why in Acrobat 7 it won’t let me change the text I’ve selected to a different font. In that case I’m not violating the embedded fonts usage restrictions – because I’m not using the embedded font. You mean there are substitution restrictions now? Sheesh. Oh, well, I guess that’s one for the Acrobat forum. Sorry to burden you with that.
