Topaz Photo AI

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Ivan Rothman

Ivan Rothman

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Today Topaz released Topaz Photo AI which in one program does all that is done by DeNoise AI, Sharpen AI and Gigapixel AI. Everything in one package. I downloaded it and have played with it for a while. It analyzes the photo and does everything automatically including detecting the subject or detecting faces and creating a mask. You can modify all the correction controls, except other than deleting the subject masking I don't see any way to modify the mask with a brush. But it seems to do a pretty good job with DeNoise and sharpening. And I tried some low resolution facial images and "Recover Faces" was pretty impressive.
I'm not yet sure I should be using this in place the the individual Topaz AI programs that I am familiar with, but if it does a good a job or better it will make the work process much more streamlined.
I'd be interested in hearing the experience of any others.
 
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I really enjoy enhancing images in Post using my own creativity, I don’t use the auto function in LightRoomClassic. Even tough I have the full complement of Topaz apps, I’m going to skip this one for now.
 
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Strodav said:
I really enjoy enhancing images in Post using my own creativity, I don’t use the auto function in LightRoomClassic. Even tough I have the full complement of Topaz apps, I’m going to skip this one for now.
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I also like enhancing my images in post without using the auto function in Lightroom or using any presets
But when it comes to sharpening and especially to noise reduction I have achieved significantly better results using Topaz AI programs. But with these programs you need to use a relatively light touch to avoid oversharpening and often masking to apply effects to the right areas
 
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Strodav said:
I really enjoy enhancing images in Post using my own creativity, I don’t use the auto function in LightRoomClassic. Even tough I have the full complement of Topaz apps, I’m going to skip this one for now.
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If you have an active subscription on the image quality bundle (gigapixel, denoise & sharpen), it is a free upgrade.
click on product and legacy upgardes on right of my products view of topaz account to get option to add Photo Ai
 
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I tried the new Photo AI, but was not impressed. I definitely will still use the separate programs when needed. I think Photo AI is more for photos "mostly good out of camera."
 
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SandyW said:
I tried the new Photo AI, but was not impressed. I definitely will still use the separate programs when needed. I think Photo AI is more for photos "mostly good out of camera."
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I've been doing some more playing with the program today and you may be right. While I was very impressed with the speed of the program and the all-in-one correction abilities, I did find some pictures needed to be taken back to Topaz Denoise AI for adequate noise reduction. And while the subject selection generally works very nicely, there is no too for adding or subtracting to the selection as there is in the other Topaz modules. I did use it for a few low resolution people images and it did a nice job of improving the faces. My plan for now is to try it with some images but I won't hesitate to either start with or go to the separate Topaz programs, especially with a potentially difficult image.
 
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Andrew Lamberson said:
I have been using the beta for a couple months and it is outstanding. FAST!
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Bennvdm said:
If you have an active subscription on the image quality bundle (gigapixel, denoise & sharpen), it is a free upgrade.
click on product and legacy upgardes on right of my products view of topaz account to get option to add Photo Ai
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I have the current bundle of separate apps and understand I can get a copy of the new Photo AI free. Can you keep both the new Photo AI app and the earlier separate apps? Or does the “upgrade” force you to replace the individual apps with the new combined program? Sounds like you can keep the older apps too, from what I am reading in this thread.
 
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BillW said:
Or does the “upgrade” force you to replace the individual apps with the new combined program?
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You keep all Topaz product installations, in my opinion you still need them.
To keep up with the goings on you can find all Topaz release details here and Photo AI v1.0 here.
Make sure you have full access to the internet before you try to install Photo AI and have plenty of data available, I had a 2.49GB model download over and above the application download of 688K, so around 3GB in total.
It seems from comments posted that Topaz are working towards only having one product Photo AI and will reign in updates for the other products now on offer.
Not sure that this is a good thing and it feel will make other non Topaz applications more attractive.
My tests from version 0.6 onwards have not been acceptable in my opinion, over sharpening, poor subject selection options, poor noise reduction and waxy face reconstruction, the complaint lists on the linked site are long.
 
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BillW said:
I have the current bundle of separate apps and understand I can get a copy of the new Photo AI free. Can you keep both the new Photo AI app and the earlier separate apps? Or does the “upgrade” force you to replace the individual apps with the new combined program? Sounds like you can keep the older apps too, from what I am reading in this thread.
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You keep the older apps. I've been using them along with the new Photo AI
 
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soundbyte said:
It seems from comments posted that Topaz are working towards only having one product Photo AI and will reign in updates for the other products now on offer.
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I think the only reason for this new program would be to combine the other stand alone versions. It would make business sense. Judging from v1 though, this should be along ways off. At least I hope so.
 
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I batch process certain types of images and I think the Photo AI version has a ways to go before I can use it instead of DeNoise. I cannot find a way to apply settings to a batch of images. I can adjust for one image but it returns to auto for the next image. It creates some spooky looking background faces.
 
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It seems to me, that V1 sharpening has some issues that previous versions did not. Specifically, the images appear to be over sharpenened unless you adjust the slider way down.
 
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Ivan Rothman said:
I'd be interested in hearing the experience of any others.
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I am one who has the full pack and therefore received the beta and now the v1.0 of Photo AI for free -- well at least for now.
This means I already have and use extensively Denoise AI, GigaPixel AI and far less frequently Sharpen AI.
I have had the opportunity to use it and compare it a fair bit to the individual tools.

Obviously Photo AI is designed to be a user free AI tool -- just let the tool decide for you. Well this is where the problems begin for me. I am deeply biased against full AI tools. I want far more control than seems to be available in Photo AI and since I have learned how to get the best out of the 3 component tools I am not going to use Photo AI for any serious work. That said you can just let the tool do its thing and follow it's guidance.

The advantage of Sharpen AI is one can select 1 of 10 AI models, choose where sharpening is to be applied and very carefully adjust sliders to prevent or at least reduce issues. It is far less clear how or where the refine subject mask works in Photo AI - one gets to pick between Default, Portrait (presumably people) and Landscape subjects and then move 2 sliders Sensitivity and Softness --- but one cannot see a mask until the preview has so it is unclear where the tool is being applied AND one does not get to adjust what areas each tool is applied to.
Photo AI only has Lens Blur and Motion Blur and an amount setting under the sharpen tool.
Similarly Remove Noise has has only Normal and Strong and an amount slider.
We already know from GigaPixel AI to avoid the "face recovery" tool and the same storey is true for Photo AI -- avoid the Recover Faces tool like the plague. Please do not just turn it on.
The same but with more venom is the Enhance Resolution tool in Photo AI -- I find what this "tool" does is truly terrible. It is NOTHING like as good as the similarly named tool in LightRoom Classic. Again please do not just turn this tool on.
Upscaling is similar to GigaPixel but without the 4 different models and without applying sharpening or denoise.

My view -- buy the full pack to gain access to the 3 tools and avoid Photo AI.
 
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I’ve now used Photo AI on just a few photos, and in one instance I compared it to a photo that I had previously processed through DeNoise. I was VERY happy with the results and the fact that I didn’t have to do anything — I let it do everything without any fiddling from me and was very happy with the result. What I didn’t like was that I thought it was very slow to the point I wonder if I was doing something wrong? I have an M1 Mac Mini with 16GB.
 
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ajm057 said:
I am one who has the full pack and therefore received the beta and now the v1.0 of Photo AI for free -- well at least for now.
This means I already have and use extensively Denoise AI, GigaPixel AI and far less frequently Sharpen AI.
I have had the opportunity to use it and compare it a fair bit to the individual tools.

Obviously Photo AI is designed to be a user free AI tool -- just let the tool decide for you. Well this is where the problems begin for me. I am deeply biased against full AI tools. I want far more control than seems to be available in Photo AI and since I have learned how to get the best out of the 3 component tools I am not going to use Photo AI for any serious work. That said you can just let the tool do its thing and follow it's guidance.

The advantage of Sharpen AI is one can select 1 of 10 AI models, choose where sharpening is to be applied and very carefully adjust sliders to prevent or at least reduce issues. It is far less clear how or where the refine subject mask works in Photo AI - one gets to pick between Default, Portrait (presumably people) and Landscape subjects and then move 2 sliders Sensitivity and Softness --- but one cannot see a mask until the preview has so it is unclear where the tool is being applied AND one does not get to adjust what areas each tool is applied to.
Photo AI only has Lens Blur and Motion Blur and an amount setting under the sharpen tool.
Similarly Remove Noise has has only Normal and Strong and an amount slider.
We already know from GigaPixel AI to avoid the "face recovery" tool and the same storey is true for Photo AI -- avoid the Recover Faces tool like the plague. Please do not just turn it on.
The same but with more venom is the Enhance Resolution tool in Photo AI -- I find what this "tool" does is truly terrible. It is NOTHING like as good as the similarly named tool in LightRoom Classic. Again please do not just turn this tool on.
Upscaling is similar to GigaPixel but without the 4 different models and without applying sharpening or denoise.

My view -- buy the full pack to gain access to the 3 tools and avoid Photo AI.
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Thank you for that very thorough review
The more I’ve been using Photo AI the more I find that it’s better to use the other individual modules as you describe
 
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ColinBailey said:
Matt Kloskowski has been testing it too. He has produced a video on it and has concluded that he is sticking with the individual modules.
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Thank you for the link to Matt K. I watched the video and he does say that he prefers using the individual modules for the added control, but he also says that he finds relatively minor differences and that Topaz Photo AI does work well. I believe he feels that if using only one module, such as Denoise, he would prefer to use the individual Denoise program but with need for multiple modules would do OK with Topaz Photo AI. He also states that he believes, without any direct knowledge, that Topaz going forward will more likely support and build on the Photo AI program and may give less support to the individual programs.
I'm satisfied because I was able to get the Photo AI program at no cost. Now I can take a given photo and run it through one or more of the individual modules and then I can also run it through Photo AI and then see which way works better for me. I guess time will tell.
 
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I often use DeNoise and Sharpen for my images, now there is a new offer for Topaz Photo AI. Has anybody here already tried it out? They have a special offer up to Oct. 7.? Will it pay off to change - seems to be an all in one software in the future?
 
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There is a thread on this in the post processing forum you might check out. Matt Kloskowski also did a video on it.

If you own current versions of DeNoise, Sharpen and Gigapixel, Topaz is giving you a free copy of Photo AI. I downloaded one, but have not done enough with it to have a view. The individual apps seem to offer more user control.
 
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BillW said:
There is a thread on this in the post processing forum you might check out. Matt Kloskowski also did a video on it.

If you own current versions of DeNoise, Sharpen and Gigapixel, Topaz is giving you a free copy of Photo AI. I downloaded one, but have not done enough with it to have a view. The individual apps seem to offer more user control.
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Oh, ok - I did not realize that, my question in General Photo Discussion has now thankfully been moved to this thread. Since I do not own Gigapixel, Photo AI would cost me $109. Reading the comments above, I will stick to the original two programs. I often try out the different models and select the subject carefully - especially when I need Sharpen so I do not get artifacts in the background. I am sure I would need more control than Photo AI seems to have. DeNoise and Sharpen are really cool tools though, would not know what to do without them.
 
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