Alien Skin Image Doctor 2 is an update to the original Image Doctor 1 plug-in package. It includes all of the same plug-ins that was in the 1.0 package, but they of course have been updated and improved (otherwise this wouldn't be much of an update would it?)

Included in the package is:

Dust and Scratch Remover

Dust and Scratch Remover Dust and Scratches Sample 1 | Dust and Scratches Sample 2 is used to restore and retouch photos. This filter helps repair tears, dust and scratches, these annoying problems occur in some fashion or another in just about every old photograph. It can also be used to remove non-photo damage things like electrical power lines, telephone poles and the like. This is a very powerful and useful plug-in.

Tips:

• When removing a large defect such as a long scratch that spans the image, start at one end of the scratch and work your way along, creating smaller selections then applying Dust and Scratches, repeat this until the defect is gone. Working in smaller steps will almost always give you better results than one large step.
• When removing a large number of similar defects from an image, run the filter on an individual defect and then select the remaining defects one at a time and use the shortcut to re-apply the filter (Control + F).

SmartFill

SmartFill SmartFill Sample 1 | SmartFill Sample 2 is used to remove large unwanted objects from your photos. For example say you have a lovely beach sunset shot, but there is a person with their dog on the beach, you could quickly and easily use SmartFill to remove the person and the dog. SmartFill intelligently replaces the unwanted object with nearby background pattern or you can specify the location of the background sample.

Tips:

• Use multiple selections to remove objects from complex backgrounds, e.g., a background of dirt, asphalt, and grass; making multiple selections for a background like this will product the best results.

Blemish Concealer

Blemish Concealer Blemish Sample | Blemish and Skin Softener Sample is magic for skin. You can diminish or remove freckles, acne, moles, birthmarks and more. When you use this filter with the Skin Softener filter it is like digital plastic surgery.

Tips:

• Do not overuse Removal Strength. Overusing Removal Strength yields completely blurred selections, wiping out any realistic surface textures.
• Use the Skin Softener filter to finish off the look of blemishes concealed by Blemish Concealer.
• For removing high contrast blemishes, such as tattoos, trying using SmartFill.

Skin Softener

Skin Softener Sample Just about every face portrait image could use with at least some small amount of skin softening. Skin softening can make the person look younger and even healthier. When this filter is used with the Blemish Concealer you really can perform miracles.

Tips:

• Make selections carefully to only include similarly lit areas of skin. Applying Skin Softener over areas that span both highlights and shadows will tend to flatten the effect of the filter. In this case, split your selection up between the highlight and shadow regions.
• Use Skin Softener in tandem with Blemish Concealer to maximize the results.

JPEG Repair

JPEG Repair Sample Have you ever had a JPG image that you had to use but really didn't want to because it had been too highly compressed creating large blocks of JPEG compression, blurred edges, and overall softness. Well JPEG Repair can reduce the JPEG compression artifacts making the image look better. It is important to note that it isn't recommended that you try to remove all of the JPEG compression artifacts and it is important to understand that this nor any other filter can add detail back to the image once it has been lost. This filter simply reduces the visible signs of high JPEG compression making the image seem better than it actually is.

Tips:

• Do not overuse the Deblocking Amount. Overusing this control will produce and unnaturally soft image.
• Use Blur Amount and Add Grain cautiously. Excessive blur will wipe out all detail.
• Resize images after using JPEG Repair. Since JPEG Repair works on 8x8 blocks, resizing your image before repairing it will limit the effectiveness of the filters repair. It is okay to crop before repairing as JPEG Repair recognizes cropped areas.
• You can use JPEG Repair with or without a selection. It is recommended that selections are used with this filter to repair areas with perceptibly different levels of damage. For instance, an area of skin may exhibit more damage than an area of hair.

What's New?

• Image rendering quality has been improved in two ways. Image Doctor 2 now offers more seamless integration of replacement pixels with the existing background so that edges or repaired areas now more smoothly blend with the balance of the photo. The software also is improved in its ability to match the patterns of the existing background. Image Doctor 2's JPEG repair offers higher quality fixes of JPEG compression artifacts.
• Image Doctor 2's range of skin retouching capabilities has also been expanded. The software's Skin Softener and Blemish Concealer filters together offer a wider array of kin beautifying capabilities, including wrinkle softening a blemish removal.
• The performance upgrades in Image Doctor 2 result from changes tot he original rendering algorithms and to the program's multithreading capacity. Other new improvements in Image Doctor 2 include 16-bit support, native support for the Macintosh Intel computers, multiprocessor support and a variety of user interface tweaks.
• Image Doctor 2's user interface has been simplified and made easier to use. The Smart Fill filter now offers and automatic mode that can be used when the source texture location is not important.

The Interface

The interface for all of Alien Skin's plug-ins are clean and simple, this makes the learning curve of the plug-in quick and simple and once you know one plug-ins interface you will have 98% of the information you need to use the other plug-ins.

On the right side of the screen is your preview area. You can view just the edited image or you can split the view in various ways so you can see before and after views. Of course you can zoom the preview in and out as well as pan it around. This is done using the zoom tool and the hand tool respectively. Also, at the top of the screen on the upper left side of the preview is a small thumbnail of your image with a red box indicating the area of the image shown in the larger preview window. You can click on this red box and drag it around to pan the image in the larger preview window.

On the right side of the screen is the settings palette, all of the plug-ins come with a nice assortment of presets. Below that is a user settings box where you will find any presets you make and save. In the same location as the settings box is the basics box which is accessed by clicking on the basics tab. In this section you will find the controls for adjusting the effect of the plug-in. All of the plug-ins controls are adjusted either using a slider or by entering a number. The controls are well labeled and with few exceptions easy to understand what they do.

While the controls for each plug-in are minimal there is a great deal of power available. If you can't find a preset that works for you, you should have little trouble selecting a preset that comes close and then going in to basics tab and adjusting the settings to get what you want. Being able to save and load these custom settings is a real time saver.

Nearly all of the plug-ins require that you first make a selection in your image, others can be used either with or without a selection. The JPEG Repair for example can use a selection which enables you to choose where the JPEG repair is applied. This is great for fixing overly troublesome spots leaving the rest of the image alone.

I have to say this collection of plug-ins is quite impressive with the exception of the SmartFill filter, I have found it to be very hit and miss. On some images for some objects it works like a dream on others not so much. Basically what I am saying is like anything that does any type of automatic selection, blending, cloning, adjusting, etc. you will find some images that it works well on and others that it doesn't. For those that doesn't, I suggest that you play with the settings and see if you can improve the results also if need be work with smaller selections you may have to apply it several times to take care of the entire problem but it may work better for you. By the way this limitation isn't unique to Alien Skin's Image Doctor 2, many things like the magic wand, auto-color and other such auto tools are hit and miss as well. With the images I tested SmartFill with it worked quite well about 50% of the time, the other 50% of the time I had to use other methods including a combination of Smart Fill and the clone or patch tool or just forgetting Smart Fill all together.

If you do any kind of photo retouching or restoration Image Doctor 2 can save you a great deal of time while keeping the finished work high quality and professional looking. Just don't expect 100% automatic 100% of the time. Like most things in life you may have to do a little work yourself, yah I know that's shocking but that's life and image editing. We would all kill for a plug-in that could take any image and make it perfect but until computers can think that isn't going to happen and when they finally can think we will be far too busy running from Terminators to care all that much.

Needs

• Intel Pentium 4 processor or better (or compatible)
• Windows XP or later
• 1024MB of RAM
• 1024x768 or greater monitor resolution
• Host applications supported
• Adobe Photoshop CS2 or later
• Adobe Photoshop Elements 4 or later (Macintosh)
• Adobe Photoshop Elements 5 or later (Windows)
• Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2
• Adobe Fireworks CS3