Plugin Galaxy
February 2, 2001
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Today's web sites face an inordinate amount of competition at the mere
click of a mouse, making presentation more important than ever if site
owners want to draw attention to their message.
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Plugin Galaxy is a program that can help anyone from the artistically
challenged to the most talented of artist make web sites more
attractive and, perhaps, give them the edge to draw readers away from
the competition.
Plugin Galaxy is an add-on program that provides more than 20 plugins
carrying more than 120 basic effects. What sets Galaxy apart from many
others is that, while most are designed to work with one application,
such as Adobe Photoshop, Galaxy works with more than 20 applications.
Using sliders, check boxes, dialog boxes, color pickers and previews,
Galaxy features four interfaces to accomplish its many tasks, and it
works on both PC and Macintosh environments.
Here is a look at the various effects buyers get for their $49.95:
- Alpha Tool: Lets users adjust the alpha settings,
including inversion and removal.
- Bluuur: An intensity slider enables users to adjust the
amount and type of blur they use.
- Breakfast: Not sure about the name, but what it does is
make wave effects and enables users to change the amplitude of said
waves. Colors can be adjusted and zoomed; effects can be angulated.
Useful for making background tiles.
- Colorize: Apply all types of color effects, including
cartoon look.
- Cryptology: Select eight numbers to encrypt a photo, then
use those same numbers to decrypt it.
- Edge Tool: Great tool for applying those fancy edges to
photos by changing the amplitude of the waves.
- Feedback: A way of making swirling patterns on a photo.
- Fusion: Creates good looking chrome, metal, and neon
appearances.
- Glass: Makes beveled-appearing glass effects.
- Grid: Creates borderless patterns.
- Instant Mirrors: Users can make vertical, horizontal,
quadrant, or crossing mirror looks.
- Noiseee: Nice effects tool, creating appearances of edge
detection, color emphasis, and adding simple noise to photos.
- Pop Art: Creates colorful popart type effects for that
'60s and '70s "hippie" look.
- Rainbow: Add gradient color effects with the typical
rainbow-type colors, and apply them in various angles, blends, and
brightness.
- Sunshine: It makes it appear the sun is shining on a
portion of the graphic.
- Star: Creates a star effect that emanates from an area
of the picture.
- Synthesizer: Makes synthetic patterns such as those
created by old video synthesizers.
- Warps: Just what it says - it warps the photos in any
number of combinations.
- Zoom: Enables users to zoom in on particular areas of a
graphic.
Remember, too, that within each of these effects are a wide variety
of options and variations that can be applied. Graphics can be taken
to a greater realm by applying multiple features to them.
Plugin Galaxy features a good collection of filters that enable
users to cover about any need possible. Added to the filters that
come with many of the host applications on which it runs, Galaxy can
turn any of those programs into a studio within itself.
Note: At this same site, users can get Plugin Commander to
help keep track of all the plugins on their computer. It enables
users to turn filters on and off individually, and comes in a free
Light Edition and a Pro Edition ($29.95). However, the limitations
of the free version (applying Photoshop compatible plugins is not
possible, for example) makes the Pro Edition a far better choice.
- What is it called again? Plugin Galaxy
- Where can I get it?
http://www.thepluginsite.com
- What's in it? 20 plugins with more than 120 effects
- What are some of the host applications with which it works?
Macintosh Version: Photoshop 4 or higher;
Illustrator 7 or higher; ImageReady 2 or higher;
Pagemaker 6.5 or higher; PhotoLine 32 v7 or higher;
Canvas 7 or higher; Color It! 4 or higher.
Windows Version: Photoshop 4 or higher; PageMaker 6 or higher;
Illustrator 7 or higher; ImageReady; Corel Draw 7 or higher; Corel
PhotoPaint 9; Xara 2; Canvas 6, Paintshop Pro 5 or higher; Freehand 8
or higher; Fireworks 2 or higher; Ulead PhotoImpact 4 or higher. Check
the web site for more applications.
- How big is the download? 1.4 MB Windows; 3 MB Macintosh.
- How much does it cost? $49.95.
- Do you recommend it? Yes.
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