There are two other presets and a manual setting offered, the presets being Portrait and Vivid, and the manual controls, a set of sliding bars in color ranges, something called Spotlight and Fill. The "Vivid" preset brings in a saturation and contrast kicker, and the "Portrait" preset proffers a "flatter" version (lower contrast and saturation). Spotlight and Fill sliders behave like the Shadow/Highlight control in Photoshop. The manual controls allow you to mess around with the color and contrast in ways that can be worked in Photoshop, but doing so in Photoshop still remains within the RGB model, so, according to TIL, the changes will still not yield full color fidelity.

As you work on the sliders or in Full Spectrum a smallish preview window shows the changes. The window might show some banding, but this is not what will happen in application to the image; it's simply that the preview is at 5 bit. Getting a larger preview window would help, but here you are not dealing with sharpening, but color, and you can see the difference in the window provided. I worked in a dupe layer to see the before and after, and in many cases was able to work the sliders to gain a more pleasing color effect. But I was using it for color control, not for color correction, but that's something that will become tempting once you begin to see what the controls allow.

True Color?

This is a classic shot for DCF Full Spectrum, a purple and magenta floral. This is the post-DCF shot, and the greens have opened up and the subtle color of the blossom shines through. Was this the "true" and original color, as seen by my eye? Frankly, I don't remember, but it's a very nice rendition nonetheless. © 2005, George Schaub, All Rights Reserved

In all, DCF Full Spectrum offers an intriguing approach to color, one that is device independent so that it can be used on any RGB image, photographed or scanned. With certain photographs (depending on color) the effect is subtle at best. But if you do a setup with greens and purples and then place the uncorrected next to the corrected image on the monitor, you will see the effect. If enhanced color fidelity in the green, blue, and purple range is your desire, the DCF plug-in seems to do the trick.

The DCF Full Spectrum plug-in costs $49. For more information, contact Tribeca Imaging Laboratories, Inc., 648 Broadway, Ste. 700, New York, NY 10012; (646) 383-4608; www.tribecalabs.com.