Using Essential HDR with a Mac

[inabech]

I have a MacBook Pro running OS X 10.5.5 and VmWare Fusion 2.0 (to run Windows applications) and use the Mac versions of Photoshop CS4 and Lightroom 2.0.  Running VmWare Fusion in Unity mode makes it easy to directly load files store on the Mac "side."

The trial version of Essential HDR runs very well under VmWare Fusion in Unity Mode.  With Unity I am able to load in CR2, JPG, and TIF files for tonemapping in Essential HDR.  Right now most of my photos are single image photos, although I have several multi-exposure RAW and JPEG files.

As far as a wishlist is concerned, I would, of course, love to have a Mac version that would export in CS4 Mac or even better a Photoshop Filter or script.  Understanding that this may be a long way down your development cycle list, I would like to make a couple of suggestions for next versions that would help Mac Intel Users use Essential HDR more seamlessly.

1.  Enable a user-configurable export dialog so that photos processed in EHDR could export directly into a Mac version of CS 2,3, or 4.
2.  Allow a save into actual CR2 files or other RAW file.  The trial version seems to only save into a JPEG or TIFF file with CR2 as part of the label?!?

Thank you for listening and congratulations on an amazing product.

Ina

[wukong dev team]

Thanks for your suggestions and interests in our product. #1, or some form of it, is currently on the standard feature list of Mac/Windows EHDR version 1.1. However, #2 requires more discussion. We see no reason to continue to use CR2 or other camera raw files as long term preservation format. It is slightly conflicting with our long term product strategy. But, I'd like to understand what you are trying to achieve by using CR2 as the format for both the source and the result. Are you concerned with source destruction? Or more space required for backup? Thanks again.