End of an era?

By Kevin La Rue

Last month, as I've talked to a number of pro photographers and enthusiasts, the news sunk in even a bit more that the venerable Nik Collection used by many was at the end of its road. According to a statement on Google’s website, there are “...no plans to update the Collection or add new features over time.”

While this wasn’t unexpected by a lot of people, it nonetheless has made a lot of people sad and searching for something new.

I am a former senior manager at Nik, and worked at the company for over 6 years from 2006-2012. Nik was a lot of fun and quite an energized, innovative place to work during that era. 

Kevin La Rue However, after the acquisition in late 2012 by Google, it was clear that the new company’s heart was in mobile and social networks, and minimal updates could be expected for the desktop software.

Soon I was fortunate enough to be recruited by Skylum and happily joined an equally innovative, equally energized team with a fantastic mission to provide easy-to-use and powerful editing software for every photographer. Having been intimately involved in the photo industry for years, it was easy to see how much promise and potential Skylum had, and more importantly, where we could go.

Now, almost 4 years of hard work later, that potential is being realized by our flagship editing products Luminar and Aurora HDR. 

Well-known photographers such as Trey Ratcliff, Scott Kelby, Serge Ramelli, Tony Corbell and many others are now using Skylum technology.

Scott Kelby Skylum has been impressing me for years with easy-to-use photo editing tools, and their new Luminar even takes it up a notch with an adaptable interface and some awesomely cool filters and presets. Collaborating with Skylum means that KelbyOne can share the latest tools and technology with our people.

On April 19, the Technical Image Press Association (TIPA) honored Luminar with it’s “Best Imaging Software 2017” award. We’re now recognized on par with Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom and Apple Aperture, all past recipients. The Nik Collection earned the award back in 2011.

Skylum products have been in the top-10 photo categories on the Mac App Store for 75 straight months in a row, since the App Store was launched. 5 times in the last five years, Skylum has been honored with a “Best of Mac App Store” award.

For those of you who are very familiar with the Nik tools, but maybe not Skylum, here’s a quick roadmap: 

Aurora HDR 2017, which we designed with significant assistance from the one and only Trey Ratcliff.

Luminar, our all-in-one standalone editor, includes features that replace or work really similar to Nik Color Efex Pro, Silver Efex Pro, Dfine, Viveza and Sharpener Pro.

It’s not a stretch to imagine that during the development of our products we took a long look at the leading products of the day and sought to exceed them.

I was lucky enough to have a front-row seat and personally contribute to the success of Nik Software and now to Skylum. It’s been one of the best times of my life. And, indeed, my time at Nik was a special era of digital photography and software.

But now, with the success of Luminar and Aurora HDR, our upcoming releases to support the Windows platform, and other innovations to be released this year, it’s easy to see that Skylum is writing an exciting new chapter in photo history. Will you join us?