Does AI Have Real Value?

By John Frelich

Not long ago Topaz, amongst others, came out with AI (artificial Intelligence) with their “Studio” and products that offered the same intriguing named improvements. Does this have value to an amateur photographer? See for your yourself in the three images.

The first is the RAW image put into .jpg. on an overcast morning shot from the island of St. Martens looking toward St Barth some 30 miles away across the Atlantic. The Metadata identifies it was shot at ISO 400 with a Nikon D810 and a 70-300mm Nikor (f4.5-5.6P) lens set at -1ev, f11, at 1/2500/sec. The camera was handheld using the balcony railing at my Timeshare unit.

The RAW image was converted to .jpg without any adjustments. Lightroom (LR) did the color adjustments except for any increase in clarity. That was left to Topaz Studio 2’s AI Clear that was used with a crop in the 3rdimage. I purposely increased the size of the last two images to 1400×1000 pixels because the combination of everything allowed me to create a pleasing final image on my screen. Notice there are no halos or anything to decrease image quality.

Will it do the same for some of your images?

John Frelich is a Photo Guide with Arizona Highways PhotoScapes.