First - you need to have at least three things.

1. Photoshop CS3 Extended or Photoshop CS4 Extended
2. PhotoTools 2 Standard or PhotoTools 2 Professional Edition
3. A video file that you wish to edit that can be opened in Photoshop CS3/4 Extended

The following video formats are supported in Photoshop CS3/4 Extended (sources: here and here):

• MPEG-1
• MPEG-4
• MOV
• AVI
• FLV from QuickTime is supported if you have Adobe Flash 8 installed.
• MPEG‑2 is supported if an MPEG‑2 encoder is installed on your computer.

Next, in Photoshop, open your video file and then open (if it isn't already) the Animation window from the Window menu.

The next thing to do is to define your Work Area. This is the area of the video that you want to apply the effects to. Move the play head to the first frame that you want to start applying an effect to. Then from the palette menu (that little triangle facing down next to the four lines), choose Set Start of Work Area.

Move the playhead to the last frame and then from the menu choose Set End of Work Area.

Next, move your playhead anywhere inside the work area and then launch PhotoTools 2 (Standard Edition or Professional Edition).

Choose the effect or effects and click the Apply button. When you do, you'll see the following dialog box from PhotoTools 2.

Click the button Apply to all Frames. Depending on the effect and the length of your work area, this can take some time. I did this on a 30 second clip (1920 x 1080 HD) that used several different effects in the PhotoTools 2 stack once and it took about 40 minutes. Yes, that is a bit of time, but the alternative is to spend a bunch of money on effects filters made for your preferred video editing application. This may or may not be an option and your willingness to be patient while Photoshop renders the effect and your video will probably influence your decision to do this kind of thing.

Once the effect has been applied to your video, you'll see a new layer in the Animation palette.

You're almost there. You now just need to render the video back out. To do this go to the File menu and choose Export > Render Video.

There you go. That's how you can apply a PhotoTools 2 effect to video in Photoshop CS3 or CS4 Extended.

One of the new effects in PhotoTools 2 Professional Edition is called Krypto Glasses by Kevin Kubota and I really like the effect but hadn't found an image of mine that I wanted to use it on until the other day with this shot. I like how it really darkens the edges and gives a much more stylized look to the photo. If you already own PhotoTools 2 Professional Edition and want this preset, go over to the onOne Exchange and download it for free.

[flv:http://www.ononeexchange.com/video/PhotoTools2_Kevin_Kubota.flv 512 384]

The funny thing here is that I never would have thought of using the Velveteen effect on a portrait shot as I've always thought of it as more of a landscape effect. However, that changed for me when I was going through the latest images published to the onOne Flickr group and saw this image that uses the Velveteen effect and it made me want to go try it out for myself.

PhotoTools 2 is a free update if you own the Plug-In Suite 4 so be sure to use the Check for Updates menu item within one of the Plug-In Suite 4's plug-ins. If you're new to PhotoTools 2, you can learn more here and request a demo download as well.

Please note, Genuine Fractals 6 (standard and professional editions) are scheduled to ship around the end of November or the first week in December depending on how fast we can get disks back from our CD replicator.

PhotoTools 2 (standard and professional edition) won't be shipping until late January 2009.

I apologize for any confusion the eNews may have caused.

On October 23, 2008 at the PhotoPlus Expo in New York, we announced three new products that are on the immediate horizon. Genuine Fractals 6, PhotoTools 2 and Plug-In Suite 4.5. I'll write a brief summary of each or you can read the respective press releases here, here and here.

New Features in Genuine Fractals 6
Texture Presets - Genuine Fractals 6 now includes texture presets allowing photographers to get the most out of the patented resizing algorithm that powers Genuine Fractals. The presets are designed to give users an easy way to set the key algorithm parameters to get the highest quality enlargement based on the type of image the user is starting out with no matter the size or subject matter.

New Gallery Wrap Feature - Photographers are often faced with losing part of their subject when some of the image is wrapped around the thick frames used to create canvas gallery wrap prints. With Genuine Fractals 6 Professional Edition, photographers have an easy way to increase the edge areas of the image by reflecting or stretching the margins to allow for canvas wrapping without having to sacrifice important details in the image.

New Batch Processing - Photographers who need to resize multiple images can now do so in a very efficient workflow thanks to the new Batch Processing feature in Genuine Fractals 6. Based on the Batch Processing Engine developed initially for onOne Software's PhotoTools Professional Edition, photographers can choose which files to resize, change file names, save files to a new location and file type, change and embed a specific color space to the new file and optionally add a customized watermark to help protect the photographers work.

Tiling for Smaller Printers - This new tiling feature allows photographers to resize their images to any desired size and then have Genuine Fractals 6 create the necessary documents so that the image can be printed on a smaller format printer. For example if the photographers desired output size is 24" x 30" but their printer can only print a maximum size of 8" x 10" they can use the new tiling feature to break the final 24" x 30" file into a matrix of nine 8" x 10" images that are returned as separate files in Photoshop.

Support for Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 and Apple Aperture 2.1 - In addition to support for Adobe Photoshop CS4, Genuine Fractals 6 Professional Edition will also support Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 and Apple Aperture 2.1 putting the industry standard for image resizing inside these photography workflow applications.

Additional Enhancements - Several other features of Genuine Fractals have been improved including the document size presets which make resizing and cropping to fit much easier; an improved crop tool that allows photographers to define a crop in any direction as well as additional user experience improvements.

Genuine Fractals 6 is a free update to anybody who has purchased Genuine Fractals 5 on or after October 23, 2008. Also, if you are a registered owner of the Plug-In Suite 4, you'll get Genuine Fractals 6 for free.

PhotoTools 2
New Effects Library - The new Effects Library in both editions of PhotoTools 2 make it easier to choose from the collection of over 300 effects. Photographers will be given several new options for finding the perfect effect or combination of effects including:

* Improved Category Mode - This mode is organized in a common photographic workflow that will be familiar to photographers. Effects are organized by categories such as Image Optimization, Portrait Enhance, Landscape Enhance, Color Tints, etc. Choosing a category reveals the available effects within.

* New Keyword Mode - Using emotive keywords and descriptors, photographers narrow down the list of effects to just those that match their unique search criteria. For example, a photographer can click on a keyword like Black-and-White and then click on a mood descriptor such as Warm and Grainy. Effects that match those two search criteria will be displayed for the photographer, greatly improving the process of locating a type or style of effect.

* New Preset Mode - This new mode displays a list of presets or effects �recipes� that are included with PhotoTools or any presets that a photographer has created for themselves. Additionally, any presets that a photographer has downloaded for free from the onOne Exchange (http:/www.ononeexchange.com), a community site dedicated to PhotoTools users, will appear in this list as well.

* New Effects Preview - Knowing what an effect will do to a photo is critical in the decision making process and PhotoTools 2 provides a new preview mode that includes dozens of new before and after previews for each effect to help photographers make the best choices for communicating their vision through enhancing their photographs.

New Photographic Effects - Designed by photographers for photographers, PhotoTools 2 includes dozens of new effects to meet the needs of today's digital photographers. PhotoTools 2 Professional Edition expands upon the Standard Edition with additional photographic effects developed by Photoshop guru Jack Davis and professional wedding photographer Kevin Kubota..

New Support for Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 and Apple Aperture 2.1 - To provide photographers using Lightroom 2 with a seamless, integrated workflow solution to go between Lightroom and Photoshop and back to Lightroom, all of the PhotoTools 2 Professional Edition presets are accessible from directly within Lightroom 2. When a photographer chooses a PhotoTools 2 Professional Edition preset from within Lightroom 2, the file will be handed directly to Photoshop where the PhotoTools 2 Professional Edition effect is applied and then returned to Lightroom 2 automatically. Photographers will benefit from this new integration as they will be able to send multiple photos to Photoshop in a single step and have all files returned to Lightroom 2 without having to edit each file individually. In the same manner in which PhotoTools 2 Professional Edition supports Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2, it will also support Apple Aperture 2.1. Aperture 2.1 users who also have Photoshop CS3 or CS4 installed can employ PhotoTools 2 Professional Edition in their image editing workflow to apply any of the included 300+ photographic effects or their own custom presets

New Masking Support - New in PhotoTools 2 will be the ability to create masks on each effect. This will allow the photographer to paint an effect in or out from directly within PhotoTools. Effects can still be sent back to Photoshop with a layer mask for future editing./p>

Easy Access to the onOne Exchange - The onOne Exchange is a new community website managed by onOne Software that enables users of PhotoTools to download free presets (or combinations of effects) for their own use. Users of PhotoTools can also upload any presets that they have created in PhotoTools to be shared with other PhotoTools users. Access to this new site is built directly into the PhotoTools user interface.

PhotoTools 2 will be a free update for anybody who purchases either version of PhotoTools 1 on or after October 23, 2008. Registered owners of Plug-In Suite 4 will get a free update to PhotoTools 2 Professional Edition when it ships.

Plug-In Suite 4.5
The Plug-In Suite 4.5 will include the Professional Editions of Genuine Fractals 6, PhotoTools 2 and PhotoFrame 4. It also includes Mask Pro 4, PhotoTune 2.2 and FocalPoint 1.0.

Plug-In Suite 4.5 is a free upgrade to all registered owners of Plug-In Suite 4.