Unable to access Topaz from Lightroom

[cortlander]

I recently updated to Mac OS X 10.11.1 El Capitan. I have several plugins running in LR 6.2 without problems - Nik, On1 10 suite, PortraitProStudio 15 etc. Except for Topaz.

While most plugins can be accessed directly, Topaz has a Fusion Express that needs to be set in LR as an editor. When you call Fusion Express from LR edit menu, it takes a few seconds, and gathers information about Topaz modules and the presents you with a choice to select one. You then have to click on its 'Run' button and the module, in my case Adjust or B&W opens up. At least it did prior to the El Capitan update. Since the El Capitan update, calling the Fusion Express editor does nothing. As such, I have no access to any of the Topaz apps.

The steps I took were:

1. Downloaded latest Adjust5, B&W and Fusion Express from Topaz site and re-installed Topaz and B&W
2. Changed file permissions for 'everyone' to Read & Write including enclosed files in Mac HD/Library/Application Support
3. Installed Fusion Exp and got the error as shown in attachment that I did not have access to the file FusionExpConfig.pdf
4. Went to that file and changed permissions to 'everyone'
5. In LR I set FusionExp as external editor
6. Did 'Edit in' FusionExp from LR
7. Made an appropriate selection to edit Original File or New one
8. Nothing happens after this. FusionExp does not do its thing and present a selection of Topaz apps.

This was about two weeks ago and I opened a support ticket with Topaz. Send a reminder four days later and another one the following day. I finally heard back that they had a high volume, and a link and video on how to do this upgrade on El Capitan. There was nothing new here that I had not done already including checking /usr/local permissions etc. I let them know, and they asked me to go to the terminal window and set the '777' permissions to the /Library/Application Support/Topaz Labs/ folder. I did that again. The problem is that when FusionExp installs, the permissions are back to 'no access' and the install halts.

That was one week ago. Couple of more reminders to Topaz produced no response. So I have two useless apps and will never buy another Topaz product.

I wonder what experience others have had with this issue, and what did you have to do to get it to work.

Thanks.

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

I wonder what experience others have had with this issue, and what did you have to do to get it to work.

Hi,

Have you restarted the computer before installing?

I'm not a Mac user with the Topaz utilities, so I'm not up to date with the issues that El Capitan created, and how to solve them, but restarting between uninstalling and reinstalling with the most recent application version occasionally helps on Windows, so who knows if the same applies to the Mac OS.

Cheers,
Bart

[Jeremy Roussak]

It's difficult to know exactly what your problem is, but the error message relates to what is almost certainly a documentation file (extension .pdf). I've no idea why it should have been necessary to change permissions. It may be that the PDF is buried somewhere inside a package, in which case changing permissions higher up the directory tree will have no effect.

I think it's unlikely that Bart's suggestion of restarting would help: it's almost never necessary when installing new, non-system software on a Mac.

I have Fusion installed and it runs without difficulty under LR6.3 and El Capitan.

Jeremy

[cortlander]

Thank you Bart and Jeremy. I deleted the old files, rebooted the PC, and re-installed Adjust5, BW and Fusion Exp. Once again the same error message. I can access the pdf file which is under Library/Application Support/Topaz Labs/FusionExp2/docs/. It just has some install instructions and makes no sense on why it should have an restrictions.

After removing the restricted permissions, I ran install again. Once more, the restrictions are back again and so is the error message.

Best,
cortlander

[Jeremy Roussak]

Thank you Bart and Jeremy. I deleted the old files, rebooted the PC, and re-installed Adjust5, BW and Fusion Exp. Once again the same error message. I can access the pdf file which is under Library/Application Support/Topaz Labs/FusionExp2/docs/. It just has some install instructions and makes no sense on why it should have an restrictions.

After removing the restricted permissions, I ran install again. Once more, the restrictions are back again and so is the error message.

I tried to duplicate your problem last night, with an interesting result.

Initially, all was fine.

I downloaded the Fusion Express installer from Topaz's site and ran it. At the end of the process, I saw the message you have seen, but since it referred only to a PDF, I ignored it. However, I then couldn't use FE from LR: as you have observed, nothing happened when I selected it from the "Edit in" submenu.

I then quit LR, downloaded the installer for Topaz Clarity and ran that. On restarting LR, all was fine again: FE opened as it should and showed me the list of available Topaz plugins.

It seems that there's something wrong with the FE installer but that the problem it creates can be fixed by running one of the plugin installers: I used Clarity but I imagine others might work.

Give it a try.

Jeremy

[Manoli]

I wonder what experience others have had with this issue, and what did you have to do to get it to work.

Allow me to save you an eternity of agony, a 2-word piece of advice: Give up.

Topaz have a truly excellent collection of add-ins, the problem is they never work in a consistent manner with 3rd party host applications. Use them in their in-house host application FX-lab, and all is in fine. You don't say whether or not you're also using Photoshop ( again a difference between CS6 and CC2015) - but if you are again there will be a difference in how/when the apps stall.

My experience is different to yours. Running Clarity, Detail, Infocus through Lightroom is fine (that 's with their obligatory FusionExpress2 intermediate host app). Use Edit-in ... and link to Photoshop produces inconsistent and unfathomable results - and no it's not an El Capitan issue - it's a Topaz issue, as can be seen by the sheer variety of incompatibilities that surface.

So you can appreciate the depth of the problem, I've attached two screenshots of what happens when I invoke the Topaz filter menu in Ps. The first run produces a clean list of apps, select one, Topaz loads and then freezes ( the ubiquitous spinning wheel). Force Quit is the only remedy. Try it again and your options are in the second screenshot ... Unfathomable.

Note to Topaz: You've got some excellent apps, they need work - life is too short.

Edit:
Make sure you have the latest version of their installers, all of which were upgraded to El Capitan. I know my results are different to your current experience, but for the record, the only way I can use the apps is by invoking them through Lightroom virtual copies and then loading the series as layers in Ps and masking accordingly.

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Allow me to save you an eternity of agony, a 2-word piece of advice: Give up.

Topaz have a truly excellent collection of add-ins, the problem is they never work in a consistent manner with 3rd party host applications.

Hi Manoli,

I'm wondering if it might have something to do with the Adobe CC applications. I have no issues, but then I'm on Windows () and use Photoshop CS6 and Lightroom 5.7. So, "never work in a consistent manner" is not my experience.

Obviously, also 'El Capitan' might create some issues of its own.

Cheers,
Bart

[cortlander]

I tried to duplicate your problem last night, with an interesting result.

Initially, all was fine.

I downloaded the Fusion Express installer from Topaz's site and ran it. At the end of the process, I saw the message you have seen, but since it referred only to a PDF, I ignored it. However, I then couldn't use FE from LR: as you have observed, nothing happened when I selected it from the "Edit in" submenu.

I then quit LR, downloaded the installer for Topaz Clarity and ran that. On restarting LR, all was fine again: FE opened as it should and showed me the list of available Topaz plugins.

It seems that there's something wrong with the FE installer but that the problem it creates can be fixed by running one of the plugin installers: I used Clarity but I imagine others might work.

Give it a try.

Jeremy

Jeremy, you are the Man! This worked!

So, installing FE AFTER installing Adjust and BW did not work.
Installing FE BEFORE installing Adjust and BW did the trick.

This is pretty sad on Topaz's part that users are left guessing how to install the software and have erroneous messages come up.

It was very good of you to take the time to investigate this.
Thank you so much - I had already given up on using these apps.

Best,
cortlander

[Manoli]

Hi Bart,

Indeed you may well be correct. It's not 'purely' Topaz but whatever it is, from the 'end-user-on-a-mac' point of view, it's exceedingly annoying and frustrating.

Here's a list of just some of the inconsistencies I've faced on a variety of OS X versions since Mountain Lion.

- Clarity works, Detail freezes (in Photoshop).
- Nothing works in Photoshop.
- Inconsistencies in Lr ( though this was resolved, I believe, with a new Fusion Express Installer)
- Invoking a Topaz plug-in in Ps, works first time around and then you get the screen shot in my previous post – totally unintelligible – applies to all Topaz products.
- There are more but I've managed to ban the memory from my consciousness .

I can't remember in detail, but I seem to recall uninstalling Ps to see if Lr worked without issue. It did – but then Ps never worked. And no – I didn't uninstall Lr to see if the opposite worked , I'd reached my limit by then.

As we are now El Capitan has proved to be the most compatible operating system – and that's in Lr only.  As we can see from the OP's post there's no evident rhyme or reason. I'm sure that Adobe are also part of the problem. Detail ran in CS6, but for me, the issues started with CC and potentially compounded by the forced OS upgrades.

–

Topaz have some great plug-ins. They're a wonderful companion simply because they fill in so many of Adobe's weaknesses. As I use Detail for 'output' sharpening and print through Lr , I've settled for the Lr compatibility, but it's regrettable that I can't seem to have reliability in both Lr and Ps because it would round off C1/Ps integration.

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Jeremy, you are the Man! This worked!

So, installing FE AFTER installing Adjust and BW did not work.
Installing FE BEFORE installing Adjust and BW did the trick.

Hi cortlander,

Great! Maybe useful to give the Topaz Labs support people this feedback, maybe it becomes easier to find the root cause for them as well. Apparently the FE installation triggers something on your system that it shouldn't, if other plugins triggered it first, or the other plugins trigger something that FE didn't.

Cheers,
Bart

[cortlander]

Allow me to save you an eternity of agony, a 2-word piece of advice: Give up.

Topaz have a truly excellent collection of add-ins, the problem is they never work in a consistent manner with 3rd party host applications. Use them in their in-house host application FX-lab, and all is in fine. You don't say whether or not you're also using Photoshop ( again a difference between CS6 and CC2015) - but if you are again there will be a difference in how/when the apps stall.

My experience is different to yours. Running Clarity, Detail, Infocus through Lightroom is fine (that 's with their obligatory FusionExpress2 intermediate host app). Use Edit-in ... and link to Photoshop produces inconsistent and unfathomable results - and no it's not an El Capitan issue - it's a Topaz issue, as can be seen by the sheer variety of incompatibilities that surface.

So you can appreciate the depth of the problem, I've attached two screenshots of what happens when I invoke the Topaz filter menu in Ps. The first run produces a clean list of apps, select one, Topaz loads and then freezes ( the ubiquitous spinning wheel). Force Quit is the only remedy. Try it again and your options are in the second screenshot ... Unfathomable.

Note to Topaz: You've got some excellent apps, they need work - life is too short.

Edit:
Make sure you have the latest version of their installers, all of which were upgraded to El Capitan. I know my results are different to your current experience, but for the record, the only way I can use the apps is by invoking them through Lightroom virtual copies and then loading the series as layers in Ps and masking accordingly.

Quite honestly, Manoli, I almost did give up.

I have been using Topaz through LR 6.3. After reading your post, I opened my Photoshop CS6. I did not see any special instructions to install in Photoshop. In the Filters menu, there was no Topaz Labs. I then physically copied the Topaz pluggins from the Library/Application Support/Topaz Labs sub folders. After closing and opening Photoshop the Topaz Lab apps appeared under Filters.

I did notice that while Lightroom is on 6.3, Updates in Photoshop CS6 show nothing new even though my Camera Raw is on 9.1, and as I open Photoshop from LR, I do get a message about the version mismatch. Are Camera Raw updates after 9.1 only for Photoshop CC?

What is so frustrating is the support. That ticket has been open for two weeks after several reminders. They just do not care. And this was the second such experience I have had with them. The first time I gave them a bad rating. Their reply was a bit optimistic, giving me a chance to change that rating:

"We're sorry to hear that you weren't satisfied with our response to your latest ticket: Unable to access Topaz Adjust5 or B&W 2.

At Topaz Labs, we truly strive to provide the best customer service experience that we can. Please take a moment to let us know if you have any suggestions that we can use in the future to avoid these poor experiences.

If you wish to change your rating or provide further details, you can do so with the links below:

How would you rate the support you received?

This ticket has been rated as Bad, I'm unsatisfied
You may still change your rating or comment."

Enjoy your day,
cortlander

[cortlander]

Hi cortlander,

Great! Maybe useful to give the Topaz Labs support people this feedback, maybe it becomes easier to find the root cause for them as well. Apparently the FE installation triggers something on your system that it shouldn't, if other plugins triggered it first, or the other plugins trigger something that FE didn't.

Cheers,
Bart

Good idea. I just sent them a link to this entire thread so they can understand some of the frustrations their customers feel.

My software company provides a Cyber Security platform for enterprises. Customer support is crucial to our existence. IBM, Microsoft may get away with sloppy support at times, but a small company like ours would get really dinged in this space if my support staff would take weeks to respond to customer issues.

Best,
cortlander

[Manoli]

What is so frustrating is the support.

I'm pleased you finally got your Lr installation working, I think there's a lesson there: Listen to Jeremy and ignore my advice!

But I would warn against automatically assuming that the order of installation is the solution. There are too many inconsistencies when one tries to install both Lr and Ps plugins plus it's almost impossible to trace the cause, in my experience.

I've settled on a workaround using just my Lr installation - but it would be great if Topaz/Adobe/OS X could all finally work together without these complications.

[free2australian]

I have Lightroom CC on my Mac with El Captain.

Same issue as you guys with Fusion Express gone missing.
 My contact with support as been less than satisfactory as response is concerned.

Be grateful if you could confirm that

1.  Should I re-download Topaz Express  or

2. Just download  some of the plug-ins which I paid  for

Which is the process do you recommend? Sorry I am a bit confused by it all.

thank you

Sue

[Jeremy Roussak]

I have Lightroom CC on my Mac with El Captain.

Same issue as you guys with Fusion Express gone missing.
 My contact with support as been less than satisfactory as response is concerned.

Be grateful if you could confirm that

1.  Should I re-download Topaz Express  or

2. Just download  some of the plug-ins which I paid  for

Which is the process do you recommend? Sorry I am a bit confused by it all.

thank you

Sue

Try as I suggest above. Download a plugin (I downloaded Clarity) and install it. Then see what happens.

Jeremy

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Be grateful if you could confirm that

1.  Should I re-download Topaz Express

Hi Sue,

From the earlier posts, apparently the correct order of installation matters. So yes, first download and install the most recent free version of the Fusion Express plugin for Lightroom.

2. Just download  some of the plug-ins which I paid  for

To make sure you get the latest version, and updates and upgrades are always free with TopazLabs, download the plugins that you purchased before or a trial version for the ones you want to purchase. Then install those freshly downloaded versions again.

Apparently that worked for others, so hopefully it will also get you back running them from Lightroom.

It seems that the Support people at Topaz Labs are a bit swamped by requests for assistance after they released their latest product, Topaz LayerEffects. Combined with the Windows 10 introduction and first major update, and the introduction of Mac OS El Capitan, I guess they have lots of things to figure out, what causes the issues some people are reporting, and whether there is some common cause that can be identified and remedied.

There can be many unexpected side effects when different software products clash, and this can hurt even really big companies because a small seemingly insignificant utility cripples their industry leading application. There is e.g. an issue on
Windows workstations and laptops with some DLLs that were wrongly compiled by Dell, and used for some of their utilities, but they render other software that depend on the correct versions unusable.

If the mentioned Fusion Express workaround of installation order works for you, please let the other forum members here know. It might also be useful to inform Topaz about how it fixed your issue, it might help them narrow down what's causing it.

Cheers,
Bart

[Manoli]

... and the introduction of Mac OS El Capitan, I guess they have lots of things to figure out, what causes the issues some people are reporting, and whether there is some common cause that can be identified and remedied.

As an update to an earlier post, since updating to the latest release of Photoshop CC (20151114r301 x64) the topaz plugins now function correctly with the exception of Detail3 - which though it 'works' , it's impossible to move the Ps image window to the back, or should I say impossible to bring the Detail screen to the forefront. Detail works but using it necessitates that you shift the original window almost off-screen , otherwise the Topaz interface is obscured.

No issues with any app via Lightroom.

/* sigh ..

[cortlander]

After I had described the workaround to this issue to Topaz Labs, and forwarded a link to this thread to them, their final response was:

"I understand the solution that you have arrived at, and I am aware that the issue with the Fusion Express 2 individual installer can cause conflicts if you have already installed Fusion Express 2 on your machine. Installing any of our plugins or the collection will automatically install Fusion Express 2, so that is how we suggest you set up the software."

I did not try this myself since the workaround did the trick for me and I figured it was best to leave it alone as long as it worked.

Best,
cortlander

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

After I had described the workaround to this issue to Topaz Labs, and forwarded a link to this thread to them, their final response was:

"I understand the solution that you have arrived at, and I am aware that the issue with the Fusion Express 2 individual installer can cause conflicts if you have already installed Fusion Express 2 on your machine. Installing any of our plugins or the collection will automatically install Fusion Express 2, so that is how we suggest you set up the software."

Hi,

That effectively amounts to the same solution, install the plugins last, but not the standalone installer of Fusion Express2 as the last one. The latest plugin versions will already also install the latest version of Fusion Express automatically.

Cheers,
Bart

[jrp]

On Topaz Labs' YouTube channel is a series of videos showing what you need to do to install the plugins on El Capitan.  I suspect that the underlying problem  is that  the security system is much stricter about where files can go in the latest OS X.