Nik Software 'Analysing' WTF?

[Josh-H]

I am quite perplexed at Nik Software's plug ins - particularly the Dfine for cleaning up noise. This plug in does an excellent job - but upon opening an image in Dfine it takes a good 5 seconds+ to 'Analyse' the image. During this time CPU usage is pegged no more than 6%, there is more than 45 Gig of RAM free and there is nothing in the way of hard disk in/out writes (and I am working off an SSD anyway). So I have no idea what the heck it thinks its doing when its 'analysing' because it certainly isn't taking advantage of my machine's processing power. I thought it might be a video card issue - but I ran some tests and the ATI Radeon 5770 certainly isn't the bottleneck. Seems no matter what system I try this on it always seems slow to 'analyse'. Anyone got any idea on this? 5 seconds might not seem like much - but image after image it gets frustrating.. especially when there is CPU & RAM available to crunch this.

[kaelaria]

It's most likely poor programming, not taking advantage of multithreading.

[Isaac]

Hmmm if 'Analyse' was using GPU for highly parallel processing would that show up in the CPU use monitor?

[SunnyUK]

there is more than 45 Gig of RAM free

You must like your computers big and powerful!

[Josh-H]

You must like your computers big and powerful!

RAM is like good single malt scotch whisky.

You can never have enough. 

[Josh-H]

Hmmm if 'Analyse' was using GPU for highly parallel processing would that show up in the CPU use monitor?

Honestly, I have no idea. But I don't think the Nik Software would be pushing anywhere near the kind of processing this card can handle. So I really doubt the GPU is the cause.

I think its just poor coding.

[Isaac]

Have you reported the problem you're experiencing to Nik Software?

[walter.sk]

I think its just poor coding.

Afraid you're right.  I just upgraded my Google/NIK collection.  Not only does it take longer to render the image while in the NIK software and alternating between filtered and original views, but when I save the results in PS CC it takes appreciably longer to process, especially if I have aggregated two or three filters, as in Color Efex.  It has really slowed down since the previous version of the full set.

[BernardLanguillier]

Afraid you're right.  I just upgraded my Google/NIK collection.  Not only does it take longer to render the image while in the NIK software and alternating between filtered and original views, but when I save the results in PS CC it takes appreciably longer to process, especially if I have aggregated two or three filters, as in Color Efex.  It has really slowed down since the previous version of the full set.

Silver eFx feels faster to me.

Cheers,
Bernard

[paulziets]

I have also updated and found things a bit slower in general. More troubling is the loss of the colour popping function in Silver Efex Pro 2. It works on screen but does not get processed into the final image, leaving a plain b&w layer. Nik are aware of this and have advised me to access Siver Efex via the selection tool. That bit of advice has me totally confused as I have no idea what they mean. They are working on the problem, so here's hoping.

Despite these teething problems, overall Nik software is a valued set of tools in my photographic toolbox.