I’m excited to announce the release of Exposure X4, the newest version of our award-winning photo editor and organizer. Powerful new features and a giant leap forward in RAW processing quality make Exposure X4 the best choice for creating beautiful photos.
Among the new features are the following:
RAW Processing Enhancements
Improved shadow and highlight recovery enables you to extract the maximum amount of detail from your RAW images, and faster photo processing times speed up your editing.
Fully Adjustable Light Effects
Exposure’s high-quality light effects are now fully adjustable, so you can rotate and place them anywhere in your image, enabling a whole new level of creative possibilities.
Transform Tools
Exposure’s new transform tools enable you to easily correct tilted or skewed perspective, such as keystoning of buildings.
Smart Collections
Exposure now helps you organize your photo library by automatically populating collections based on camera data and metadata criteria that you apply. Shutter speed, keywords, ratings, and color labels are just some of the metadata that Exposure queries to build a smart collection. It’s a great way to speed up your photo library organization, helping you quickly find specific images in your collection.
Monitored Folders for Tethered Shooting
You can now edit, cull, and share your images in Exposure with a client or subject during a shoot thanks to Exposure’s new monitored folders that support tethered shooting. You can even have Exposure automatically apply one or more of its gorgeous presets to your images immediately after you take them.
Speed Enhancements
Image rendering is now up to 30% faster, file exporting is now up to 60% faster, and launch times have been reduced by a third, thanks to improvements in Exposure’s rendering engine.
Additional Features
- Support for new cameras and lenses
- Print presets for easy printing straight from Exposure
- Lightroom migration tool helps you move your workflow from Lightroom to Exposure
- Expanded workflow options that improve image copying and exporting
Visit the Exposure features page to see a full list of the new features.
If you purchased Exposure X3 on or after July 1st, 2018, we’ll be sending you a free upgrade to Exposure X4 soon. If you purchased any version of Exposure before July 1st, you can use your license code to upgrade to Exposure X4 for the upgrade price of $99.
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This is great. I already have Blowup, Snap Art 4 – should I get the $129 upgrade or just the exposure 4 upgrade?
You only need to purchase the upgrade for Exposure because you already own the latest versions of Snap Art and Blow Up.
I purchased Exposure X3 at the end of last month. Will you be sending me a link to upgrade?
Hi Julie – you should have received an email with a free upgrade already. I’ll check on it and email you about it momentarily.
Jimmy, I am in the same boat and I bought your X3 software for full price on Aug 7. Soon after that you guys released X4. If i knew I would have waited for the new version. Can I be eligible for the upgrade as well? Thanks, Danny Singh
You should have received an upgrade email, Danny. We sent them out to everyone that purchased Exposure X3 on or after July 1st, 2018. Let’s get you in contact with our support team about it. Here is a link to open a ticket. Alternatively you can look up your license code directly using this form.
I paid to upgrade to Exposure X3 during your big 25 year anniversary sale. If I had waited 30 days more I would have gotten Exposure X4, too. I would have thought you would have told people to hold off and wait for X4. Not sure if I am willing to pay another $99 given that I just paid $69 to get a now outdated software package.
Sorry, licenses purchased during the summer sale do not qualify for a complimentary upgrade. You’re welcome to download the free trial of Exposure X4 too see how much the new functionality benefits your workflow. http://www.alienskin.com/trial/
Exposure X4 would be a paid upgrade and would use a new license. If you feel like the new features in Exposure X4 are worth upgrading your software, you can use your current license code to get the reduced upgrade rate at our web store. https://store.alienskin.com/products/exposure-x4
I’m trying it. It’s so slow in rendering detail and noise reduction, when i duplicate a layer the new one has a blue/green dominant. Shadows recovery is still lagging beyond Capture one; i hope the rendering slowness can be fixed soon, I really like Alien Skin and would be happy to migrate from Capture one.
Thanks for your feedback about the shadows recovery. We’ll make sure the design team hears it.
Duplicating layers will also duplicate the effects of the layer, which is likely what is causing the blue/green coloring issue. You can r-click on the layer in the Layers panel and select Reset Adjustments from the r-click menu to remove any effects from the layer.
Let’s get you in contact with our support team about the slowness you’re experiencing. It could be caused by your computer configuration. Here is a link to open a ticket.
Exposure X4 trial does not appear to have controls to move Light Effects, the only control is Blend Mode ?
Thanks for commenting, Martin. Make sure that you have one of Exposure X4’s movable overlays selected. Those are the light effect options that have a hand icon on them. After you have one selected, set the Alignment option to Move Freely. That should make the Move/Rotate control appear. Take a look at this video, it covers techniques for applying borders, textures, and light effects, and it shows you how to move and rotate them.
I’m a headshot photographer. Is there any benefit to using this for something as basic as headshot editing or is this software geared more toward fine art portraits?
Exposure is useful for photographers of all kinds. For headshot photographers, the catalog free workflow makes photo organization efficient. And you can complete all of your work in a single interface, where every tool you need is visible. The innovative viewing and audition features in Exposure help you quickly cull your images. And the presets range from intense to subtle looks, so you can easily find and apply a preset for your images or create and use your own.
I just thought of one more helpful feature for headshot photographers. Exposure supports tethered shooting workflows, which enables you to preview the finished look of your images on a large screen, instantly. Then you can quickly cull, perform photo editing, and apply creative effects right after you’ve snapped the picture.
That’s great! I already use tethered shooting in my workflow. Thanks
Does X4 do merging multiple exposures? Focus stacking? and pano stitch?
Thanks
Thanks for commenting, Chris. Exposure X4 does not have those three features. However, all three of them are already on our list of features we’d like to add to Exposure. I’ll add notes about your interest in each of them to our logs which will get the design team’s attention.
I am a Fujifilm X-T100 owner. I am very interested in X4 and have downloaded the 30 day trial. Might there be an anticipated date that X4 sill support X-T100 RAW files?
Hi Rick – We have adding support for the Fujifilm X-T100 on our priority list, but we don’t have a firm date for when it will be made available. I’ll send a note about your interest in that camera over to the developers.
Will it be possible to specify the custom installation path (Win 7/Win 10) in order to avoid the overloading of the (usually smaller) C: drive? Is it somehow planned?
Thanks for commenting, Eugene. It is possible, but the installer user interface is not configured to allow alternate drive installations. Let’s get you in contact with our support team about it. They’ll show you how to make it happen. Here’s a link to open a ticket.
Already done, even twice – before and after the X4 intro. Last time I have asked about the custom installation path the answer was: not now. This means that for all the SSD+HDD configurations there is the only allowed way of the X4 installation if you do not want to play with the Windows Registry.
Right now, the registry change is the only option to install Exposure on a different drive. That is a good suggestion for a new feature, though. I’ll make a note for the design team about your interest in support of alternate install paths.
Six months later … Do not see any progress. Do you still plan to allow the path/folder selection during the installation?
Thanks for the suggestion, Eugene. We have documented your comments in our system, so our development team will take it into consideration as they plan future versions of Exposure.
Hi,
I’ve been working with Exposure since X2, and it has a lot to offer, but one thing disappoints me: it seems that it does not apply automatic lens corrections (i.e. those communicated in the camera metadata, and which effectively are part of the lens design). Pretty much every other serious Raw converter does this, so it’s hard to understand why Exposure does not. Exposure’s own corrections (when they exist), which might be appropriate at a second level, are not a good replacement for the manufacturer corrections. X4 is no different, although it supports more lenses. Also, Exposure does not recognise the default imaging area, but recovers extra pixels – this is a nice to have in some cases, but it should be an option, not a default. I want my Raw convertor to show me the view I framed, not something else. Until Exposure does these things, for me it can’t be a primary solution.
(for example, none of the Olympus f/1.2 primes are supported, either in X3 or X4. In fact the list of support m43 lenses is pretty short. This is nuts, because you don’t, or shouldn’t, _need_ to do anything to support these lenses apart from 1-time code to support manufacturer corrections)
Thanks for commenting, David. Exposure can have trouble detecting the proper lens. If that happens you may have to manually select it in the Lens Correction panel. The lens distortion corrections in Exposure are automatically applied to your photos if the lens is recognized and supported. Additionally, you can turn the panel, including any effects applied to your image using the controls on that panel, off to see a before and after.
Thanks for passing along the feedback about the extra pixels. I’ve passed that along to our developers to look into.
We have a list of all the lenses Exposure supports on our website, here. If your lenses aren’t on this list, that doesn’t mean they won’t work. There are plenty of lenses that Exposure supports that we haven’t had the chance to put through our rigorous testing procedures, yet. If you own lenses that aren’t displayed on that list, are you interested in submitting some for us to use for testing and internal evaluation?
Does exposure 4 support Fujifilm X-T3 RAW files? I already have X3 since May 2018 so do I have to pay the full price or do I get an upgrade discount?
Not yet, Gary. We are working on adding support for the Fujifilm T-T3, but we don’t have a date for when it will be available. You can purchase Exposure X4 using the discounted upgrade pricing.
Hi,
x4 really seems the software to do all that I want and leave lightroom. But is it possible to read the video format?
Hi Alain, thanks for commenting. Unfortunately, it is not possible to read video formats with Exposure. That’s a feature we have on our list of options to consider incorporating in a future version. I’ll add a note to our feature logs about your request, which will put it before the design team.
Hello! I’m testing the trial at the moment..
If I buy the Mac version, can I install it on both computers I use for editing?
Thanks for commenting. Each license of Exposure you purchase allows for two simultaneous uses, so you can install Exposure on both computer systems and you shouldn’t have any problems.
Is this x4 software…no destructive, like Lightroom is ?
Yes. Exposure X4 is a non-destructive RAW photo editor.
The improvement in X4 in handling shadows and highlights is tremendous. Bravo!
Thanks, Fred!
any update on support for fuji x-t3 raw support. I know its new but most other apps have it covered now.
Yes, X-T3 support has been added to the most recent update of Exposure X4. If you have previously tried Exposure X4, but do not own the software, we are happy to offer a trial extension. Please contact our support team about it, here. https://support.alienskin.com/hc/en-us/requests/new
Can you migrate LR presets to Alienskin no probs? thinking to switch. I’m a blogger and hubby is a photographer.
Thanks for commenting! There isn’t an automatic way to migrate presets from Lightroom to Exposure, but experimenting with settings combinations can usually recreate effects made in Lightroom. However, the look will not be recreated in Exposure using the same controls at the same amounts from Lightroom.
Exposure uses internal camera profiles to interpret the RAW image data, which are calibrated to be as neutral as possible. This is very different to the way Lightroom renders RAW files. Exposure does this to make its film preset simulations as accurate as possible.
I purchased the upgrade to Exposure X3 – so have the latest version of Exposure X4 which has worked with no problem but I now cannot find Blow Up – Snap Art is fine but how do I retrieve Blow Up from wherever its gone. Thanks Jimmy for your help.
Hi Susannah! If Blow Up was installed before you upgraded, Exposure X4 should detect it and be listed in the external editor options. I recommend downloading and installing the Exposure X4 Bundle installer if you’re not seeing it. If that doesn’t fix the issue, let’s get you in contact with our support team. Here is a link to open a ticket.
Are you planning to release on iPad Pro?
Thanks for commenting, Alfonso. We have heard requests for a version of Exposure for iOS before. We don’t have plans to build one at this time, but we will document your interest in it.
Is there really much difference between X3 amd X4? Wondering if it is worth the upgrade-I use it on every portfolio image.
There have been several features added since Exposure X3. A couple of the new features are movable overlays, expanded color sensitivity sliders, transform tools for perspective corrections, and a monitored folders ability which supports a tethered workflow. You can see a complete list of them on the Exposure Features page.
You can always take the free trial for a spin to see how Exposure X4 works for your needs.