As usual, Franzis software is welcome and appreciated.

Franzis seems to be more occupied with selling miniature cars and other projects unfortunately, because they haven´t made any significant updates to their photography apps. ( the projects family )

I recently purchased Black and White projects 8 Pro and the program installed under a different directory rather than the usual:

C:\Program Files\Franzis

Maybe they sold the projects family to another company?? I´m not sure.

The freeimage.dll trick mentioned here many times before, no longer works for newer cameras. The original project has been frozen for approx. 8 years.

I have a Sony A6700 camera, and I´ve had to convert my sony .ARW files to DNGs in order to work around the freeimage.dll project falling into oblivion.

Today I found a fork of the original project on GitHub. It’s called:

FreeImage Re(surrected)

It supports newer cameras and gets updated regularly. I am now able to open my .ARW files no problem. You can download the compiled .dll from here:

https://github.com/agruzdev/FreeImageRe/releases

Thanks for the givewaway. I used version 5 for many years also given away here.

The Franzis UI is unusual. It can seem unfamiliar & daunting. Fear not. It is reminiscent of the past, yet I find it is excellent for controlling what is a very comprehensive set of options. The interface is consistent in style across their programmes, so if you like the UI on one programme, you'll be happy with the others. I find it intuitive, & easy to understand & tweak.

I downloaded & installed the program. The interface is itty bitty!! I can't even blame it on my aging eyes-it's way too small for regular eyes! I have Windows 11. Maybe the program isn't designed for Win 11?

It's a bit of fun that can make some nice images... I already have it (from 2018, not GaotD) so won't be downloading it this time...

Here's a rough getting started guide...

As usual a complicated registration process if it's your first time with Franzis. Use a real e-mail address with them to help next time.

Load a picture, play with the canned effects on the left side, play with the Film Type on the right side panel (which should start on the “Finalise” tab).

The boxes at the top of the left panel just filter the effects that are listed in the panel, so ignore them initially. Although one use you might want to play with is, when you run down the presets looking for ones you like, you click the * beside them to mark them as favourites. When you're done click on favourites at the top to just show those (click "All" to return to seeing all the presets). This does mean with the next image you'll have to deselect ones that are already selected, if they aren't making the cut. Of course you could also use it just to slim down to a few general favourites.

Press and hold the right mouse button on the image to see the "before" image. Double (left button) clicking on the image zooms you all the way in/out (one after the other). A mouse scroll wheel also zooms. When not zoomed fully out the left mouse button can drag the viewing area around the image.

Changing to "Expert" in the right panel you can add filters from the list at the top, select them in the middle of the panel and tweak their effects at the bottom (may need scrolling down). (I'd ignore that until you are comfortable using it, or forever for that matter.)

On a faster computer you can use the Eye icon on the toolbar to disable the preview mode and show the final image in the main window, which IMHO is worth doing. (Although note items on the toolbar can disappear if the Window is too narrow to show everything. If you don't see something you think should be there make the program's window wider.)

When saving the final image note that the first dialog, where it asks for the title, is going to write that over the image, it isn't the file name.

The main disadvantage is the lack of Undo operations, you can set restore points though (which appear in a timeline).

The thing to get your brain around is it a huge pile of image processing tools, which are gathered together into presets in the left pane. All those options do is select a bunch of processing tools (as shown in "expert") and choose options for them, so they are infinitely tweakable in the right pane.

Good luck and enjoy!

P.S. I believe this version is high-DPI (i.e. 4k/5k monitor) friendly. If you do have issues I'd recommend, on Windows 10/11, that you right mouse button the program, select Properties, then the Compatibility tab, click "Change high DPI settings", tick "Override high DPI scaling..." at the bottom of the next dialogue and select "System" or "System (Enhanced)" - see what works best for you.

P.P.S. one other thing, sometimes they screw up and send English users an e-mail in German rather than English, just be laid back about it... it's part of their charm (err...)

P.P.P.S. Franzis stuff usually ships with an out-of-date Raw file converter library and I write a bit about getting a slightly less out-of-date one in a comment, but as the latest version I'm aware of is from 2019 I'll leave that bit out this time, unless anyone asks...

One of the gems you can occasionally find here is franzis.Even if they failed to bring me the BLACK WHITE projects 6 on time a few months ago, I'm not upset and will wait until the next time.

Whenever Franzis projects software is offered here I always download it. Not only is it really useful and fun software they always offer lifetime licences. When I upgraded my PC and lost mu Franzis software I actually found a good package deal on their website and purchased it. Registration is a bit complicated the first time but easy after that and wrath it,.

Here are a few samples of what you can do with Color Projects P
pro 6.

https://the5thc.blogspot.com/2023/01/photo-versions-created-with-franzis.html

https://the5thc.blogspot.com/2024/09/these-are-variations-on-photo-of-orange