We have a winner! And it's been around, but the Google, she only today bequeathed it to me.

PTLens is a $15 plug-in for Photoshop and Aperture, as well as a standalone application that can be used as an External Editor in Lightroom. It's the first real-world example I've seen that shows how a standalone image-editing application can provide functionality in Lightroom 2.0 identical to that of a plug-in for Aperture.

PTLens performs a function many (read: me) were hoping to see built-in to Lightroom 2.0; the automated removal of lens distortion, with the additional option of perspective correction. I'll quote here from the comma-phobic O'Reilly Inside Lightroom blog:

There are already profiles for most any camera you’re likely to have if it’s more than a few months old because the publisher offers to make profiles for any camera for which the user will send them prescribed test shots. The PTLens folks then make up profiles for your camera and then publish them so that everyone who has the same make, model, and lenses will also have profiles. (Hint: If I were the camera manufacturer, I’d supply those tests to these guys a few days before the camera was released.) The program automatically knows what profiles to use because it gets the camera, model, lens, zoom focal length, f-stop, etc from the metadata of the file it’s been asked to correct.

Word to that. PTLens recognizes all my cameras and will now recognize my $15. Download it now and demo it on 10 images before deciding that it's well worth the price.

PTLens

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