I found that FocalPoint 2.0 continues to be very easy to use and apply. You take your image in Photoshop and select FocalPoint from the panel. Then you start with a FocusBug that you place on the image. By changing the four shorter extender bars you control the size of the sweet spot and by changing the longer bars you control blur, opacity, and the feather. You also have slider bars on the side panel that you can control as well. You can also rotate your bug to get just the placement you need. Once you are done, you select apply and you are then returned to Photoshop with your image in a new layer.
Of the new features I really like the ability to use multiple FocalBugs. It gives you much more control over your image. In the image of the two girls above, it would have been much harder to keep their faces in focus with just one bug. You would have had to expand the bug across both making it harder to control the outlying areas.
The other thing is the FocalBrush. Now I can brush in some blur into the background between the girls where I don't want the detail to be a distraction. You have control over the size of the brush, the opacity, and the feathering as well.
If you want to take control of the focus of your image, if you want the ability to introduce your own sense of depth-of-field, then you need Focal Point 2.0. It will give you instant creative license and more control over directing your viewer's line of sight. I highly recommend FocalPoint 2.0.
Article comments
1 - Pelle Piano
I like this filter though it seems to have a bug and some shortcomings.
The bug being that there is no soft transition between a non blurred area and a blurred one, there is a sharp annoying "border". This remains, using focus bugs, selection or trying to brush it with feathering or whatever. ( the brush is painfully slow when having the image open, better with just the mask showing ).
I also would have welcomed a fetahring parameter for selections, its only avaiable for bugs and brush.
I chose between using the Lens Blur in Photoshop, which is actually very good, but has little control over "blooming" which is essential and it is to slow.
Bokeh from Alien skin had to little controls for my taste, and it could not make smooth transitions based on a selection ( often you want to make aselection fast in Photoshop first ( or be very exact, as it is faster to make masks in Photoshop ). It has a nice blooming feature that can really boost the highlight though.