Nikon D90

Picture Effects Mode (8.50)
While shooting, Nikon Picture Control applies a combination of image processing settings to an image. Six Picture Controls are available as presets: Standard (the default), Neutral, Vivid, Monochrome, Portrait and Landscape. Additional combinations of sharpening, contrast, brightness, saturation, hue, filter effects and toning can be applied and saved as custom Picture Controls.

Photos stored on the memory card can be altered in a wide variety of ways through the Retouch menu.The D-Lighting option allows you to control shadow detail, with two adjustment settings – not as powerful as the Active D-Lighting option available while shooting, but still capable of making a worthwhile difference. Red-eye correction, trim (cropping), monochrome, and small picture (640 x480, 320 x 240, 160 x 120) are self-explanatory. Filter effects mimic real-world screw-on filters, including a skylight, warm, red, green and blue filters, plus a highly customizable cross screen effect for those few of you who yearn to not only apply a cheesy twinkle effect to your photos, but specify the number of points, number of bursts, angle and length of points as well.

The color balance tool lets you tweak the hues in a selected photo along the red, green and blue axes, but the small thumbnail displayed makes this less practical than it might be. Image overlay lets you combine two saved RAW images to create a multiple exposure result. Quick retouch offers the sort of smart fix found in desktop software programs, at three intensity levels, but here again the small on-screen display makes the tool much less valuable than it might be. Straighten, on the other hand, is an unusual and welcome tool, superimposing a grid pattern over a stored photo and allowing a substantial pivot around a central axis. Distortion control corrects for barrel (where the corners seem to bow outward) or pincushion (where the corners seem to be pinched in) lens distortion. With a type G or D lens, this adjustment can be made automatically. With other lenses, or if you prefer hands-on control, Manual mode is also available. And if your goal is to make the photo look less accurate instead, try the digital Fisheye effect.