Digital Anarchy (http://www.digitalanarchy.com), a provider of
special effects software for Apple and Adobe products, has released
two software products for use in Apple's Aperture.

Knoll Light Factory generates lighting effects that enhance the
natural or man-made lighting in photographs. ToonIt! Photo creates
cartoon-like images from photographs. Both products are currently
also available for Adobe Photoshop and Photoshop Elements.

Aperture gives photographers the ability to manage large groups of
images and work with RAW files. By using image processing filters
like ToonIt and Knoll Light Factory directly in this environment,
it's easy to design with multiple images and compare the results side
by side, says Jim Tierney, president of Digital Anarchy.
Knoll Light Factory is a tool for enhancing stock photos,
wedding/portrait photography, and landscape photography. The plug-in
creates realistic lens flares and other lighting effects, including
sun rays, street lamps, headlights, candle flames, light rays, and
glows.

ToonIt! Photo analyzes photographs and then creates flat regions of
color and outlines that produce a cel-shaded cartoon look. Aperture
users have a great deal of control to customize the cartoon with
different paint styles, shading and outlines. One of the key features
of ToonIt! is its ability to translate the details of the human face
and form into a believable cartoon.

Knoll Light Factory 3.0 and ToonIt! 2.0 for Aperture are US$129 each.
The products will be on sale for $99 each until Feb. 28. Owners of
the Photoshop version of these plugins can purchase the Aperture
plugins for $49 each.

The products are available for Aperture 2.0 and higher. Both products
run on Mac OS X 10.4, 10.5 and higher, and are native to both Intel
and PPC systems. Aperture is a Mac-only application.