Aperture 3 and NIK- plugins, problems...

Question

I wonder whether others like me have experienced problems after rendering a photo in NIK's HDR EFEX Pro, and returning to Aperture 3....the latter crashes rather often? Any comments about this issue would be most welcome. Mamster 37

Answer 1

Hi.
I just happen to have the same problem. I reported it to Nik Technical Support and was given this advice :
HDR Efex Pro 2 takes advantage of the Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) of the computer system. The GPU is also sometimes referred to as the Display Adapter or Video Card, in any case they are all the same. Sometimes certain video cards will not handle this additional processing. You will note this when opening an image into HDR Efex Pro 2 and one or more of the following happens: 1.) HDR Efex Pro 2 will crash right away, or 2.) if it opens the imported image will sometimes not be displayed correctly (solid gray, black or white image), or 3.) the buttons will not display correctly, or 4.) the responsiveness is simply very slow.
In order to resolve this, the first measure would be to update the Display Adapters or GPU driver.
Mac Users: Generally the video card that comes with your Mac will be updated automatically. The exception may be when there has been an additional video card added. In that case the user may need to go to the video card manufacturer's website to download an updated driver for their secondary GPU. If you are using Mac OS Snow Leopard (10.6) ensure to update to 10.6.6 or higher as this can affect performance. If this does not apply to you, please go to the next section below.
Windows Users: Locate the manufacturer of the GPU as well as the model number.Once this is determined, it is then recommended to go directly to the GPU manufacturer's website (best option) or if that is not possible to go to the computer manufacturer's website (secondary option) to obtain an updated video card driver. It is NOT recommended to use Windows Update as in general we have found that these drivers are not updated as frequently. To identify which video card you have please do the following:
Click on Start >Control Panel>System & Security >System >Device Manager and then click on the plus next to Display Adapter, this should display the make and model information.
Go to the manufacturer's website (you may need to search for it via Google) such asNvidea.com and with the model number you should be able to search for the latest driver. If you are unable to locate the driver you may need to contact the manufacturer of your computer to obtain an updated driver.
Once the latest GPU driver is located,download and install the new driver.
Restart the computer and try HDR Efex Pro 2 once again.
If after following the above steps, you are still experiencing the same issue, the next step will be to either disable the GPU (if possible) or force HDR Efex Pro 2 to not use the GPU (safe-mode). If HDR Efex Pro 2 states your GPU is not in use, the following steps may still be necessary to improve performance. In order to disable the GPU in HDR Efex PRO 2 please do the following:
If you are able to open HDR Efex Pro 2 and can see part of the interface, see if you can click on the"Settings" button in the lower left.
In Settings locate the section "GPU" and expand it, in this section you will see a check box "Enable GPU Processing", uncheck this so the GPU will be disabled, then close the settings window.
Close out of HDR Efex Pro 2 (click Cancel), quit out of any and all host applications (Photoshop, Lightroom, Aperture), and then relaunch HDR Efex Pro 2 to see if this corrects this issue.
If you are unable to disable the GPU via settings (e.g. HDR Efex Pro 2 crashes or the buttons are not displaying correctly), please try the following steps below after quitting out of all host applications (Photoshop, Lightroom, Aperture):
Mac Users:
Open a finder window (or double click on the Macintosh HD on the desktop) and navigate to:
Macintosh HD : Users : <user name> : Library :Preferences : Nik Software : HDR Efex Pro 2
Locate the file, HDREfexPro2.cfg and right-click and choose "open with..." and then click "Choose" and then locate the applications, "TextEdit" to open this file.
At the very beginning (before all the text) of the configuration file, paste the following code below verbatim:
<configuration>
<group name="INTERN">
<key name="UseSafeMode" type="bool" value="1"/>
</group>
</configuration>
Now save the file, close it and relaunch HDR Efex Pro 2 and see if the issue has been resolved.
I have follwed all the recomendations but with no results. I talked to Nik's Support today and together we have verified that the tiff stored by Nik HDR Efex Pro 2 inside the Aperture Librarty is fine. The problem is with Aperture graphic memory management. As a matter of fact, if you experience the problem, you will also see that not only the image edited with HDR Pro 2 can be affected, but also any other you open in your strip after it has occured the first time.
Below is a typical result.