Issue with Nik plugin filters and PS CS5

I use PS CS5 and the latest version of Nik filters on my Mac Pro running OS X 10.7.5.  Until recently, this worked as expected.  Over the last few weeks or so, I noticed that with some filters, like Nik RAW presharpener or output sharpener, the dialog box appears but the names for the sliders do not (please see the screen shown below; FYI, this is not limited to Nik Sharpener Pro – I mentioned this because this is one of the filters I use the most).  As far as I know, aside from perhaps updating Adobe flash for Safari, and updating Firefox, my system has not been modified.  Restarting PS and/or reinstalling the Nik collection has not resolved this.

This isn't a big issue when I use filters I work with frequently but if I try something new, I can't always tell what the slider does.  This also affects some dialog boxes such as those that ask if you want to apply or discard a particular effect – the boxes are present, but the words apply or discard do not appear.  Any ideas how to correct this? TIA.

Is this the original Nik suite or is this the Google Nik suite? If it isn't the Google version, I urge you to uninstall all of the original Nik stuff and install the Google Nik version. Even if it is, you may need to reinstall.

Hi EJ,

Thanks for the quick reply. The version I downloaded and reinstalled (after uninstalling what ever version I had previously) is nikcollection-full-1.2.11, which according to my Mac, has a creation date of April 6, 2016 , if that means anything. I think this is the google version, and as I said, installing this version did not clear the issue.

Given this somewhat unusual behavior, I thought there was a chance that my previous Nik installation may have not been executed properly, I downloaded the same .dmg file again, uninstalled my Nik collection, and then ran the installer from the latest download. When I open a file in PS, and click the presharpener filter, the same problem occurs – no labels for any of the sliders.

Also, I just tried to use my filters in LR5, and the same problem exists.

Anyone have any luck submitting a Nik issue to Google? I could not find a way to submit a problem to them.

Hmm, try changing the interface colors of Photoshop - perhaps the letters and the background are the same color...  Just a shot in the dark...

Here is how mine looks:

Here's another long shot -- it's a link to google nik support about troublesome duplicate fonts on the mac.
nik sharpener crashes

EJ, for once I was ahead of you .  I already tried changing the colors – still no labels showing.  My window used to look just like yours.

Gary, I will checkout that link.  Thanks for the help.

I checked out the link you provided Gary, and did remove several duplicates.  None were in the Arial family, and this did not clear the problem unfortunately.  Someone else suggested the issue is probably not with duplicate fonts, but rather with a missing font.  Does anyone have any ideas how I can troubleshoot this possibility?  I restored my fonts to default via Font Book.app but this too didn't change anything.  I appreciate the help.

Hmm it may be a Photoshop font that got corrupted somehow. Perhaps a PS reinstall action or possibly clearing the PS preferences file might clear this up. Try clearing the preference file first. Save your workspace so that you can easily restore PS to the way you had it configured after clearing the preferences file.

Martin,

Hopefully your post to the nik help forum will produce some positive results. Did notice the comment that a corrupted nik presets file can cause peculiar behavior in the nik plugins?

[edit] By the way, have you tried reinstalling the Arial font? A corrupted font file would likely cause problems too!

Gary

BINGO!  That was it Gary.  I opened up my Fonts Disabled folder and found several, including Arial.  I moved these back into my Font folder and voila my text is back.  Gary and EJ, thanks for taking the time to help me – I genuinely appreciate your time and efforts.

Awesome. Arial is a very common font - without it, a lot of things wouldn't work right but most apps are smart enough to replace it with just plain untagged text if missing. This is a miss on the part of the Nik developers.

Martin 095 wrote:BINGO!  That was it Gary.  I opened up my Fonts Disabled folder and found several, including Arial.  I moved these back into my Font folder and voila my text is back.  Gary and EJ, thanks for taking the time to help me – I genuinely appreciate your time and efforts.

That's good news Martin. Congratulations on sorting out the problem!