Perhaps the biggest knock against nik’s plug-ins for Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom has been their price. At a couple hundred bucks a pop, buying the full suite could cost you as much as buying Photoshop itself.

Google (nik’s new owner) has changed all that with one stroke of the pen. Rebranding the nik plug-in line as nik Collections, the whole suite is now priced at a more than competitive $149. Certainly Google hopes to make up for any revenue lost on an individual copy with a huge increase in volume.

There are two other pieces of good news as well. Existing nik customers (at least of their current suite) are eligible for a free upgrade to the complete collection of six plugins. Perhaps more importantly this step also indicates Google is willing to stick with the much-loved nik suite of plug-ins, at least for now.