The Bottom Line
Pros
- The industry standard for professional photo editing, graphic design, and digital imaging.
- Offers ultimate flexibility and more non-destructive editing features with every version.
- Photoshop CS4 includes many performance advances and productivity enhancing features.
- Photoshop can now take advantage of the graphics card's GPU for improved performance in certain a
- Supports unlimited RAM and 64-bit processing under Windows Vista 64-bit version.
Cons
- Steep learning curve.
- Price may be prohibitive for some.
- Buyers must choose between giving up features or paying more for the costly Extended version.
- GPU and OpenGL features increase the hardware graphics card requirements.
- No support for Windows Vista Home Basic Edition.
Description
- The industry standard for professional photo editing, graphic design, and digital imaging.
- Preview, organize, search, and manage image files with the Adobe Bridge File Browser.
- Combines tools for painting, drawing, retouching, adding notes, and working with type.
- Edit images non-destructively with layer styles, adjustment layers, masks, smart objects, smart filters, and history.
- Automate tasks and speed up production with actions, batch processing, history tracking, and scripts.
- Adobe Camera Raw offers non-destructive preprocessing of Raw files from most digital cameras, plus JPEG and TIFF files.
- Includes tools for graphic design, Web design, video production, and photography.
- Extended version offers tools for film & TV, medical, science, engineering, architecture, and manufacturing fields.
- Besides new tools and features, this version has many user interface and efficiency improvements.
- Requires at least Mac OS X 10.4.11, Windows XP SP2, or Vista SP1 (excl. Home Basic) and DVD-ROM drive.
Guide Review - Adobe Photoshop CS4
For the ultimate in graphics power and flexibility, Photoshop can't be beat. Photoshop offers more non-destructive ways of working than any other photo editor, and Adobe is always adding enhancements to help get the job done faster and with less frustration.Photoshop CS4 brings even more interface refinements and, as usual, several new productivity-increasing features. Overall performance received a lot of attention in this version, and for the first time, Photoshop can take advantage of your computer's graphics processor, allowing for smoother screen drawing, improved zooming, and a new canvas rotation tool.
The new Adjustments and Masks Panels lead users to better, non-destructive ways of working, while making adjustments easier and more accessible for users who are already familiar with them. The older dodge, burn, and sponge tools have also been reworked in Photoshop CS4. These tools now operate much more intelligently, preserving the tone of the image you are adjusting. An impressive new feature in Photoshop CS4 is the content-aware scaling, which can detect detailed areas of an image and leave those areas untouched when scaling images up or down or to different proportions. And Bridge, the file browser bundled with all Creative Suite applications, is quite a capable and mature application now.
Although the cost of Photoshop may be prohibitive for some, the investment can pay off in increased productivity and maximum flexibility. Students and educators can take advantage of academic pricing to bring the cost down. The changes from Photoshop CS3 to CS4 are more evolutionary than revolutionary, but those who work with the software every day will no doubt find a benefit to upgrading. I've summarized all of Photoshop CS4's new features in a separate document along with screen shots, so check that out for the full details.
