The new feature list is unrelenting:
• Wet media brushes
• Content-aware fill and heal tools
• Improved masking/chroma keying
• Camera RAW 6
• Puppet Warp
• Mini Bridge
• Data-based lens distortion correction with custom lens profiling application
• Local adaptation tone-mapping
• Faster realtime 3D engine
• Repoussé 3D features and HDR image-based lighting
• New floating color picker and eyedropper
Girard reports, “Of course, all of these features also appear in the Windows version, which has had 32- and 64-bit flavors since version CS4… This update is not going to please people with multi-core machines—multithreading is still very poor in CS5, and there is no use of the GPU for filters. It isn’t trivial to thread filters and, considering the 64-bit Cocoa transition and wealth of new features, I didn’t expect CS5 to also have pervasive multithreading. But it’s bad enough to warrant mentioning. Obviously, given the very low times that some filters take to execute on the very large 16-bit file in the benchmark, it’s not needed everywhere. But on things like HDR processing, complex and slow filters like lens blur definitely need it… One plea for Adobe: if you add GPU-accelerated filters, please use OpenCL. Premiere’s new Mercury engine and GPU filters are CUDA-only, so users with those shiny new Radeons with tons of stream processors are out of luck.”
“The interfaces built with AIR have different widgets since they are basically Flash applications,” Girard reports. “Adobe probably would never have been able to get a simultaneous 32-bit/64-bit OS X and Windows version out this year without a cross-platform development kit. The flip side is what Apple claims as their defense against allowing cross-compilers for iPhone/iPad apps: the results lack consistency of user experience, and the things like window layering that you get for free with native components don’t always work right.”
Despite those niggles, Girard reports, “Photoshop is still just a great program and CS5 is a worthwhile update for a broad cross-section of users. My complaints are about minor issues—things like the low-res preview in HDR Merge Pro or window layering with AIR filters—can be addressed in a x.1 update without really slowing people down in the meantime. Nine thumbs up.”
Full review – recommended – here.
Adobe is EXPENSIVE, in time and money. Buy them Apple. Make them real.
I am done with Adobe. I was ripped off for too long. I stopped at CS3 and I won’t use any of those useless expensive piece of s… software.
“I stopped at CS3”
I did also.I stopped at CS3
“””I stopped at CS3”
I did also.I stopped at CS3″
Add me to that list… I am sick and tired of Adobe screwing me.
And I am a PS user since version 1.0.
I am done with Adobe!
What happened to MDN’s standard “screw Adobe, use Pixelmator” take?
——RM
I’ll be waiting for that email from my ‘special friend’ informing me that my ‘special copy’ is ready for download at my ‘special pricing’.
Jeezus, multi-processor *still* hasn’t been properly implemented? I wish Apple would just spend a little pocket change and buy Adobe.
Then, drop Windows and make the friggin’ Mac versions run right.
I used to use Adobe Photoshop, and was even a beta tester as far back as v1.07. But, when I had to go to a table to figure out which version I now need, Adobe has become Microsoftian with all their variations. Just NUTS!
Yup, nothing but CS2 an CS3 (Dreamweaver) on my machines too. No interest in CS5 (though demos of the content-aware fill and heal tools do look amazing).
Moving to Pixelmatr
Whine, whine, whine. Photoshop is a bit expensive, although if you’re on the nonprofit upgrade cycle like I am, it’s peanuts (a couple hundred dollars every 2 years, I think). Even without the nonprofit discount, I expect that many pro users pay for the whole app after just a few jobs. If all you’re doing is cropping photos of grandma, then yes, you might better skip this. But the price is really not that bad. I used to upgrade my personal Adobe apps just for the fun of it, with my own cash, and I never ended up in the poor house. Save the cash you’re burning on drugs each week, and buy something productive!
But I NEED my allergy and my asthma medications!
One word: Pixelmator
I’m definitely sticking with CS4 and trying to switch to Aperture.
Adobe is clearly the successor the Microsoft in terms of control and arrogance.
Go for it, Apple… buy them out and start offering upgrades for Macs on an equal basis to windows
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tom
I don’t know. Adobe products have allowed me to make a living for last twenty years. I don’t agree with all they do (and don’t do), but, please, a little gratitude for producing some pretty amazing software over the years wouldn’t be out of line. Count me out of the Adobe bashing clique.
I would really like to see a roadmap for future development. After all these years of multicore processors, it is a shame that Photoshop is does not yet harness their power.
I stopped at CS3 because I didn’t feel there was enough to justify the upgrade to CS4 for me. I do like a lot of the new features in CS5, so will probably be ordering the upgrade after my tax refund gets in.
“…the Windows version…has had 32- and 64-bit flavors since version CS4…multithreading is still very poor in CS5, and there is no use of the GPU for filters…One plea for Adobe: if you add GPU-accelerated filters, please use OpenCL. Premiere’s new Mercury engine and GPU filters are CUDA-only…The interfaces built with AIR have different widgets since they are basically Flash applications,…the results lack consistency of user experience, and the things like window layering…don’t always work right.”
Don’t buy it or upgrade to it. You’ll only encourage those fucking assholes by doing so.
If PS allows me to get my 3 hrs of processing done faster, I’ll be buying the upgrade. I have a Pixelmator licence but I haven’t touched it. Can Pixelmator run actions? Or is the Shadow and Highlight tools as good, selection tools? Yeah will be blowing some cash on an upgrade from 3 to CS5
The content-aware fill is nothing short of astonishing. Definitely check out the videos on YouTube.
following Mac snub of flash in the iphone and ipad adobe should snub Apple by not releasing CS5 to mac.
CORRECTION:following Apple snub of flash in the iphone and ipad adobe should snub Apple by not releasing CS5 to mac.
Apple should by Adobe.