It’s an exciting time for Photoshop!

I don’t think I’ve ever been this excited for Photoshop, except maybe Spring 2004 when Photoshop CS was new and Bryan Lamkin announced the DNG file format at Photoshop World (well, DNG hasn’t turned out to be as groundbreaking as PDF, but it was still exciting). Creative Suite 3 is now getting out into the public’s hands. Photoshop CS3 was actually not emphasized as much as Illustrator, Flash and other products when CS3 was launched a couple months ago, and it’s pretty obvious this is because Photoshop CS3 has been around for months now as a [1] public beta and recently was confirmed by John Nack to have been [2] downloaded by a half-million people. There’s all kinds of Photoshop CS3 videos, tutorials and tips out there at places like [3] lynda.com, [4] NAPP and [5] photoshopcafe.com. A post from John Nack’s blog with links to various free sources can be found [6] here.

STANDARD AND EXTENDED

What we didn’t know until the March 27 media event was that the public beta we’ve been playing with all this time is Photoshop CS3 Standard—this is something I predicted [7] here and wasn’t that hard to figure out if you paid attention to the public beta’s splash screen. Along with Standard, there is a Photoshop CS3 Extended—a more powerful version of Photoshop—that will be included with all premium CS3 suites and the Master Collection (the CS3 Design Standard suite gets Photoshop CS3 Standard, and the CS3 Web Standard suite gets neither in lieu of Fireworks CS3). I wonder how Adobe is going to support such a wide variety of image editing applications—Photoshop Elements is still around too. There is such a thing as oversegmentation of the market, and it will be interesting to see how Adobe handles this glut of products that came about after the [8] Macromedia merger. One method already being used is repositioning a product: Fireworks CS3 is now a web prototyping application, with a secondary purpose as an image-editing application. I have been using Fireworks for a month or so now as my primary web graphics application, and I will review that application in early June.

Photoshop CS3 has many new features, and several of them contribute major advances in how creative professionals work with images.

NEW FEATURES IN CS3 STANDARD

The Layers panel, showing a couple smart filters. Notice the mask!

Smart filters. Users have wanted this one for a long time, and it’s here: the ability to apply non-destructive smart filters to layers. It’s done by making the layer a smart object and then applying the filter; this is different than adjustment layers, which don’t need a smart object to do their magic. There’s a mask attached to the smart filters so you can keep pixels unfiltered, same as with adjustment layers. This is an exciting new features for Photoshop CS3, something that’s a no-brainer and will make a lot of Photoshop users happy. If you are a member of NAPP and saw the special issue on CS3, you’ll get a kick out of Deke McClelland’s story of the history of smart filters (and how he’s pined for them for years). Due to the nature of filters, the layer does need to be converted to a smart object manually with Filter -> Convert For Smart Filters. I think the next version of Photoshop needs to make this seamless, whether it finds a way to do it without smart objects or it simply converts it for users behind the scenes.

A selection made by the Quick Selection tool. This is in Quick Mask mode to show the selection.

Quick Selection. One of my favorite Photoshop tools is the Magic Wand tool, so you can imagine my shock when its icon in the toolbar was replaced by the Quick Selection tool (don’t worry, the Magic Wand tool is still there, bundled with the Quick Selection tool in the same toolbar icon). Quick Selection allows you to select areas of similar color with a paintbrush motion rather than a single click like the Magic Wand tool does, and it works pretty well though it takes a little practice and sometimes some tweaking afterwards in the new Refine Edge dialog box. It reminds me of the Magnetic Lasso tool, another attempted solution at making pixel selections easy and natural. I don’t know anyone who likes the Magnetic Lasso tool, though I do and think others would too if they have the right image and use the right tool settings.

I am still playing with the Quick Selection tool, trying to make it work as well as the Magic Wand tool for what I use it for. I find that there’s many instances when the Magic Wand tool does just as well as the Quick Selection tool, if not better. I think a big part of that is the lack of control with the Quick Selection tool: there’s no tolerance setting that I can find for this tool. That would help a lot. The Refine Edge dialog box is NOT used to fine-tune the Quick Selection tool; it’s used to refine selections after they are made, and they incorporate the old Select -> Modify settings. However, there are many times when the Quick Selection tool will do much better than the Magic Wand tool at selecting an area, especially if the area has shadows and highlights that will throw off the Magic Wand tool. Quick Selection does a great job in these cases. Overall, I am glad to see the Quick Selection tool in CS3 and I do expect it to overtake the Magic Wand tool as the selection tool of choice—Quick Selection is a “smarter” tool—but it’s not yet perfect. As I learn tips and techniques to maximize its productivity, I’ll post them here.

The Refine Edge dialog box, a very useful addition to Photoshop.

Refine Edge dialog box. While we’re on the topic of selections, let’s consider the Refine Edge dialog box in more detail. Basically it combines the Select –> Modify options (minus the Border option, which I think is a new feature) with Radius and Contrast options which affect the sharpness of the selection one way or another. I like that the Refine Edges dialog box brings together all those Modify –> Select commands: they’ve been bunched up in that drop-down menu since the early days of Photoshop, and it was time to put them in a simple interface. The Photoshop team deserves real kudos for this one. My next vote to have a dialog box interface is the Edit –> Transform commands, which are extremely important but still reside only in the drop-down menu. Fortunately, most of these commands can be done with the anchor points and Edit –> Free Transform (Cmd/Ctrl-T).

Aligning and blending layers automatically. I think the layer alignment and blending improvements are the best new features in Photoshop CS3 Standard. Compositing images is made much easier: now you can put two photos together and Photoshop can automatically align the photos (no more overlaying a layer at 50% opacity and rotating and transforming to match) and blend them so the transition is truly seamless. I’ve seen this in action and it is wonderful to watch—it’s one of those moments when you really marvel at what the technology can do and how Photoshop can analyze images intelligently. These features have also beefed up the Photomerge function, which combines images into panoramas. It’s worked pretty well in the past, but with the layer alignment and blending features of Photoshop CS3 it has improved almost as far as it can go. The intelligence Photoshop demonstrates when it aligns and merges images is truly impressive.

Look to the right—these icons are your access points to Photoshop CS3’s panels.

The (controversial) interface. In an effort to maximize workspace and productivity, Adobe has adopted a new interface that uses icons and adjustable palette docks that are supposed to be an intuitive way to get workspace when you need it and have the palettes you need at your fingertips. I am still fiddling with it, trying to find the perfect configuration, but I think I like the old Adobe interface better. Adobe’s interfaces have always been considered top-notch, and I am not sure why Adobe wanted to fix something that wasn’t broken. I do think designers were feeling a bit of palette overload (hence stop-gap measures like Photoshop CS’s palette well) and I suspect this is Adobe’s way of fixing the problem before it got really bad.

Now that I have been working with CS3 for several weeks, I am getting used to the interface. At first, I was very disappointed that the previous palette system was being mucked with. After some use, I believe that the icon system is an improvement (having more work space is always a good thing) but the icons aren’t always clear as to what they mean so it takes some practice to get familiar with them. There is also a new Interface panel in the preferences that allow Photoshop to remember palette locations and auto-collapse palettes back to icons. Side note: I learned from [9] Scott Kelby’s blog that Adobe is now calling the palettes “panels,” which is what Macromedia called them.

The Black and White dialog box. Do you need another way to convert to grayscale?

Black and white conversion. The new Black and White dialog box allows one to convert color images to grayscale by mixing color channels. Power users have been doing this for years with the Channel Mixer dialog box or other techniques (L channel in Lab color mode, working with channels directly in the Channels palette) and now the Channel Mixer dialog box has been refined and renamed “Black and White”. It’s yet another tool to create black and white images, and I don’t see anything groundbreaking within it but it is easy, powerful and worth using as your primary grayscale conversion tool. More important is what has been included to both the Channel Mixer and Black and White dialog boxes: the ability to save and reuse presets. We’ve seen strides with this sort of thing in PDF presets, and Photoshop CS3 is migrating preset functions to other areas.

The improved Curves dialog box.

Improved curves. The Curves interface has seen some very nice improvements: addition of the histogram (usually found in the Levels dialog box or Histogram palette), larger size, improved curve display options and preset functions (again). I often apply the same or similar curves to images over and over again, so presets are helpful here—and Adobe will be shipping Photoshop CS3 with several presets to get you started. If you haven’t been using curves to improve your images, this would be a great time to start.

The Clone Source panel.

The new Clone Source panel. Almost everybody clones in Photoshop, and the method and interface for doing so has hardly changed since Photoshop’s early days—until now. The new Clone Source palette allows users to both see an overlay of an image before cloning and transform pixels while cloning. This means that exact placement is possible with the overlay, so you don’t have to estimate where to clone or use landmarks to hit the mark (which is what I do). Also, if you want to clone an item but need to offset, rotate or scale it, you have an easy method for doing so. The Clone Source palette also allows for five source points to be saved, and you can switch from one to another by clicking an icon within the palette. It’s another palette to keep track of, which means Adobe’s interface revisions make more sense, but it’s a powerful new addition and very worth it.

LOTS OF OTHER NEW FEATURES

It’s crazy how many new functions have been added to Photoshop CS3; John Nack calls it “lots of little nips and tucks.” Here are many others:

• Zoomify export makes large images easy to post online. The Zoomify exporter gives your web images a zoom in/out interface so users can zoom in to see fine details on large images. Zoomify has been around for a few years but this is the first time it has been a component of Photoshop.
• Improved Print dialog box. The printing interface now sports a larger preview, more controls and better handling of color management and other aspects of printing. I can tell with Lightroom and Photoshop CS3 that Adobe is catering more and more to photographers who process their images and make professional prints within their digital studios.
• The next generation of Camera Raw is a big improvement. It can now handle JPEG and TIFF files, offers Clone and Heal tools, new Fill Light and Vibrance sliders, and is generally faster and easier to use. Some people grumble about the little panel icons that have replaced the text tabs at the top of the interface, but as with the general Photoshop interface it will just take a little getting used to.
• Vanishing Point 2.0 now offers multiple adjustable angle perspective planes so you can map a single piece of art across multiple planes. Adobe’s demo consists of mapping a CD’s cover art across both the front and back of a blank jewel case. It’s very cool to do!
• Enhanced Merge To HDR. HDR has been around since CS2; it composites overexposed and underexposed images in order to deliver a single image with a vast range of values. Photoshop CS3 offers an updated Merge To HDR that automatically aligns your images as they are merged. The algorithms behind the process have also been modified to deliver better results. This is a great thing for photographers like me who shoot bracketed exposures.
• Workflow enhancements such as a higher max zoom (now at 3,200%!), PDF support and PDF presentation enhancements, the ability to add swatches from the Color Picker directly to the Swatches palette, and the switch to Universal Binary (required for Intel Macs) all improve Photoshop CS3 in little ways that add up to a big bonus for designers.

An image with the Zoomify interface, allowing for zooming capabilities on the web.

This CD case’s art is mapped form a single file (inset) with Vanishing Point.

There’s also plenty new in the auxiliary applications that ship with Photoshop CS3: Adobe Bridge CS3, Adobe Device Central and Adobe Stock Photos. The Bridge CS3 review will be in a different article so I won’t go into detail here, but Bridge in particular has a new look and feel that I think will show many more users how important Bridge can be in their work.

AND NOW EXTENDED

I’m not done explaining Photoshop’s new features yet! I still haven’t touched upon the new features in Photoshop CS3 Extended, the more advanced of the two Photoshop applications.

The 3D can shown here is pulling its art from a single file (inset). You can rotate the can in Photoshop CS3 Extended and view how the art appears on all sides!

3D visualization and texture editing is an amazing addition to Photoshop—everyone should at least try it. 3D models built with various 3D applications (I use [10] Strata) can be brought into Photoshop CS Extended and given art or texture. Imagine applying various labels to a 3D model of a soft drink can, moving them around and manipulating the can just like in your 3D application. Despite this breakthrough, Photoshop CS3 Extended is not designed to create three-dimensional art. However, the new Vanishing Point filter allows you to make multiple planes that can be exported as a 3D model to work within Photoshop CS3 Extended. In the future, we may also see some plug-ins on the market that allow greater 3D model creation within Photoshop.

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Here you can see the video layers in the Layers panel and the Animation (Timeline) panel. Click the image to view at full size.

Motion graphics, video layers. Given that Photoshop is as important to video work as After Effects and Premiere Pro, it’s great to see Photoshop CS3 Extended offering tools for video professionals. The new video layers allow video frames to be imported as a single layer (rather than multiple layers) and edited as such. The new Animation palette, revised to show a timeline as well as standard animation frames, makes it possible to work with video within Photoshop CS3 Extended. Photoshop CS3 Extended imports and exports QuickTime and Windows Media, and exports Flash movies as well. Photoshop files and their video layers are also editable within Premiere Pro and After Effects, so the compatibility goes both ways. Video frames are also editable with any of Photoshop CS3 Extended’s tools, and you can edit as many as you like at once—select the frames in the Animation timeline, then start cloning, painting, or anything else you might need to do. The Photoshop team has this aspect of Photoshop CS3 Extended down to a science, thanks to their knowledge of what works and what doesn’t in After Effects and Premiere Pro.

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Using the new measurement tools (inset), one can measure areas and distances. Photoshop keeps all the data in an easy-to-use log. Click the image to view at full size.

The Analysis menu and Photoshop’s new measurement tools are designed to help architects, the medical community and other professionals who need quantitative analysis. Imagine you have a schematic drawing in Photoshop. Establish the scale of the drawing (1 inch may be equal to 1 mile, for instance), then use selection tools or the new Ruler and Count tools to measure objects or distance. The Count tool doesn’t measure distance but tallies objects. All this data is organized by Photoshop CS3 Extended into a Measurement Log for easy access or export.

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Working with DICOM images in Photoshop CS3 Extended. Click the image to view at full size.

DICOM, which won’t interest you much unless you work regularly with medical scans. DICOM files are basically the native file format for CAT scanners, MRI scanners, ultrasound and X-ray machines, and they are different in that they can have any number of frames. Photoshop CS3 Extended includes a DICOM dialog box that can open multiple files and frames simultaneously and allows full editing and export capabilities.

MATLAB support, another capability you may never need to use. MATLAB is useful when building graphical representations of mathematical functions and algorithms, and Photoshop CS3 Extended allows for easy manipulation and plotting of data via MATLAB to create dynamic graphics based on data.

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On the left: a DICOM frame. On the right: the result of stacking a sequence of DICOM frames and creating the average of them. The image becomes more realistic. Click the image to view at full size.

Image Stacks may be the most exciting development to come out of Photoshop CS3 Extended, and it definitely gets the most oohs and ahhs out of crowds at demonstrations. Basically, Photoshop CS Extended can compare groups of similar images and execute one of several kinds of commands to composite them. One example: after pulling several images out of a DICOM file, a surgeon can combine the images as “slices” of a patient to create a two-dimensional image of the patient with depth. Using the measurement tools, Photoshop CS3 Extended can also look for the maximum distance in pixels from one point to another. Another example of the power of Image Stacks is Photoshop CS3’s ability to remove large objects from photos by comparing several similar photos, recognizing what should not be in the final image and using image data from the other shots to replace what is there. Imagine taking 20 shots of a landmark at a street corner, then using Image Stacks to remove any people walking through the shots!

Photoshop CS3 Extended comes with all the CS3 Premium suites (Design Premium, Web Premium, Production Premium and Master Collection) and it’s definitely more powerful than Photoshop CS3 Standard. I’d recommend moving up to the Extended version if you can afford it. Photoshop CS3 Standard is the traditional “upgrade” to Photoshop—same application with improved features and a few new surprises. Photoshop CS3 Extended, however, has more radical improvements that make it stand out.

BUYING ADVICE

While writing my review I asked myself, “If someone asked me if they should upgrade Photoshop to CS3, could I give a reason not to do so?” I honestly can’t think of a reason to not upgrade. The price will turn off some (it costs $199 to upgrade a standalone copy of Photoshop CS2, CS or 7 to CS3 Standard, $349 to upgrade to CS3 Extended) but the application in itself has made enough of a leap forward that I would say this is the most important Photoshop upgrade since 6.0 (the CS upgrade ranks up there as well). The vast changes with the entire Creative Suite line makes it even more important to upgrade your collection of Adobe software if you haven’t done so already. The one real caveat: have a powerful computer to run Photoshop CS3. Creative Suite 3 is three times as large as CS2 and Photoshop CS3 has grown accordingly. However, compared to the other CS3 applications, Photoshop does an excellent job of maintaining performance and staying away from pauses and crashes. I cannot always say the same about other CS3 applications.

I attribute Photoshop’s maximized performance to its public beta program, which has done a great job of optimizing Photoshop for its official release. I think Adobe should release public betas of all its creative professional software—it definitely worked for Photoshop and Lightroom!

Photoshop CS3 Standard and CS3 Extended
Adobe Systems
Extended $999/$349 upgrade
Standard $649/$199 upgrade