So I have to admit that I may have been a tiny bit wrong about Photoshop CS4. OK, I was very wrong. I’ve been telling a lot of people recently that there are a ton of reasons to consider upgrading to CS4 … if you use Dreamweaver, Flash, Fireworks, or Illustrator. But if you’re a Photoshop user, well, I hadn’t really seen much to be impressed with.
Well, I was wrong. It turns out that there are a ton of really great enhancements in Photoshop. The problem, I think, is that none of them are terribly flashy. But that doesn’t make them any less impressive.
Something that’s been fairly frustrating for me throughout the whole transition to CS4 is that most of the things that are new in all of the programs are things that require me to rethink my workflow. Dreamweaver’s Live View, Live Code and Related Files features, for instance, have saved me more time than I can count, but it took some time to get it stuck in my head, because in order to use them, I had to change the way I do things. The new animation model in Flash and the Motion Editor have likewise forced me to rethink my entire approach to creating animation. And I’ll admit that I still don’t think of Fireworks first when I need to wireframe a web site, but I’m trying to get there.
Photoshop’s new features fall into the same category. I haven’t really discovered them because I’ve been trying to use Photoshop the way I always used it in the past. But now I need to take a new approach to a lot of things, and that’s going to take some getting used to. But it will be worth it. Just as I can’t count the hours I’ve saved thanks to my new workflows in Dreamweaver and Flash, I know now that forcing myself to relearn how I edit images in Photoshop will be worth the effort.
Okay, now I know you’re sitting there, screaming at your screen, “JUST TELL ME THE FREAKING FEATURES ALREADY!” Well, you really shouldn’t yell at your screen. I can’t hear you, and it will hurt your monitor’s feelings. Besides, I have no intention of telling you what the features are. I know, it’s mean. It’s partially because it’s a little bit late, and I really want to go watch Grissom’s final episode of CSI, but mostly it’s because I don’t have to. Instead, I’m going to let Scott Kelby do it. Enjoy!
P.S.: Here’s the link to the second and third parts of the series. As of when I’m writing this, he hasn’t posted the fourth part yet.
Edit: They have now posted part four.