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Photoshop 5.0
Photoshop 5.0: Text enhancements, batch processing and new Effects add Production-oriented Power
Product: Photoshop 5.0 (updated to 5.0.2)
From: Adobe, www.adobe.com (Announced April 22, 1998; released in mid-May)
For: Windows 95/NT; PowerMac
Price: US$995, with an estimated street price of between C$900 and C$1000. Upgrades priced at US$199 until Aug. 31 and US$249 afterward. Users purchasing Photoshop 4.0 after April 1, 1998 are eligible for a free upgrade. Contact Adobe for details.
Pros: New text controls add kerning, tracking, etc. using familiar commands (option+cursor left or right to kern, for example). New "magnetic lasso" makes quick object selections easy. New tools allow easier resizing, drop shadows, glow effects, GIF transparency exports and other common functions. Improved web integration and spot color support. Unlimited Undos.
Cons: No default shortcut keys for commonly used commands like Adjust>Variations, etc. Copying and pasting screenshots, etc. from Clipboard doesn't work every time. (There is, fortunately, a workaround: Just add the following line to the photos50.ini file:ALWAYSIMPORTCLIPBOARD=YES.)
Photoshop: The Next Generation
Adobe has added several long-requested features to the program that has become the industry's dominant image-editing application. Now in its fifth major iteration, Photoshop is for the first time leaving 68K Mac users behind, as its Mac release is now PowerMac-compatible only. On the Windows platform, Photoshop 5.0 runs on Win95/98 and NT, with multiprocessing support on the latter and MMX optimization on MMX-compatible CPUs. No upgrade was announced for the SGI version, which appears to be stagnating at v3.0. (SGI's new NT-based Visual Workstations, however, can run the latest Intel version.)
New text, object selection controls
Photoshop's new text controls now include long-absent features such as kerning, tracking (both use the same commands as PageMaker) and a text box that allows you to zoom in or out of the text you are creating. In addition to the features Adobe introduced in Photoshop 4, in which text elements are automatically placed on their own layer, version 5 includes vertical text support, along with the older version 3.0-and-earlier-compatible "marching ants" method of displaying text selections.
Object selection is easier than ever, with version 5.0's new magnetic lasso tool. Unlike the pen paths tool, which is nearly inscrutable to those unfamiliar with the strange process of drawing with of bezier curves, the magnetic lasso simply detects the edges of objects near it and makes a selection when you click the button. Then, if you wish, you can automatically turn these selections to pen tool paths for final tweaking with those pesky bezier controls.
There is also a Magnetic Pen tool, but our tests suggested that, at least in our hands, this tool produced selections so inaccurate and with so many extraneous control points, that it was nearly worthless.
Speaking of Pen paths, there's a new Free Transform path command, although we're not sure what we'd do with it. Unfortunately, you still have to be clever enough to know that pen paths won't be properly copied to the clipboard (for seamless pasting into Adobe Illustrator, for example) unless you option-click them or drag-select them with the cunningly hidden "direct selection" tool.
Some of the new functions in Photoshop 5.0 may seem a little gratuitous, for example, the new Pattern Stamp variation of the Rubber Stamp tool does nothing the previous version couldn't do. Other features, such as the weirdly named "History Brush," however, exploit and extend the previous versions' underused snapshot function to overcome Photoshop's long standing limitation of having only a single undo. The new History palette has a "non-linear history" option (similar to the way Corel Photo-Paint implements undos) that can be quite useful, albeit confusing. In keeping with this new History functionality, the old "magic eraser" now also allows you to erase to a designated history state -- a "History Eraser," so to speak. Ah, if only....
A few of the tools have been shuffled around. The smudging finger tool, for example, has been demoted to a position in with the seldom-used waterdrop (blur) and sharpen tools. Where the Line tool used to be, there's a new Measurement tool, which adds the ability to measure angles in degrees -- a feature long present in Adobe Illustrator. The Gradient tool has received one of the biggest improvements in this revision, and now sports no less than five pop-out sub-options, including new cylindrical, angled and diamond-shaped gradient fills. The eye dropper tool now allows you to take up to four separate measurements and average the results.
The program can now import and convert multi-page PDF files, using the new "Automate" item in the File menu. This menu has a few other nifty tricks up its sleeve, including the ability to fit an image to an existing selection, or constrain it to a predefined size. Batch processing and conditional mode changes are now also possible. The program can even make "contact sheets" from a batch of source files.
Some functions that were easily accessed back in version 3.0, such as transparency masks, became annoyingly hard to find in v4.0, and v5.0 doesn't change this. There's no Transparency Mask command listed on any of the menus -- presumably you just have to read the manual to discover that it's a Command-click on an object's icon in the Layers palette that does the trick.
The new "3D Transform" effect in the Render submenu of the Filters menu is very cool. Although its user interface doesn't make its purpose especially obvious, it allows you to map 2D photos or paintings onto 3D shapes such as cubes, spheres and cylinders, which you can then rotate and move using a pair of tools. Other than that, there's not much new in the Filters menu. For new effects, you have to look elsewhere. Fortunately, your effort will be amply rewarded in the new Effects section of the Layers menu.
The Layers menu now has a batch of predefined effects that are among our favorite new features in this release. Unlike version 4.0's often hard-to-manage method of manually defining drop shadows using multiple layers, this release makes layer effects like drop shadows, glows and bevels a real no-brainer, with previews and non-destructive effects.
Improved web integration
In keeping with Photoshop's growing role as a tool for producing web-friendly graphics, version 5 extends its web prowess with an improved set of links to updates, tutorials and content, including type, photography, illustration, video, etc. Other web users can check out this new "Adobe Studios" section, too, at www.adobe.com.
(We're not sure, however, that the "Adobe Online" menu command in the new version's File menu makes as much sense as its previous location in the Help menu of 4.0. And, although we appreciate the new "wizards" for transparent GIF and resized images in the Help menu, we can't help but think such commands are better placed elsewhere -- for example, under the File>Export..." and "Image Size..." menu sections, respectively. )
At least one long-standing bug from version 4.0 persists in the 5.0 release. Copying and pasting screenshots, etc. from Clipboard doesn't work every time. Quitting Photoshop and relaunching it is one workaround, but there's a better one: add the following line to your photos50.ini file: ALWAYSIMPORTCLIPBOARD=YES
One final issue we encountered was a seeming incompatibility between files created with the standard 5.0.2 edition of the program, and a 5.0 "educational" release. Although Adobe assures us that the two versions are fully compatible, the educational Mac version could not read a PSD file created with the full release Windows version 5.0.2. We're investigating this problem now.
Upgrades: According to Adobe, anyone purchasing Photoshop 4.0 since April 1st, 1998 is eligible for a free upgrade to 5.0. Proof of purchase, serial number, etc. is required as well as a credit card for S&H charges. Requests can be faxed or mailed to Adobe. Purchasers of academic versions are also eligible for this offer.
For Further Reading:
- Adobe InDesign - an exclusive hands-on review of Adobe's latest DTP and graphics powerhouse.
- Graphics Tools - The Sequel
- Graeme Bennett's Photoshop tutorials (in HTML or printable PDF format)
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