Adobe’s recent announcement of Photoshop CS (not “8″) was welcomed by many. There are lots of powerful new features and capabilities. But let’s take a look to see if this upgrade is right for you.

First, it’s easy to identify a group of Photoshop users who definitely should not upgrade to Photoshop CS…at least not right away. If your hardware and operating system don’t meet the minimum requirements, forget about upgrading Photoshop until you upgrade your computer. Here’s a look at the bare minimum for running Photoshop CS (with my comments added).

These specifications are not a “wish list” or “for good performance.” These are “absolute minimums.” If your hardware or OS doesn’t meet these requirements, take that $169 upgrade fee and start a hardware-improvement fund.

Alright, so your hardware meets the specs. Now, is Photoshop CS worth your money? Here are some categories that should answer with an unqualified “YES!”

• You work with 16-bit color
Photoshop CS has vastly improved support for images in 16-bit mode. Copy/paste, layers, type, image adjustments, and additional filters are just some of the capabilities now available.

• You shoot (or want to shoot) RAW

While the Camera RAW plug-in for Photoshop 7 was cool, it can’t hold a candle to the power of the new version.

• You regularly use the File Browser

Have you ever said to yourself, “I wish the File Browser could ________”? Odds are, Photoshop CS’s File Browser can fill in that blank for you. When introduced in Photoshop 7, the File Browser was a good idea and a useful tool. Feedback from users has resulted in a far

more capable feature.

• You produce PDFs from Photoshop

Layered PDF files and PDF presentation creation are just two of the highlights.

• You need to create extremely large images
How about 300,000 pixels by 300,000 pixels? That’s one hundred times as many pixels as Photoshop 7’s largest document. And each Photoshop CS file can have as many as 56 channels.

• You have very complex images with many layers

Layer sets are great for keeping the Layers palette neat and organized. But Photoshop CS goes a step further: nested layer sets!

• You create panoramas

Photomerge creates seamless panoramas and takes advantage of advanced blending to match appearances. You can even leave each image on a separate layer.

• You use Photoshop in support of digital video

New document presets in standard digital video sizes, with action-safe and title-safe guides already established. Support for non-square pixels and 16-bit images, too

• You understand and regularly use histograms

The new Histogram palette enables you to track changes as you make them. You can view a discrete little palette, or get information for each channel, all at once.

• You work with slices, rollovers, and HTML

ImageReady users will certainly appreciate slice sets, smart guides, point-and-shoot targeting for rollovers, and enhanced HTML and XHTML code. And once you try them, you’ll wish that ImageReady’s conditional Actions were available in Photoshop, too.

• You use Flash or data-driven graphics

Export layers as SWF files, then import the SWF files as Flash layers. Define variables and use data sets to create dynamic Web sites. Import from databases or spread sheets for easy, comprehensive page and site updates.

• You want the Adobe Creative Suite – cheap

Upgrading from Photoshop? Why not get the whole Adobe Creative Suite at a huge discount, even if Photoshop is the only Adobe program you currently own.

• You can’t stand being behind the competition

In addition to all the features mentioned above, Photoshop CS has customizable keyboard shortcuts, a new Replace Color Brush (paint while retaining tonality and texture), Match Color command (two images, one appearance), real type-on-a-path, Layer Comps (store different versions of artwork in one file), photographic filter adjustments (warming, cooling, and more), Crop and Straighten command (for scanning multiple images in a single pass or for correcting an individual image), save editing history (either in a file’s metadata or as a text file), Lens Blur filter, the Filter Gallery to easily work with multiple filters, and even a Picture Package layout editor.
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Photoshop CS (and the rest of the Adobe Creative Suite) should be shipping by late November, 2003. Upgrades from all previous versions of Photoshop to Photoshop CS are $169 (list price). Upgrades from Photoshop to the Adobe Creative Suite, Standard edition are $549. Upgrades from Photoshop to the Adobe Creative Suite, Premium edition are $799. (Photoshop Elements, Photoshop LE, PhotoDeluxe, and Photoshop Album do not qualify for the upgrade price.)

SPECIAL NOTE:
Members of the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP) qualify for a special price of $139 for the Photoshop CS upgrade. Contact NAPP Member Services for details.

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