The arrival of Photoshop CS6

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After waiting 2 years, Adobe’s latest creative suite boasts a new and much improved Photoshop, the backbone of many a digital designer’s toolbox here at Reading Room. With a vast array of new and improved tools, a cinematically dark and slim-line interface and refined toolbox, this promises to be everything we have been waiting for.

First of all and most practically, an autosave feature has been created that logs the file status every few minutes, so disasters can be averted if the machine crashes or freezes. The file also saves in the background without having to wait for the progress bar to fill. So no more waiting whilst huge files save!

A layer search filter has now been implemented, assisting the sorting and searching of numerous layers that build up in the design process, this is especially handy when designers pass files over to front end developers. For example, a developer can find a particular button and its styling without having to stray from the layers panel.

Also, one of the most impressive additions is the new content aware extend, move and patch tools. They promise to be efficient and accurate, creating some amazing results when cloning sections of images or repeating patterns. Tools like this can give us more flexibility when retouching or altering every manner of graphic or photograph.

CS6’s new brushes have got the illustrators amongst us excited allowing new styles to be applied to digital painting. There is even a new set of erodible pencil brushes that breaks down as a normal pencil would! You even have to click to sharpen it! This allows us to replicate natural techniques with all the benefits of digital.

The re-purposed vector tool allows a more advanced control of vector creation without having to drop in and out of Adobe Illustrator as frequently. We now have far more capability to make more advanced vector shapes quicker.

Another great addition is the new Mercury graphics engine. This speeds up the rendering process when transforming and applying styles to various elements, hopefully eliminating lag and the all too familiar Mac colour wheel of death that appears when you really haven’t got the time to wait.

There are far too many alterations to mention individually, but here’s another lovely little touch; when creating a text box to insert dummy text for draft designs or pitches, there is now an inbuilt method to drop ‘lorem ipsum’ into designs without ever having to leave Photoshop!

With its multi purpose approach to video editing, animation, 3D image creation, digital painting, photo manipulation and of course general UI design, Photoshop is further evolving into a far more refined and powerful designer’s dream package.

Its good to see Adobe have most definitely taken the time to listen to its users and implement many features that help creatives from all professions get the most from working digitally.

As digital designers, tools such as Photoshop CS6 are forever expanding our skill set and knowledge, helping us to increase and speed up our workflow, meeting deadlines and keeping project managers happy!