Adobe prepares to launch its 6th Photoshop – Beta?

You read a ton of claims every day. Adverts, articles, fans and haters alike – everyone has an opinion. But when Adobe says that Photoshop is the world’s best image editing software, it is hard to disagree. Now, as the beta programme for version CS6 begins, KitGuru gets misty and nostalgic.

It’s coming and we ain’t gonna be able to stop it. Whether you love the new interface for Photoshop CS6 or hate it, it represents the future in terms of desktop image manipulation. Unlike the bastards at Facebook, if you don’t want the new features/layout – at least your old Photoshop won’t time out!  That said, what can we expect that’s new and different?

Well, with CS6, Adobe is putting ALL of its emphasis on performance. For that, we’re reading that there has been some antique code knocking about in the backend for several years and it’s just been re-written. The Mercury Graphics Engine seems to be the focus of Adobe’s re-writing attention, as the graphics giant claims that many effects and actions will now have ‘near instantaneous results’.

We’re not sure about this as a benefit. Most of the main rigs we use for work are overclocked with 6 cores, SSD boot devices and plenty of RAM. With that kind of engine, everything seems instantaneous anyway. On the move, you can get Core i5 systems with 6GB of memory for around £400, which also handle Photoshop comfortably. Still, plenty of people may well be using something older/slower – so any improvement to the underlying slickness of the Adobe code is likely to work well for them.

So what else can we expect in CS6?

Adobe claims to have added ‘magic’ to the process of sampling an area of your image. You choose the area and Photoshop will automatically blend pixels in a magical way. Hmm. Not sure we like automatic, but let’s see this in action before we judge.

Overall, it promises to be new, different and desirable – so who are we to tell you it’s not?

Download your path to pixel paradise from this link.

KitGuru says: While each iteration of Photoshop may seem really similar to the one that was replaced, when you go back over several generations you can see a serious improvement. CS6 may not be for everyone, but it will definitely deliver Nirvahna for some (even if Kurt needs to be added in to the band pic later).

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