Adobe Photoshop CS5, Upgrade Version from Photoshop CS2/CS3/CS4 (PC)

I have returned to my original review to add some extra comments. Experience of using the program has shown up some deficiencies in the interface but several stunning, yet quite fundamental, extra benefits. I've left the rating as 5 stars because it is really is perfect at what it does. It's just that the front end makes it unnecessarily fiddly to use to its best. I'll say why, as it might "just be me". I'll get the adverse comments over first - bear in mind these are overwhelmed by the extra benefits.The main problem is that to make best use of the program you have to deal with 3 or 4 different interfaces which in my view could be better integrated.For example, to make best use of the excellent Photo RAW features I find I have drag my images through effectively FOUR different programs: Adobe Bridge, Photo RAW, Adobe DNG Converter and Photoshop itself! The DNG converter is in fact a separate free download, and totally separate program, and not part of Photoshop at all. You could cut it out but then you wouldn't be able to save the images in Photoshop's excellent Digital Negative format. I cannot see why these functions cannot all simply be accessed through the main Photoshop Interface.The Help pages were little use, which brings me on to my other gripe. The Help feature had got more and complicated and fiddly to use with each upgrade I have bought and the latest is really fiddly. I don't use it - I use a link to the user manual on my desktop and Google anything unresolved! And use a couple of books (Martin Evening's latest and the one I mention below) There's loads out there on the net (yes I know the Help page tries to access them, but it's clumsy).BUT, but, but, it's still the best piece of software I've ever used! Once you get over the multiple interfaces, the facilities are 100% quality. Since my original review, I've realized just how good some of the camera RAW features are. The sharpening and noise filters for instance are way better than those in the "main" program not least as you can use them simultaneously and see the results as you make them. There is less haloing and artificiality. The fact these edits are not destructive also means you can keep fiddling with them as much as you like without using multiple files, layers etc.)The Recovery filter is another wonder. It manages easily to restore apparently burnt-out highlights much more effectively and without the undue disturbance or artificiality that tends to come from using curves, shadows/highlights etc. This was very useful as my G11 does tend to overlightened the highlights, a problem now pretty much cured.So, the interfaces are well worth persevering with!I've left the rest of my review unaltered as there is nothing there I would wish to change.As an amateur photographer, I don't really need anything this powerful. But, having used PS since version 4, I succumbed to the rave reviews. I was also influenced by the fact the upgrade price was competitive with Lightroom, the obvious alternative, and "only" about twice the price of Elements.There are a few little gripes which I'll return to, but on the whole I'm amazed at how good it is, a huge advance on my previous CS2.Firstly it loads much faster - a real surprise. PS is not a big resource hog at all - it does not need a PC with a fancy spec. - although huge images/files or large numbers of open images will obviously consume resources. Secondly, the main screen remains reassuring familiar, but with several useful tweaks.The many improvements are well-documented elsewhere so I'll concentrate on the two that are most important to me.Camera RAW. I bought a new digicam (Canon G11) only a few weeks before the camera so I was eager to use this feature to make the best of RAW. I had been disappointed with the results from Canon's supplied software as it seemed to retain the tendency of the cameras inbuilt processing to produce pictures that were too light in the midtones with burned out highlights. PS has a vastly better RAW converter which, with the camera set slightly to underexpose, is giving me excellent base images. Camera Raw 6.1 opens within PS when opening RAW (in my case .CR2) images.CR6.1 has its own layout based on sliders for you tweak to choose settings. These are saved in a separate .xmp "sidecar" file for each image so the original is unaltered. CR6.1 is elaborate and stunning in its own right. You could indeed choose to do most of your image work here rather than in PS - maybe it's a pointer to the future? It has a totally different interface than PS itself, using slide bars grouped under various headings. The most useful to me are Lens Correction, which has pre-set profiles for many modern cameras OR you can make your own OR you can adjust manually rather like an upgraded version of the lens correction filter in PS CS2. I normally also use the basic auto colour balance filter. There is no undo feature Camera RAW - which I think is a drawback. The official line is that it is unnecessary as the image is unaltered and you can fiddle with the sidecar file as much as you like without degradation. True - but that misses the point! If you are using a serious of functions and one doesn't work as you'd like it you want to undo it without undoing the others. You can't - you have to close it and start again from scratch, or close and re-open after each stage. Barmy!But overall - brilliant.Content Aware Fill. I was a little cynical about this much-demonstrated feature, thinking it would be more accurate and no less trouble to use a combination of copy/paste, cloning and healing brush tools. Sadly, some reviews have retained this attitude against all the evidence. It is stupendous! The first times I used it were on stitched panoramas (using Arcsoft Panorama Maker incidentally). My chosen cropping would leave extensive areas of white in the lower corners of one image and in the lower centre of another. The infill needed to be quite complex, involving road/footway/shopfront on the first and a drain going diagonally across the footway,. In each case I used the Wand to select the area, enlarging the selection by a few pixels, and then selected C-AF. The first time I just sat there dumbstruck at the amazing way the area had filled. The pictures still needed a little tweaking with the traditional tools as, inevitably, there were a few strange artefacts and some too-evident cloning. But I produced decent results in a couple of minutes rather than ten times that.Another good feature is that the tool has no trouble with edges, unlike the patch tool which still fades to white at the fringes.I could go on about the program. It is a vastly expanded yet faster version of PS compared with CS2, with no evident drawbacks.I was little disappointed that for the first time in my experience there was no printed manual - but that is really inevitable given the range of the program Even the CS2 manual was not comprehensive. I bought "Brilliant Photoshop CS5" by Steve Johnson as a nice clear manual-type book to keep by the PC. Martin Evening's books are excellent for photographic work.

Enough has been said in other lengthy reviews, so I'll just add a couple of points.The content-aware stuff alone is worth the price of the upgrade. It doesn't work every time, but when it does, it does as good a job of cloning out unwanted stuff as I do. It doesn't just come as an option in the fill command, the spot healing brush also has the option, & a few of the other tools too.You don't have to be a student/teacher to get this on the cheap. Buy a copy of CS2 if you can get it, or 3 if you can't (around £100.00, or less used), & get this upgrade version. Ok you still pay £280.00, but it's better than £650.00 for the full version. & it's a ligitimate route into CS5, since the upgrade does anything from CS2.

I upgraded from Photoshop CS3 to Photoshop CS5 on Windows 7. Photoshop works fine, but I have had weeks of frustration due to Bridge constantly crashing. I have contacted Adobe who suggested conflict with my NVIDIA graphics card. This problem is still not resolved so please check that CS5 will work with everything on your computer before purchasing.Update: does not appear to be the graphics card - problem still arising - adobe is now looking into this.Update: Adobe have now found a bug which is causing Bridge to Crash and will correct on next update - i.e. if the Collections folder is opened Bridge will not crash. However, when images are placed into the Collections folder they are lost when Bridge is closed. Other people are also experiencing this problem - see Adobe help pages. I have reported this to Adobe.

This latest version of CS is definitely worthwhile. There are a number of new features which are worth trying, though the new 'Mini Bridge' takes a bit of getting used to, and I'm not sure whether it was worth the software designers' effort. Doing a large part of one's edits in ACR (Raw), non-destructively, is definitely a good change. Thoroughly recommend it as an upgrade but, as an outright purchase, the cost would be prohibitive to all but the most dedicated and wealthy photographer.

Adobe release a new version of Photoshop far to frequently in my opinion. If you really want to see a significant difference it's best to upgrade two versions in one go such as CS3 to CS5, unless of course its essential to you or you have more money than sense. It remains the best product on the market. Lightroom really ought to be merged with Photoshop, but remains an excuse to make ever more money from the buying public.

I was tempted to upgrade to CS5 by people telling me how good the content-aware fill was... Well, having recreated a panoramic of the Rockies that I had originally done on CS4, I was amazed at the content-aware fill (so I could reclaim some of the edges of the shot) but the blending of the different images. Previously, you could see the changes in light and there was no easy way to blend the edges - CS5 did it without even needing a touch-up. Very very impressed!

Have used CS2 for some time, and now have Windows 7 64 bit laptop, high spec, and have pondered about upgrading, finally took bullet, and I have not regretted it. Having researched the web, read reviews, looked at video tutorials, etc. No Manual, but there are some Brilliant books out there, and the available free tutorials are easy to follow. I am a keen photographer, and just getting into video. So far I am very happy with the upgrade.

Probably the best photo editing package in the world. I use it with a 64 bit vista operating system and it is twice as fast as the CS2 version I was using previously. Only negative is that I also use Photoshop elements 9 for ease of tagging images and there does not seem to be any way of importing a keyword tags file from Elements, (it uses xml format)into CS5 which uses a text format for keywords.