Digital Photography Essentials

By Darnell Garcia Austria


We had a chance to break in the latest Photoshop CS6 Extended (64-bit) beta version before its grand launch. The main difference from the Extended and Standard editions, apart from the price tag, are the advanced 3D abilities. Adobe has addressed functionality in both versions but since it is a beta release, we won't comment extensively on that aspect of the program until we evaluate the final release.

There are lots of revisions within the application which includes more than 65 "user-inspired" updates; we are going to focus on the most relevant modifications for photography fans for now.

The very first thing you will find is a fresh, darkish interface which gives you a far more focused viewpoint and much more adequate evaluation of photos. Even so, you can change the backdrop by a simple right click or by making the change in Preferences. Personally, I prefer the dark backdrop but others may feel more at ease with one that is even darker or lighter (there are four options by the way).

Though it isn't really noticeable, the new Background Save and auto-recovery options are huge. Given the ever-growing size of image files and the amount of time it requires to write them to your hard drive, Background Save tends to make these tasks in Photoshop far more beneficial because you can carry on other files while you wait. Auto-recovery will rescue you from unforeseen episodes in editing where most of us have experienced.

Another time-saver is the power to migrate your preset coming from a recent release of the software. Photoshop CS6 is the earliest build to offer this crucial attribute which means you will no longer have to set all of the presets you worked overtime to recreate.

There were hopeful rumors Photoshop CS6 that it could possibly deliver blurry pictures into focus. In the meantime, we are going to let the Lytro camera keep hold of that claim. But Photoshop CS6 has a fresh blur gallery with 3 choices: Field Blur (a graduated blur), Tilt-Shift and Iris Blur. The latter is regarded as the important to produce targeted bokeh or depth-of-field. Just simply insert a point on the photograph to set the spot of focus after which moves two surrounding rings. Both inner and outer rings are changeable separately so that you can reveal where blur is the most powerful with the latter, while the inner ring controls feathering. If your lens doesn't get you just as much bokeh as you'd like, the Iris Blur tool gives you a simple and straightforward selection.

In addition to the said features, there are also the regulars for making photo improvements familiar to all professional photographers such as contrast, brightness, balance in color and standard tools like Levels and Curves, it is possible to pick from five transitions and a lot more.

Adobe Photoshop CS6 can certainly make life simpler and photos much better. It's as easy as that. And, the ability to modify a big list of variables for video clips just boosts the variety of reasons photography enthusiasts will be downloading the beta by the thousands.




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