Adobe Photoshop CS2 Review
Vincent Bockaert, June 2005

The GUI

Following the Adobe Photoshop tradition, each new version is a smooth evolution from earlier versions which makes it easy to switch versions and allows you to benefit from your earlier learning curve. Apart from a few exceptions, most of the commands and shortcuts are identical to earlier versions.

Perhaps A Little Too Evolutionary?

Fonts

A long awaited improvement is the display of a sample word next to the font name in the font list of the Type tool so you have an idea what the fonts looks like. Unfortunately the word "Sample" is not much to go by as it exemplifies only 6 sample characters and no numbers.

Layers Palette

Photoshop CS Layers Palette	Photoshop CS2 Layers Palette

Multiple layers can now be selected in the same way you select multiple files in Windows. If you select one layer you can select/deselect additional layers while holding down the "CTRL" key or a range of layers by holding down the "SHIFT" key. This makes linking much less necessary. However, you can still link or unlink the selected layers by clicking on the new "Link" button at the bottom of the Layers palette. Although this is overall an improvement, some people may miss the link layer icon column, which is still present in ImageReady CS2.

Adobe Bridge

The File Browser which was introduced in Photoshop 7 and improved in Photoshop CS is now called "Adobe Bridge" because it can be accessed via the other Creative Suite applications as well. Just like the File Browser, Bridge's integration with Adobe Camera Raw 3.1 allows you to preview, adjust, and process multiple raw files at once. Moreover, the processing can be done in the background while performing other tasks in Photoshop. Bridge can also run independently from Photoshop as a standalone application. New features include scaleable thumbnails, many types of image review modes, and improved rating and labeling features. We will now have a closer look at the performance.

Application Startup Speed

Thumbnail Generation Speed - JPEG Images

The above tests were done with the upcoming Bridge 1.0.2 which performs much better than the current version 1.0.1. The embedded JPEG thumbnails appear in about the same time as ACDSee. However, the building of higher quality thumbnails based on the full image takes much longer than in ACDsee 7. More importantly, in ACDSee 7 you can choose between viewing the embedded JPEG thumbnails and building the thumbnails based on the actual image data via "Tools -> Options -> File List -> Use embedded JPEG thumbnails". Unfortunately, Bridge does not have such an option to speed up things. Bridge allows for thumbnail and image preview sizes of up to 1,024 x 1,024 pixels. In ACDSee 7, the thumbnails are limited to 240 x 240 pixels, but there is no limit on the image preview size.

Thumbnail Generation Speed - RAW Images

The File Browser in Photoshop CS and Bridge in Photoshop CS2 use Adobe Camera Raw, so an additional pass based on the actual RAW data is done to build more accurate previews. Here Photoshop CS2 with Bridge is faster than ACDSee 7 (for RAW images, selecting the earlier mentioned "Use embedded JPEG thumbnails" option does not make a difference). Microsoft Windows Explorer showed the embedded JPEG thumbnails almost instantly.

Bridge Conclusion

Performance for RAW files has improved compared to the Photoshop CS File Browser and the tight integration with Camera Raw offers clear RAW workflow benefits. However, now that Bridge has become a separate application from Photoshop, one would have expected a Windows shell integration and a JPEG performance which is at least on par with applications like ACDSee 7 (which could easily be achieved by having an "Use embedded JPEG thumbnails" option).

The pages that follow will discuss the new Photoshop CS2 features that are useful for digital photographers. Click here to continue.

This article is written by Vincent Bockaert, author of The 123 of digital imaging Interactive learning Suite featuring Adobe Photoshop Elements 2 & 3 and Photoshop 7, CS & CS2 Click here to visit 123di.com

If you're new to digital photography you may wish to read the Digital Photography Glossary before diving into this review (it may help you understand some of the terms used).

Images which can be viewed at a larger size have a small magnifying glass icon in the bottom right corner of the image, clicking on the image will display a larger (normally 1024 x 768 or smaller if cropped) image in a new window. To navigate the review simply use the next / previous page buttons, to jump to a particular section either pick the section from the drop down or select it from the navigation bar at the top. DPReview calibrate their monitors using Color Vision OptiCal at the (fairly well accepted) PC normal gamma 2.2, this means that on our monitors we can make out the difference between all of the (computer generated) grayscale blocks below. We recommend to make the most of this review you should be able to see the difference (at least) between X,Y and Z and ideally A,B and C.

This article is Copyright 2005 and may NOT in part or in whole be reproduced in any electronic or printed medium without prior permission from the author.