Photoshop CS3 beta

Adobe have released the new version of Photoshop CS3 as a public beta.

[quote]SAN JOSE, Calif. ? Dec. 14, 2006 ? Adobe Systems Incorporated (Nasdaq:ADBE) will introduce a beta version of Adobe? Photoshop? CS3 software, the next release of the world standard in digital imaging, on Friday, December 15th. Adobe is delivering a widely available Photoshop CS3 beta to enable customers to more easily transition to the latest hardware platforms, particularly Apple?s new Intel- based systems. The beta is available as a Universal Binary for the Macintosh platform, as well as for Microsoft? Windows? XP and Windows Vista computers. The final shipping release of Adobe Photoshop CS3 is planned for Spring 2007. The software can be downloaded at: labs.adobe.com, in the early hours Pacific Standard Time on December 15.

Packed with new features, Photoshop CS3 beta also includes a pre-release version of a major upgrade to Adobe Bridge, as well as a preview release of the all-new Adobe Device Central. Photoshop customers can use Adobe Device Central to design, preview, and test compelling mobile content, created specifically for smaller screens. This new tool, integrated in the Photoshop CS3 beta, simplifies and accelerates the creation of mobile content through a preview environment and built-in device profiles. ?This is an exciting time for the Mac, and Adobe wanted to ease the move to new Intel-based systems with a preview release of Photoshop CS3,? said John Loiacono, senior vice president of Creative Solutions Business Unit at Adobe. ?We didn?t want to leave Windows customers out of the party, so the beta is available to everyone in the creative industry?s most passionate user community ? no matter what their platform choice. We still have some surprises in store, but this beta gives customers an early chance to see the power of another great Photoshop release, optimized and tuned to run natively on the latest hardware and operating systems.?

To utilize Adobe Photoshop CS3 beta, customers require a serial number from either Adobe Photoshop CS2, Adobe Creative Suite? 2, Adobe Creative Suite Production Studio, Adobe Design Bundle, Adobe Web Bundle or Adobe Video Bundle. Adobe Photoshop CS3 beta is available in English only. Customers who have a valid serial number for all other language versions of qualifying Adobe products can download the software. Without a serial number, users can still download Adobe Photoshop CS3 beta, with the product expiring after two days. Customers must register online with Adobe or have an existing Adobe.com membership account to access the software.

In related previews of future technologies, Adobe has also released two new web tools as beta releases. Adobe CSS Advisor is a new web-based community site to easily identify and resolve browser compatibility issues. Web designers and developers can contribute their own issues, comment on existing issues, or become an editor to participate in driving the site?s future. The site is accessible at: www.adobe.com/go/cssadvisor.

System Requirements For Adobe Photoshop CS3 beta, recommended system requirements are as follows. For Macintosh: Mac OSX 10.4.8 or 10.5, 1 GHz PowerPC? G4 or G5 processor, Intel based Macintosh. For Windows: Intel? Xeon? , Xeon Dual, Centrino? or Pentium? 4 processor, Microsoft Windows XP with Service Pack 2 or higher, Microsoft Windows Vista. Both platforms require 512 MB RAM and a 1024?69 resolution screen. Photoshop CS3 beta will expire soon after the launch of Photoshop CS3 in Spring 2007. Details on final pricing, system requirements and availability have yet to be determined. .[/quote]

It can be downloaded here

Nice and bold move from Adobe. I am using CS3 now and it’s really slick. Like the new interface and the workflow is quite different.
Still playing around with it.

I’m glad it’s a rainy weekend - perfect for playing around with it. It’s very fast. I’m on an aging XP machine that’s in need of an upgrade, with only 1GB RAM and it’s running very smoothly. Faster than CS2.

I love CS3. Besides all the new features, the palette management is amazing; that’s stuff that’s useful all the time. And it loads in less than 3 seconds on my MacBook Pro.

There’s a CS3 Learning Center that has many videos of the new features.

photoshopuser.com/cs3/index.html

It’s definitely beta - Bridge has just crashed for the 4th time today. Aaaahhhhhhh!

Free video tutorial PS CS3 at Lynda.com:
movielibrary.lynda.com/html/modPage.asp?ID=327

so for a basic user like me… apart from it being faster… is there any reason to upgrade from CS1 or CS2? I don’t know what all these bridge things are etc. etc. I just know the basics~

For the basic stuff, I’d say there’s probably no point upgrading. Any recent version of Photoshop is probably overkill if it’s just the basics you do. Plus, it ain’t cheap.

Bridge is basically the File Browser from CS renamed, revamped and some would say, with extra bugs.

Has anyone else had any problems with CS3 crashing? I had to reinstall it today as it just would not load up. Bridge would load with errors, but PS itself wouldn’t. When I first installed it, last month, I put in the serial number to take it off the 2 day limit, and it was all working fine. But sometime between last Friday and last night, it stopped working. Which is exactly 30 days after the first install, which is the length of time that the trial versions of Adobe’s software usually last for.

It seems to work fine after the reinstall. I had to re-enter the activation code, but it had somehow saved all my actions and settings.

I’m not sure if anyone else on here is using CS3, but for those that are and have the required activation numbers, Adobe have released a beta2 for Bridge.

http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/entitlement/index.cfm?e=labs_photoshop

EDIT - forgot to add the fix list.

[quote]What’s New!!

Bug Fixes

Too many to mention! Thanks for testing and providing feedback. There was a particularly nasty memory leak that was masking a number of other issues which is now fixed.

Flat View

The flat view provides the ability to view all the content in the subfolders - effectively flattening the view. From the filter panel select the folder icon with the circle and slash through it. Using this with the filter panel, allows you to quickly see all the assets in a project and quickly find the files that you need, regardless of the file structure.

Multiple Monitor Support

We’ve heard the feedback for multiple monitor support. Creating a new synchronized window will allow you to create separate windows that are all synchronized on the same view. Here is how it works with 2 monitors:

  1. In Monitor 1, from Default workspace create new synch window.
  2. In new window move Preview panel to the center, hit the Tab Key to minimize left and right columns.
  3. This should leave you with the just the preview panel in the window, drag to monitor 2
  4. Go back to window 1, select thumbnails.

As you select thumbnails the second window will be synched and display the preview in monitor 2. Try it out with multiple synch windows and different layouts - let us know what you think.

Loupe Improvements

We’ve made a few tweaks to how the loupe reacts as it is dragged near the edge of the image. There should be less flipping and moving around.

JPEG TIFF ACR Editing

The Open in Camera Raw command can be used when a JPEG or TIFF file is selected. A setting in the Preferences dialog indicate if ACR should always be used to render JPEG/TIFF.

Other Improvements

  • File Type Extensions are now shown by default - there was some confusion on file types when the extension was hidden by the OS.
  • Keywords are now saved more often to avoid data loss in case of crash.
  • Filter by ISO values
  • Filter by Camera Serial Number
  • Larger maximum thumbnail size now increased to 640 pixels
  • Improved support for a wider range of hardware configurations, including improved support for Software Rendering
  • Improved display in the Preview panel and Slideshow, particularly with rotated images
  • Folders, text files, etc… can be assigned a label and rating
  • Stacks menu now available in the Menu bar
  • Thumbnails are sharper when displayed at large size
  • Select All now selects all items in a stack, not just the top of the stack
  • Added Edit Metadata Template command in the Tools menu
  • Added keyboard shortcut for Reject
  • Added Batch Rename to contextual menu
  • When using the Build Cache for Subfolder command, respect the thumbnail quality setting (previously, the thumbnails were always thumbnail as high quality thumbnail)
  • The panels can be turned on and off from the Window menu (previously in the View menu)

Release Notes

Mac: After installing the newer Bridge beta build over the older beta build, there will be two Bridge executables in the Applications:Adobe Bridge CS3 folder. Customers must launch ‘Bridge CS3’ to run the updated version

Mac/Win: Bridge error on launch: ‘An error occurred in a Bridge extension. JavaScript error (EventHandler:0): handler is not a function’
Workaround: Disable Start Meeting, Device Central, and Photoshop Services in the Startup Scripts pane under Edit>Preferences (win) or Bridge CS3>Preferences (Mac). Note: OLS and Photoshop Services are both listed in the Startup Scripts preferences. This occurs because the newer beta Bridge build was installed over the older beta build.

Mac/Win: When using Software Rendering, the Loupe only displays 100% (not 200%, etc…)

Win: Using the Backspace key to delete a file or Alt-Backspace to mark an item as rejected does not work as expected.
Workaround: Use delete key instead.

Mac/Win: Unable to open PSD files created in Lightroom if Bridge was used to modify the file.
Workaround: Do not modify Lightroom files in Bridge

Mac: After changing metadata (add keywords, rotate, etc.) for .psd and .jpg files, can’t double-click files to open in PS CS3 using same Bridge session.
Workaround: Exit Bridge and re-start.

Mac/Win: Open RAW file via Bridge Camera Raw and click on Open button in Camera Raw window. Photoshop is not launched as expected.
Workaround: Shift-double-click the RAW file in the Bridge window to open in Photoshop (note on windows: Photoshop may not come to the front when launched or if already running).
[/quote]

The multiple monitor support sounds great, I’ve been waiting for that to work properly. It was a PITA trying to properly configure Bridge on dual monitors before.

I don’t think any photographers are using Bridge anymore. Lightroom is the ultimate for photographer and is way better than Bridge as a workflow.
Thanks for the update.