Sketch Pad: Photoshop CS5 One Step Closer to Real Life Painting

Because this video link came from Net.Tuts+, this has to be legit. Adobe is hard at work right now developing the CS5 suite, and one of their reps just uploaded to YouTube a sneak peak of what is in store for their flagship imaging editing program. CS4 had some negative press last year due to poor sales and many criticizing Adobe’s decision to “rush” it to market, however there were a number of very cool features added specifically to Photoshop, including it’s ability to work with 3D objects, content-aware scaling, and smooth zooming and scrolling across images. 

This video alone highlights how every iteration of Photoshop has at least one or two “must have” tools for imaging artists and photographers alike. Although only two things are shown here, neither are a small deal. The new, more realistic brushes look awesome and is probably the first major overhaul to the brush tool (one of the program’s most basic) in at least a decade. The ability to blend colors into each other with a brush so that it mimics actual painting is simply brilliant. Also, I love the warp tool, which was added in CS2, so the “smarter” warping ability shown in this video is also going to be a very welcome feature. Looks like it works similar to After Effect’s puppet tool. I can only imagine what other goodies are going to come bundled with CS5. Guess we’ll have to wait until it’s proper release, to be tentatively released in Spring 2010!