MPJMP Posted February 5, 2010 Share #1 Posted February 5, 2010 Advertisement (gone after registration) I've been using Photoshop Elements 6 for Mac for the past year. Adobe is running a promotion right now and I can upgrade to CS4 for $299. I'm trying to figure out if it's worth it for me to upgrade. In a nutshell, what are the things that I can do with CS4 that I can't do with PSE? I'm not interested in graphic design or illustration, just photo editing. I've been satisfied with PSE up to this point, but for all I know I could be missing a lot by not having CS4. Thanks, Mike Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted February 5, 2010 Posted February 5, 2010 Hi MPJMP, Take a look here Should I upgrade PSE to CS4?. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
ptarmigan Posted February 5, 2010 Share #2 Posted February 5, 2010 Seems pretty straight-forward to me. Ask yourself if there are things you want to do but cannot with your current software that adopting CS4 you will be able to do? If the answer is no, it's not a good investment. If yes, it is. You should maybe also look at whether Lightroom is more suitable. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest WPalank Posted February 5, 2010 Share #3 Posted February 5, 2010 Just a warning. I believe CS5 is just around the corner. In fact, I have been invited to and will be in attendance at the "20th Anniversary of Photoshop Party" on Feb. 18th at the Palace of Fine arts in San Francisco. it wouldn't surprise me if they made the announcement that night. Photoshop CS5 Tutorials - Free Adobe Photoshop 12 Tutorials | PhotoshopSupport.com Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
rob_w Posted February 5, 2010 Share #4 Posted February 5, 2010 For me the issue with PSE was that it is restricted to 8-bit mode and so the image could not be worked too deeply. Don't know if this is still the case, but I abandoned it for LR and CS3. These days LR does nearly everything I need, so if as you say you do not have a strong graphical need for CS4/5 maybe you could consider staying with LR? Cheers Robert Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
MPJMP Posted February 6, 2010 Author Share #5 Posted February 6, 2010 What's the benefit of editing in 16-bit vs. 8-bit? I've never used LR before. Need to download a trial version to see what all the fuss is about. -Mike Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
andybarton Posted February 6, 2010 Share #6 Posted February 6, 2010 Working in 16 bit means that you work in more or less full colour. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
haroldp Posted February 8, 2010 Share #7 Posted February 8, 2010 Advertisement (gone after registration) What's the benefit of editing in 16-bit vs. 8-bit? I've never used LR before. Need to download a trial version to see what all the fuss is about. -Mike 16b Reduces cumulative rounding errors. .... H Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
MPJMP Posted February 13, 2010 Author Share #8 Posted February 13, 2010 16b Reduces cumulative rounding errors. .... H I'm not sure I understand what this means. Can you please explain? Thanks, Mike P.S. - I downloaded the trial version of LR2 and the beta version of LR3. A really good tool, but I still think mostly in PS terms. I will continue to play with it for the 30 day trial to see if I catch on, but there are some things in PS that I am used to that just don't seem to be there in LR. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
adan Posted February 13, 2010 Share #9 Posted February 13, 2010 RE: rounding errors. If, for example, you make a "curves" or "levels" change to an 8-bit image that raises midtone brightness 50% - a level of 128 will map nicely to a new level of 192, but a level of 127 can't map to a new level of 190.5 (only integers are allowed), so it has to be rounded off to 191 or 190. Reduce brightness again by 30%, and 190 can't be changed to exactly 146.15384615, it has to be rounded off to 146. Do that often enough, and you get odd separations of tones that used to be right next door to each other. In effect, 16-bit gives you "decimal places" - in-between values that don't get rounded off nearly as much on a percentage basis. With 64,000 overall brightness levels in 16-bit, any rounding errors are only 1/256th as large as in 8-bit, relative to the total range. You (or at least I) wouldn't think it makes much difference - but I was playing around with some 8-bit images with large open skies and a touch of vignetting (21mm lens) today, and it was amazing how quickly bands started to appear in the subtle sky gradations. 16-bit gives you 256x more headroom to avoid that. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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