Photoshop CS3 beta released

Yes, you read the title right. It’s out, since yesterday (just didn’t have time to write about this, due to my flight to finland).

This is especially good news for us Intel mac users, since the beta is universal. A windows version is of course also available.

I’m not going to write a full scale review or whavetever of the new version, since I haven’t had the time to experiment with it so much yet. Still, I gotta say the new interface is really smart. It scales according to your needs, and doesn’t have any loose palettes, similar to the After Effects 7 interface. All palettes can be accesses with one click of a button, so you don’t have to navigate in the window menu, or remember shortcuts anymore. You really gotta try it to see what I mean.

Another interesting feature is smart filters, which work like adjustment layers. You can change the options later on. This is great when working with filters on for example photographs. Sweet! Other sweetness such as improved 32-bit image handling is also available.

A new feature, open gl zoom, which will be included in the final release, is missing from this beta.

Update: It’s blazing fast. Oh man, you really don’t need to wait for anything. Also it as loads and loads of really smart features. This is a much bigger upgrade than cs1 -> cs2! Been doing some small photo manipulation and graphics for my new site, and I can say I’m really noticing the difference! Now I’m just hoping for a similar release for Flash and After Effects.

Great work from Adobe, again.