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The first version of Adobe Photoshop was released on February 19, 1990 for Apple's Macintosh operating system exclusively before it was ported to Windows in 1993. Newer versions of the application are also available for Apple's iPad.
Software programs that manage to lead an entire Industry are rare, and even rarer are programs that manage to do so for decades. Adobe Photoshop is such an application; it has become the de-facto standard in raster graphics editing, photo editing, and digital art despite the fact that plenty of free and commercial alternatives are available.
Adobe changed the naming scheme of Photoshop when it introduced its Creative Suite branding in 2002 and when it launched the Creative Cloud in 2013.
Adobe Photoshop turns 30
Adobe Photoshop is available in various Creative Cloud subscription packages. Individuals may subscribe to the Photography plan for $9.99 per month to gain access to Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Lightroom, and 20 Gigabytes of cloud storage. Users who need more storage may switch to the 1 Terabyte cloud storage plan instead, and there is a 7-day free trial for those who want to test the program, e.g. to make sure it installs and runs fine on their devices.
All programs that are included in the subscription may then be downloaded to the local system. Installation requires an active Internet connection as the latest versions are downloaded from Adobe servers when the installer is executed.
The last major version of Adobe Photoshop, Photoshop CC 2020, was released in November 2019. Adobe introduced several new and improved features in the iPad and the desktop version of Photoshop.
Here is our list of the best features of the new release.
Auto Selections improvements - New Object Selection tool
Selection has always been a strong feature of Adobe Photoshop but thanks to the new Object Selection tool and the integration of Adobe Sensei, the company's artificial intelligence, it has been improved significantly.
Photoshop analyses the part of the image that you have selected to identify the object that you most likely wanted to select.
The automated selection process worked really well during tests even with complex images or objects. Minor adjustments may be necessary here and there, but the automatic selection process improves the workflow as most of it is done automatically.
To use the new tool, simply locate the Object Selection tool in the toolbar and activate it. Use the selection tool then to draw a rectangle around the object, e.g. people, a car, pets, or furniture, that you want selected. Adobe Sensei analyzes the part and makes the selection automatically.
You may also select the tool in the Select and Mask workspace.
Properties Panel improvements
The Properties Panel received major improvements in the new Photoshop release. Document, Pixel Layer, and Type Layer properties have improved with new quick actions and other additons.
Quick Actions include new options such as remove background which is also powered by Adobe Sensei. It may be used to isolate objects by removing the background. Backgrounds are not deleted but hidden in a new layer mask.
Other quick actions include selecting a subject while in the Pixel Layer properties, converting text to shapes, or trimming images.
Preset improvements
Adobe reimagined presets in the latest release of Photoshop. Select Window and then Swatches, Gradients, Patterns, Shapes, or Styles to get started. You may notice the following:
- Panels for gradients, patterns and shapes.
- Modernized default presets.
- Option to organize presets into groups using drag and drop.
- Option to drag gradients, patterns, swatches and styles from the panel onto the canvas.
- Live preview on the canvas to try presets.
Content-Aware Fill enhancements
Adobe added three new Sampling Area options in this release to the Content-Aware Fill workplace. These allow you to select the sampling area that you want Photoshop to look to fill content.
The three new options are:
- Auto -- Pick content similar to the surrounding fill area.
- Rectangular - Pick content based on the selected rectangular region.
- Custom - Pick content user user defined sampling areas.
Other improvements in the new Photoshop version
- Transform multiple layers proportionally without using the Shift-key. The default behavior is now “proportional scaling” for all layer types and objects; this can be turned off with a click on the maintain aspect ratio button. The Shift-key acts as a toggle now. If Maintain Aspect Ratio is on, holding down Shift toggles it off and vice versa.
- Convert Smart Objects to layers by selecting the Smart Object in the layers panel, right-clicking (Control-clicking on Mac) the Smart Object, selecting Convert To Layers from the menu that opens.
- Enhanced Transform Warp give more control over Photoshop's warping functionality, .e.g by choosing new preset grid size options, creating custom grids, or deleting gridlines.
- Access a font's alternate glyphs with Stylistic sets. Access the Stylistics Sets menu in the properties panel to apply these to text.
- 32-bit adjustment layers for Brightness /Contrast and Curves.
- New shortcuts
- Use the tilde key to goggle painting and erasing using the same brush tip.
- Use Alt-click or Option-click on a layer to zoom the contents.
- Rotate brush tips using left and right arrow keys to rotate by 1 degree anti-clockwise and clockwise, or by 15 degrees when holding down the Shift-key.
- Animated Gif format saving option added to File > Save As.
- New Document dialog opens much faster.
- Improved Lens Blur performance.
- New „Close Others“ option to close all open documents except for the active one.
- New World-ready Layout text engine option to provide correct word shaping for South-East Asian, Middle Eastern and Indic scripts.
