Adobe Photoshop Elements Turns 6

Posted 10/10/2007 at 8:26pm | by

If it's autumn, it must be time for a new version of Adobe's Photoshop Elements. Photoshop Elements 6 is now available on store shelves as well as from Adobe (but you can beat Adobe's online price by $20 or so by shopping at stores like Wal-Mart). It's been just over a year since version 5.0 hit store shelves, so should PE5 fans head back for a new version?

Photomerge Gets Smarter - and Easier

PE 6 brings the much-improved version of Photomerge pioneered in Photoshop CS3 over to the consumer side. The original Photomerge was designed for landscapes only, but the new version also adds support for faces and group shots - perfect for solving the problem of "somebody's eyes were closed - again!"

Better and Easier Photo Editing

Choose from full-featured, quick, or guided step-by-step photo repairs
Easier area selection tools
Better healing brushes
Easier clone tool operation
Better brightness/contrast controls

Get Artistic with PE6

PE6 improves the black-and-white conversion options inherited from PE5, adds better RAW file support, and an improved photo book creation feature. Like to create multiple versions of a photo? PE6 stacks them automatically for you.

Photo Organizing and Sharing Made Simple

Instead of clicking all over the place to locate CD burning, slide show, email, and other sharing features, PE6 puts them all in one place with the new Sharing Center.

Find the photos you want by specifying multiple search criteria with Smart Albums.

Bundle Up! PE6 + Adobe Premiere Elements 4

Adobe continues to provide single-package savings for photo and video fans by bundling PE6 with the new Premiere Elements 4 (or you can buy it separately). New features in Premiere Elements 4 include:

Support for direct uploading to YouTube and mobile devices
Video style effects and transitions for photo slide shows
Video freeze frame effects
Transformation of frames into disc covers and albums
Movie themes
New audio mixer
Improved title animation
HD /Blu-ray Disc support
Automatic optimization for playback on any device

Time for an Upgrade? Hopefully, Soon!

Whether you're strictly a digital photo fan or have a leg in both the digital photo and digital video world, upgrading to PE6 or the PE6 plus Premiere Element 4 bundle makes sense. Better features and improved ease of use make the upgrade worthwhile - if you use Windows XP SP2 or Vista. Unfortunately, MacOS is still on PE4, but Adobe promises version 6 for MacOS in early 2008.

However, keep in mind that some users are reporting significant bugs in Premiere Elements 4 and some users running Windows Vista are less than pleased with PE6's performance (see related articles). Adobe frequently introduces patch files not long after shipping a program, so keep a watch on the Downloads page at Adobe.com for updates. Hopefully, Adobe will fix any lingering bugs sooner rather than later, because PE6 and Premiere Elements 4 have exciting new features you'll want to try.

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