Photoshop Goes 3D

Citing an explosion of digital photography uses, Adobe Photoshop Senior Product Manager Ashley Manning told Automation World, “Engineers can carry digital cameras into manufacturing areas to document the project cycle. As manufacturing information coming from computer-aided design applications is increasingly rendered in 3D, the 3D tools in Photoshop will allow professionals in manufacturing to document and collaborate in 3D naturally instead of finding workarounds to 2D images.”

May 9th, 2007

Manning’s comments came in reference to the latest additions to the Photoshop line of products rolled out recently by Adobe Systems Inc. (www.adobe.com/go/photoshop), San Jose, Calif. The company announced Adobe Photoshop CS3 and Photoshop CS3 Extended, two new editions of the professional digital imaging application that for the first time extend the software’s capabilities to three dimensions.

Photoshop CS3 and Photoshop CS3 Extended will be available as stand-alone applications or as key components of Adobe’s expanded Creative Suite 3 family. The software will be available as a universal application for both PowerPC and Intel-based Macs and will support both Microsoft Windows XP and Windows Vista. Customers will experience increased levels of performance and speed running Photoshop CS3 on Intel-based Macintosh systems and the latest Windows hardware.

While the new Photoshop packages may open new application areas in manufacturing engineering, Adobe believes the products’ new features—including its extended 3D capabilities—will have major implications across a range of industries and disciplines.