Photoshop's Upgrade

Someone commented today on one of my posts (from November 2007), asking if I use the latest version of Photoshop. Well no... I use CS4 and there's a brand new version out which I don't have. Maybe I'll put the upgrade on my wishlist.

I see on Adobe that new features of Photoshop CS5 include automatic straightening and "automatic correction of lens distortions, chromatic aberration, and vignetting." That sounds useful! I do a fair amount of correcting for lens distortion, mostly on photos of buildings and tabletop-style signs like Civil War Trails markers. Ideally I would avoid the problem in the first place by holding the camera absolutely level and parallel to the subject, but it isn't always possible. In the case of buildings, often it's impossible to get an unobstructed view from far enough away to get the roof in the picture, so I wind up tilting the camera, causing lens distortion. It may turn out looking awkward, and Photoshop already has a filter for improving it. It's not automatic though, so I'd love to see the new version in action.

Whether it will work on those table-top markers is a different matter. If I hold the camera level, the text of the sign is angled away and will be unreadable. On the other hand, if I tilt the camera above the marker so that it is parallel to the surface, the sign will read clearly BUT my arms aren't long enough to hold the camera high enough to get everything parallel! So I usually take a couple of compromise shots, and the results can be awkward, like the example here in which none of the lines look parallel.

The upgrade sounds intriguing but Adobe's upgrades are expensive. I'll have to think about it a while.