14 DAY TRIAL // Adobe Photoshop Creative Suite 2 and creative Suite 3 do not offer support by default for Microsoft's HD Photo, also known as Windows Media Photo. HD Photo is the Redmond company's new digital image file format positioned as an alternative to the JPEG standard, coming to the table with superior quality and compression. The photo file format, natively supported by Windows Vista, benefited from the full support of the Joint Photographic Expert Group on its path to becoming an international standard. JPEG XR is the label for the standardization project of HD Photo. And Microsoft is gearing up for a time when HD Photo will be as ubiquitous as JPEG. In this context, support for Adobe's suites is a must.
"HD Photo plug-ins for Adobe Photoshop CS2 and CS3 have been officially released for both Windows and OSX. The Windows version is supported on Windows XP and Windows Vista, and works with Photoshop CS2 and CS3. While not officially supported, it will also work with limited features with older versions of Photoshop and with Photoshop Elements. The included README file has details. The OSX version works with both 10.4 (Tiger) and 10.5 (Leopard), and supports Photoshop CS2 and CS3", explained Bill Crow, Microsoft Senior Program Manager.
Crow underlined the fact that there was no difference between the pug-ins for the two platforms in terms of functionality. Essentially the plug-ins, available as free downloads, will permit CS2 and CS3 users to save and open HD Photo files. The final version of the plug-in does not add anything on top of what Microsoft has already delivered with the beta builds. Moving to RTM was simply a matter of fine-tuning HD Photo Plug-in.
"All the changes we've made since the last beta are under the covers, fixing a couple minor bugs, addressing several theoretical security vulnerabilities and generally bringing the code up to current Microsoft standards for released software. But on the surface, the released plug-ins look and act identical to the most recent betas. Don't forget that the BETA versions will expire on December 31st, so you should definitely download and install these new released versions", Crow added.
HD Photo Plug-in for Adobe Photoshop Software - Windows is available for download here.
HD Photo Plug-in for Adobe Photoshop Software - OS X can be grabbed via this link.