Wednesday, Sep 17, 2008    Text size: 

Details about the new suite remain sketchy, but various online reports suggest a major leap forward in functionality for most if not all of Adobe's premier applications.

Dreamweaver, Fireworks, Flash, Flash Player, InDesign, Photoshop and Soundbooth will all see full upgrades, while smaller bundles of updates will be made available for the suite's other applications.

Apple Insider reported that Photoshop's 3D objects function will be updated in the CS4 release, as well as a Flash services panel, natural canvas rotation and content-aware image resizing. In addition, Windows users will get 64-bit support in this new release.

InDesign CS4, Adobe's answer to the QuarkXPress desktop publishing application, will include an option to export an InDesign document to Flash.

Flash CS4 will include improvements to the application's motion editors, as a new option aimed at improving in-between, or "tween," frames in animated elements.

Tech writer David Hague of Hydrapinion.com hinted that Adobe's film-editing software, Premiere, will see a marked improvement.

The current suite of Adobe programs includes such must-haves as Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Flash, Acrobat and InDesign. The company launched the the most recent update, known as CS3, last March.

Consumers got a sneak peek at some of the new features to be added to CS4 in May, when Adobe posted previews of Dreamweaver, Fireworks and Soundbooth.