Informatix has announced the launch of the Mac version of Piranesi 5 and with it a 5.02 update for Windows that fixes a few bugs and adds a couple of tweaks (most useful for improved Google SketchUp support).

Full information at http://www.informatix.co.uk/piranesi/downloads/windows/upgrades_and_fixe...

Microsoft has finally officially released its free HD Photo plug-ins for Photoshop CS2 and CS3.

I wrote about HD Photo a while back when it was first announced and after my initial doubts - why on earth would we want a JPEG replacement? - I was won round by the flexibility of the specification...

VERDICT: Plenty of core new power for the digital camera user – but Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 is still playing catch-up.

Over its long history Paint Shop Pro has built up a great deal of bitmap editing power, but it has also come to seem dated and increasingly out of tune with the times...

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VERDICT: A new interface, smart albums, guided editing and photo merging but comparatively little to boost core efficiency.

Organizing and enhancing thousands of digital photographs is a time-consuming task and the digital camera owner needs dedicated help to make the process as productive and enjoyable as possible...

If you were held back from buying a new camera because its RAW output wasn't supported in Lightroom or Photoshop CS3 then the latest free updates from Adobe might help.

14 new cameras are now supported namely the Canon EOS 40D; Fuji FinePix IS-1; Leaf Aptus 17, 54s and 75s; Olympus EVOLT E-510; Panasonic DMC-FZ18; Pentax K100D Super; Phase One P 20+, P 21+, P 25+, P 30+ and P 45+; and Sony A700.

Tom Arah shows you the best way to bring some texture into your design work.

Long-term readers will know that I am a big fan and keen advocate of the use of seamless bitmap textures. Such textures play an essential role in the production of 3D work, as we saw again last month, but they can also prove just as useful within 2D bitmap and vector environments...

Tom Arah explores the ways in which 3D modelling and bitmap editing can be creatively fused.

The end quality of 3D output depends largely on the application’s handling of materials and, more often than not, this involves mapping imported bitmaps to your objects’ surfaces...

VERDICT: Piranesi gets the major overhaul of interface and tools that its extraordinary creative power deserves.

Piranesi stands out from all other bitmap editors because it is able to handle material and depth information as well as colour; it might sound a relatively small difference but it unleashes a massive amount of 3D painting power...

Microsoft pulls off an extraordinary feat reinventing desktop application design, but it's only the taste of things to come regarding the web.

For years now there has been talk of Microsoft’s determination to move into the design software territory normally associated with Adobe. Now, with the launch of the Expression Studio suite, the talk is over – so how does it shape up?

VERDICT: Bizarrely antiquated and underpowered creative asset management.

To give a general boost to its professional design credentials and in particular to its Expression Studio suite, Microsoft decided that it needed an application for managing media assets and so bought up iView MediaPro 3...