I recently updated to Photoshop CS5 on my home computer, and I wanted to briefly share how particularly impressed I am with the new capabilities of their PhotoMerge process. The old PhotoMerge was a hassle to work with, and tended to screw up panoramas in weird ways. Getting the perspective right was usually a guess and check affair. Happily, the new system blows the old one out of the water.

Here's are two examples to compare the systems:

• Original Currituck Lighthouse Panorama (Photoshop CS2)
• New Currituck Lighthouse Panorama (Photoshop CS5)

The results with the new system are much better, and more in line with tools like Microsoft Research's Image Composite Editor. I will be going through my panorama collection over the coming days and updating them as necessary, cleaning them up where needed. I'm looking forward to producing better panoramas in the future with this help of this great tool.