If you've seen Photoshop CS6 you won't be that surprised - by default it's charcoal grey. The first thing you notice about Adobe Illustrator CS6 is that it looks different. So, what has Adobe done in Adobe Illustrator CS6? A facelift, some speed improvements, a few tweaks and one major addition that illustrators and designers in particular will love are all on the agenda. Over the years the application has been given some quite remarkable features - from the Gradient Mesh in the 1998 release of version 8 to multiple art boards in CS4 and the Perspective Grid in CS5 (which Adobe ported across from FreeHand, the tool it bought from Macromedia and then phased out), it is a behemoth of an application, whether you want to create photorealistic illustrations or slick logos. We dislike? Actually, there's not much to dislike. For Illustrator users working with patterns in any way, the new functionality is intuitive and extremely powerful. We like the redesigned interface, the intelligent tweaks to panels, the speed and the incredible new pattern creation tools. if you're just using Illustrator to design letterforms, create logos or design simple line drawings, you'll probably be happy sticking with the version you've got.

When it comes to the crunch, if you use any kind of patterns within your work, it's a no-brainer. The minor additions make Adobe Illustrator CS6 a more rounded, quicker to navigate and use application, whereas the bigger additions - especially the pattern creation tools - make it a more versatile and powerful piece of software. The application looks slicker, is much faster and for the Â£190 standalone upgrade it's worth the cash. It's difficult not to recommend Adobe Illustrator CS6 - what it adds are a number of workflow and creative-focused tools that are genuinely excellent.

Adobe illustrator mac cs6