i'm a casual photoshop user that delves into some light photo editing and vector art. for the casual vector artist, photoshop is more than sufficient (if you are a hardcore vector user, i suggest picking up adobe illustrator rather than photoshop). the line/pen tool, is paramount if you are at the least bit interested in vectorized art. it allows you to create images in vectors rather than pixels. the end result, with photoshop's tool, is that you create images that can be resized upwards or downwars without any loss in quality. images as a result become crystal clear regardless of whether there was any resizing or not. apart from its vector tools, photoshop has a myriad of other tools, ranging from color swapping, cropping, blending, and pattern creation, to name a few. the one HUGE drawback of photoshop CS4 is its cost. it simply costs too much. if you are strapped for cash i recommend you pick up the stripped down version of Photoshop or pick up another software. 

stacyjerr

Los Angeles, CA