5 ms·

In the last month I've returned two pieces of Adobe software and canceled a yearly subscription. I've been seeing ads for the AI features in photoshop all over

In the last month I've returned two pieces of Adobe software and canceled a yearly subscription. I've been seeing ads for the AI features in photoshop all over twitter this week. It's pretty clear what their business strategy is -- just keep working on the tech and assume people will buy their software because it's the only one with the hot tech thing. It's ironic that for a company that caters to designers, artists and product folks, all their products have such poor UI. And there's no incentive for Adobe to care. The difference between Adobe and Procreate is night and day. It's so clear that Procreate folks use their app themselves and take pleasure in it. I've switched all my work to Procreate, Affinity, and Final Cut.

henriquez 6y ago
Speaking of UI, I’ve been using Photoshop since 1999 and it’s remarkable how little the UI has changed. Sure there are new panels and features, but the basic layout and most of the keyboard shortcuts are all the same. The consistency and familiarity is really nice but I’m sure they’ve sacrificed a ton of UX potential to keep old farts like me.
- gibolt 6y ago
  Changing the UI would raise so much uproar. Millions of workflows would have to change. In addition, it just does so much that changing it would be a very costly task likely to break a lot of things and end up removing features that some tiny niche still uses.
  - mdip 6y ago
    That's it. I didn't even really use Photoshop in a professional capacity, but it's probably worse in that situation. In the past, if you wanted to do something "cool looking" on the web, you'd describe to Google something you saw and invariably land on some Photoshop tutorial. It doesn't translate to other things easily. So to switch to something like GIMP, you have to not only learn the interface, but learn how to translate all of the useful help "in the wild" from Photoshop to GIMP. I remember when I sat down to try to learn paths and such in Photoshop, thinking, "Is this really the best they could come up with?" But, yeah, it was ... when they came up with it and everyone learned how to use it. A switch would eliminate the moat that the product has. And that's what's been chipped away at, in general. I haven't had any need of Photoshop for web dev work in a long time. My image processing needs rarely go beyond the command-line, these days, because many other things we relied on PS for are described in css or are vectors rather than image files.
- pfranz 6y ago
  That's kind of the problem Photoshop has been painted into. As things were added they were kind of shoved into the spots in the UI that existed early on. Old-timers have muscle memory, but it's hard for newcomers to hunt for things because it's not logically organized. The steep learning curve is there for newcomers, but since it's what everyone uses they learn it. Throw enough other hurdles like subscriptions and people will start to switch. It will be hard to dig themselves back out because changing their UI alienates old-timers.
- pixelrevision 6y ago
  As someone who is trying to use pixelmator after 25 years of photoshop there is a lot of muscle memory to overcome.
interestica 6y ago
Are there any great alternatives to Flash (Animate) that can output SVG animation? I think that's the last piece for me.
- stuaxo 6y ago
  Enve looks interesting, it may be one to crowdfund - https://maurycyliebner.github.io/ https://maurycyliebner.github.io/ https://twitter.com/enve2d https://twitter.com/enve2d
  - interestica 6y ago
    This definitely has potential. Thanks for the tip. Continued development may be stalled (patreon currently paused) but hopefully it's just temporary. Would definitely be something I'd want to help crowdfund.
cheeze 6y ago
As someone who has used both quite a bit, IMO Procreate is nice, and very good for certain things, but not even close to Photoshop. If I can't run it on a desktop computer, big fat meh.
- achow 6y ago
  Affinity is the answer. "I've switched all my work to Procreate, Affinity, and Final Cut."
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- prox 6y ago
  Another Affinity vote here. Basically everything I did in PS, can do in Photo. It’s ridiculously good for a version 1. Also they made 8 updates without paying anything extra.
- richrichardsson 6y ago
  > If I can't run it on a desktop computer, big fat meh. This is where Apple Silicon and the convergence of macOS and iPadOS sounds useful. Still not convinced it makes up for the losses though.
dorkwood 6y ago
> It's ironic that for a company that caters to designers, artists and product folks, all their products have such poor UI. That's not really who they're catering to anymore, though. Not primarily, anyway. If you pay attention to the way Adobe communicates in recent years, it's all about the "democratization" of design tools. They want their new tech to look like magic to regular consumers. It doesn't need good UI. It doesn't need to help professionals work more efficiently. It just needs to help Joe Everyman use content-aware fill to remove the unwanted thing from his next Instagram upload. If they can do something in that vein once a month and keep the subscription rolling, then they're golden.
- cecja 6y ago
  yOu aRe NoT aN aRtIsT iF yOu UsE cOnTeNt AwArE fIlL
- egonschiele 6y ago
  Do you feel like they are succeeding at that? I've been using Adobe products since the early 2000s. I recently bought Premiere Elements and it was my first time doing any sort of video editing. I found it awful to use. I've switched to Final Cut and it's a ton better. iMovie was better too.
  - dorkwood 6y ago
    > Do you feel like they are succeeding at that? Their record-breaking profits for the last few years in a row tell me 'yes'.
tmaly 6y ago
what alternative is there for After Effects?

henriquez 6y ago

Speaking of UI, I’ve been using Photoshop since 1999 and it’s remarkable how little the UI has changed. Sure there are new panels and features, but the basic layout and most of the keyboard shortcuts are all the same. The consistency and familiarity is really nice but I’m sure they’ve sacrificed a ton of UX potential to keep old farts like me.

gibolt 6y ago
Changing the UI would raise so much uproar. Millions of workflows would have to change. In addition, it just does so much that changing it would be a very costly task likely to break a lot of things and end up removing features that some tiny niche still uses.
- mdip 6y ago
  That's it. I didn't even really use Photoshop in a professional capacity, but it's probably worse in that situation. In the past, if you wanted to do something "cool looking" on the web, you'd describe to Google something you saw and invariably land on some Photoshop tutorial. It doesn't translate to other things easily. So to switch to something like GIMP, you have to not only learn the interface, but learn how to translate all of the useful help "in the wild" from Photoshop to GIMP. I remember when I sat down to try to learn paths and such in Photoshop, thinking, "Is this really the best they could come up with?" But, yeah, it was ... when they came up with it and everyone learned how to use it. A switch would eliminate the moat that the product has. And that's what's been chipped away at, in general. I haven't had any need of Photoshop for web dev work in a long time. My image processing needs rarely go beyond the command-line, these days, because many other things we relied on PS for are described in css or are vectors rather than image files.
pfranz 6y ago
That's kind of the problem Photoshop has been painted into. As things were added they were kind of shoved into the spots in the UI that existed early on. Old-timers have muscle memory, but it's hard for newcomers to hunt for things because it's not logically organized. The steep learning curve is there for newcomers, but since it's what everyone uses they learn it. Throw enough other hurdles like subscriptions and people will start to switch. It will be hard to dig themselves back out because changing their UI alienates old-timers.
pixelrevision 6y ago
As someone who is trying to use pixelmator after 25 years of photoshop there is a lot of muscle memory to overcome.

interestica 6y ago

Are there any great alternatives to Flash (Animate) that can output SVG animation? I think that's the last piece for me.

stuaxo 6y ago
Enve looks interesting, it may be one to crowdfund - https://maurycyliebner.github.io/ https://maurycyliebner.github.io/ https://twitter.com/enve2d https://twitter.com/enve2d
- interestica 6y ago
  This definitely has potential. Thanks for the tip. Continued development may be stalled (patreon currently paused) but hopefully it's just temporary. Would definitely be something I'd want to help crowdfund.

cheeze 6y ago

As someone who has used both quite a bit, IMO Procreate is nice, and very good for certain things, but not even close to Photoshop. If I can't run it on a desktop computer, big fat meh.

achow 6y ago
Affinity is the answer. "I've switched all my work to Procreate, Affinity, and Final Cut."
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
prox 6y ago
Another Affinity vote here. Basically everything I did in PS, can do in Photo. It’s ridiculously good for a version 1. Also they made 8 updates without paying anything extra.
richrichardsson 6y ago
> If I can't run it on a desktop computer, big fat meh. This is where Apple Silicon and the convergence of macOS and iPadOS sounds useful. Still not convinced it makes up for the losses though.

dorkwood 6y ago

> It's ironic that for a company that caters to designers, artists and product folks, all their products have such poor UI. That's not really who they're catering to anymore, though. Not primarily, anyway. If you pay attention to the way Adobe communicates in recent years, it's all about the "democratization" of design tools. They want their new tech to look like magic to regular consumers. It doesn't need good UI. It doesn't need to help professionals work more efficiently. It just needs to help Joe Everyman use content-aware fill to remove the unwanted thing from his next Instagram upload. If they can do something in that vein once a month and keep the subscription rolling, then they're golden.

cecja 6y ago
yOu aRe NoT aN aRtIsT iF yOu UsE cOnTeNt AwArE fIlL
egonschiele 6y ago
Do you feel like they are succeeding at that? I've been using Adobe products since the early 2000s. I recently bought Premiere Elements and it was my first time doing any sort of video editing. I found it awful to use. I've switched to Final Cut and it's a ton better. iMovie was better too.
- dorkwood 6y ago
  > Do you feel like they are succeeding at that? Their record-breaking profits for the last few years in a row tell me 'yes'.

tmaly 6y ago

what alternative is there for After Effects?