11 comments

  • Juan ArreguinJuan Arreguin, over 8 years ago

    Great read, definitely proofs that being one of the best tools out there isn't easy. Yet is all about making the tools better and easier to use.

    Great article for sure, go team Adobe! — I got your back boys and gals!

    3 points
  • John PJohn P, over 8 years ago

    I miss Fireworks

    3 points
  • Jason CsizmadiJason Csizmadi, over 8 years ago

    Two years to launch artboards? I've lost faith in Adobe.

    2 points
    • Charles PearsonCharles Pearson, over 8 years ago

      Not sure how you got that, it doesn't say anywhere it took 2 years to launch artboards. Dev to get to v1 of artboards was probably 6 months (and no molecule is full-time on any one feature, there is multiple work happening simultaneously).

      0 points
      • Jason CsizmadiJason Csizmadi, over 8 years ago

        "Almost two years ago, the Photoshop team pivoted to focus its energies and resources on design features and workflows."

        Maybe I should have said design features instead of artboards, but the output of this pivot seems to have been primarily the new artboards feature. You could make a case for "Design Space" but it's unusable in its current form and appears to be only a glimpse of what's to come.

        I'm sure the dev process was much shorter than 2 years. My point was after Adobe pivoted to focus on adding design features and workflow improvements into Photoshop it has taken 2 years to see those improvements released to public.

        My intention is not to be negative, but I'm paying a lot of money for a subscription service I didn't ask for just for the privilege of using Photoshop.

        2 points
        • Charles PearsonCharles Pearson, over 8 years ago

          I hear you. Like we talked about on Twitter -- there are gaps, we know. "Only a glimpse" is right, cool things, so many more things in the works here. :) BTW: is PS only Adobe app you're using? If so, check out the photo bundle. $10 a month gets you PS (and Lightroom), pretty good deal.

          0 points
          • Jason CsizmadiJason Csizmadi, over 8 years ago

            As a product designer, I need Photoshop and Illustrator to be effective. I wish Adobe would offer designers a choice like they do photographers with the Photoshop / Lightroom subscription option.

            0 points
  • Riho KrollRiho Kroll, over 8 years ago

    It's great to see interest in designers' workflows from Adobe, however having seen how Design Space performs and performance of Photoshop in general lately, I wonder if it's the right platform for this kind of a tool.

    I am fully against having a tool that only does UI design, which is the reason I don't intend to seriously use Sketch, since I would always have to switch programs (and the mindset to go with it) to do raster modifications. This is why Photoshop is so great. You can do everything in one place without changing mindset or breaking your flow. Which at least to me, allows me to be much more creative and free in my approach to (visual) design.

    That aside, Photoshop for UI is like a T-Rex that we're trying to convert to a vegetarian babysitter. It may be possible, but the effort put into that might be more than just building a 'design' tool (note the lack of 'UI') from scratch.

    That is just my opinion on the matter, I'm sure Sketch works great for you. You don't need to go all Sketch's witnesses on me.

    0 points
    • Charles PearsonCharles Pearson, over 8 years ago

      Hey Riho. I'm curious: what would be your ultimate design tool? If its not "UI only" but needs to handle raster well would love to hear what kind of tool you're looking for. Part of our vision (if you have haven't guessed) is to have multiple spaces so one could switch seamlessly within PS between a UI-focused space and an imaging space or even painting space. The goal would be minimal context switching. Performance is key though, and we're working on that.

      1 point
      • Riho KrollRiho Kroll, over 8 years ago (edited over 8 years ago )

        Hey Charles,

        What I mean by photoshop not being the right platform is two fold.

        Firstly it's definitely the performance. It is bad both in the 'classic' photoshop and especially in design space. It's probably the hardest to sell internally for you guys, but photoshop needs a performance overhaul. Without that it's really hard to sell any new features, at least for me.

        The second part is the drastic difference between the classic space and design space. I feel that this might not be the right approach. I understand the need for a 'clean slate', but it means leaving behind everything that's familiar about photoshop (for good and for bad).

        So the perfect design tool for me would be a lightweight, modern app that takes the best of raster editing from PS, the best of vector editing from illustrator and sketch and adds UI focused features on top (artboards, layer comps, etc.).

        This is why I think photoshop might not be the right starting place, especially if you're not going to reuse any of the tools that are already there (in context of the design space).

        Btw did you ever get a chance to have a look at the proposal for 'Smart Groups' I emailed to you some time ago? :)

        0 points
        • Charles PearsonCharles Pearson, over 8 years ago

          Thanks for all that, very insightful. More to discuss off-line, I'll be in touch.

          And yes to your email but tbh it got lost in the swirl of the run-up to release. I'll re-visit it, chat soon.

          0 points