Microsoft Pauses Work on 'Photoshop Killer'

daria42 writes "According to this article, Microsoft has paused development work on some parts of the pro graphics application it first released in beta back in June 2005. The problem? It appears the software giant doesn't see the application as a stand-alone product, but more of a companion piece to its Expression product line. Plus Vista needs to be released first."

Re:PaintbrushShop

[Alex P Keaton in da]

Hmm- what is funny is that MS has to fight the same kind of thing that keeps Windows entrenched. It is commonly argued that people stick with windows because it is what they know and what they are used to (I know I am overlooking the fact that it is included with almost every PC sold).
Now MS is on the other end- I use Photoshop almost daily. I have to be honest- even if there was a program twice as good (however you measure twice as good) I would be hard pressed to give up a program I have used for a decade (Photoshop) and am used to. Even when I use Fireworks, I have some trouble, because the commands are different/located in different places...

Then it's not a "Photoshop Killer"

[babbling]

If Microsoft think that the scope of the application is too small to be considered a completely separate package, it's not going to be the "Photoshop Killer" that they want it to be.

Will they get it right eventually? Probably. Microsoft can afford to throw money at things until they become good, and they have the added advantage of being able to make any product successful just by making it the "default". For this reason, they get a huge headstart over any competitors. Once competitors like Adobe and Google realise this, they might start thinking that switching customers over to Linux is a good idea. On Linux, no company controls the playground, so every application developing company is in there with an equal chance. There's no "default".

I tried it..

[bigman2003]

Okay, I'll admit that I am somewhat of a Microsoft fan. (see my history...) Yeah, you might think I'm sick. But I do think they put out a lot of good software.

I was excited about this when it was announced. I've downloaded the betas...umm...it just isn't quite good.

Yes, I understand it is a beta.

But this thing is ugly, it's SLOW and it doesn't seem to be anywhere NEAR Photoshop.

I've downloaded tons on Microsoft betas (working on IE 7 now) and this had to have been the worst that I ever used. I just don't know where this one is heading. People up above suggested that this will be an integral part of the OS and bundled in...

I don't see how it has a chance otherwise...

Not to mention the fact that the world isn't even ASKING for a Photoshop replacement.

Re:PaintbrushShop

[Anonymous Coward]

Remember DR DOS, Netscape? I expect that photshop will stop working with Windows pretty soon.

They did what?

[ErikZ]

They...stopped working on it?

What happened? Did they run out of programmers?

The Perfect Photoshop Killer...

[__aaclcg7560]

If they want to dominate the market, the product pricing has to be between what you would pay for Paint Shop Pro and Photoshop. Plus they have to offer a Mac version and a free Wacom tablet.

Nah... that will never happen.

I'd like a Photoshop replacement

[Rocketship Underpant]

"Not to mention the fact that the world isn't even ASKING for a Photoshop replacement."

The world might not be, but I am. Photoshop, for all its snazzy tools, is in need of a refresh, one it's not going to get from Adobe. Many bugs have persisted in every version I've used, from 4 to 8 (CS), and the basic interface has never changed. There are lot of usability improvements that could be made.*

I'd personally like Apple or a Mac software outfit like Panic to create a Photoshop competitor. With APIs like Core Image and Core Data available now, much of the groundwork is already laid for a great OS X application. And if I were running Adobe, I'd get a small team of engineers like the ones responsible for Lightbox to start building a Photoshop replacement from the ground up.

* Here's an example of what I mean. To save a .png file after editing it, I should just be able to hit "save". Instead, it takes no fewer than 6 clicks to get the darn file saved. Adobe does little or no usability testing, I'm convinced.

Re:PaintbrushShop

[Uber Banker]

I have to be honest- even if there was a program twice as good (however you measure twice as good) I would be hard pressed to give up a program I have used for a decade (Photoshop) and am used to.

Exactly, and this was recently cited as one of the reasons users will not switch to Lunix or other OSes, because their favourite app had not been ported. IMHO its bad news that MS have paused work on this, because it reduces the chance of Adobe getting annoyed and porting Photoshop to Lunix.

Re:PaintbrushShop

[Dan Ost]

Has Adobe ever given an official position about porting to Linux?

Masochism

[Anonymous Coward]

"Now I know a ton of graphic designers who use Windows machines. That was unheard of when I was younger."

What do they do? Surely not prepress. You can get Photoshop for the PC, but trying to ensure colour accuracy on a PC is a nasty, nasty process. It costs far more in time than you save on hardware, and even with the best solutions available you won't have consistent colour across all apps.

Sounds like you know a lot of _web_ designers.

This is why Adobe needs Linux.

[babbling]

Microsoft can't make their applications the "default" on alternative operating systems. With Microsoft starting to expand their reach, companies like Adobe need to start thinking about what they're going to do when Microsoft has a "default" built-into-Windows program that does the same things that Adobe's programs do.

This concerns all companies that are competing with Microsoft now, or will be in the future. They need to prevent Microsoft from making clones of their programs that will be the Windows "defaults".

I bet IE7 doesn't have Google search as the start page. Can you guess which page might be the default?

Does anybody else think...

[jareth-0205]

Does anyone else think that Microsoft's obsession with integrating every damn piece of software that they release is actually hurting their software rather than making it easier to use?

I worked in Visual Studio 2003 for 2 years and waited with baited breath for 2005 (and all the bugs and new features it was promised to bring), it slipped back more than a year because SQLServer 2005 wasn't ready, then Team System wasn't ready... Now it's finally released and it isn't the fantastic piece of software we thought it would be, partly I recon because the focus wasn't on the IDE, it was on making it and a ridiculous amount of satellite software all work together and integrate seemlessly. Can't help thinking Microsoft would be better off if they *weren't* able to work so closely together!

Adobe's Price

[Stephen Samuel]

Perhaps this was the price for Adobe not developing a Linux version of Photoshop.

You stop slicing my back, I'll scratch yours.

Partial replacement here today - Aperture

[SuperKendall]

I'd personally like Apple or a Mac software outfit like Panic to create a Photoshop competitor. With APIs like Core Image and Core Data available now, much of the groundwork is already laid for a great OS X application.

Aperture is one such application, making heavy use of both Core Image and Core Data.

While not a replacement for all of Photoshop, it replaces much of what a photographer would otherwise do in Photoshop. And that helps clear the way potentially for something smaller that does the remaining, more graphic-design and pixel oriented work in a better way.

Re:Does anybody else think...

[soulhuntre]

"Now it's finally released and it isn't the fantastic piece of software we thought it would be, partly I recon because the focus wasn't on the IDE, it was on making it and a ridiculous amount of satellite software all work together and integrate seemlessly"

Yeah, because the last thing you want in your IDE is an easy and simple way to build, manipulate and deploy your databases. Thats really a silly idea all right. Down with integration!

Or that incredibly slick Office SDK that makes it a absolute snap to build add ons for Office products that is light years ahead of what was there before. bad, bad idea.

Oh, and allt hat cool new stuff with tighter integration into the development locally hosted web server for better debugging and easier development of web services. Yeah, that was a dumb idea.

Re:Masochism

[hullabalucination]

Same here. And I'm a guy who bucked the trend and did high-end CMYK color on Windows for 7 years before largely giving up on it (partner still uses Win2K, although she dual-boots Linux and is learning it now).

One of the big problems under Windows is the lack of a commonly-agreed-upon color management subsystem that all vendors utilize, like Apple has in Kodak's ColorSync (and Linux has in lcms). On Windows, you've got Microsoft's color system, which everybody happily ignores, then Adobe's system, along with others. One of my favorite Stupid Windows Tricks (under Win2K): Open a Corel product (CorelDraw, say) and an Adobe product (Photoshop), go to adjust the color settings in CorelDraw and get a sharing violation. Um, guys...ICC profiles are supposed to be shared system resources.

Another big problem: Microsoft just doesn't "get" Postscript. Microsoft's Windows XP Postscript drivers are so lousy that some consultants are advising clients to stick with, or downgrade to, Win2K. Symptom: I've got a client who has five software patents from a long programming career with Tandy, Gateway and others. This guy's no Luser. Yet, he absolutely cannot get an EPS out of Microsoft Publisher with the image oriented correctly to his page setup. Obviously, a lot of this is Publisher's fault, but you get all sorts of nonsense out of Windows using Microsoft's Postscript printer drivers and graphics software that the folks on a Mac or Linux never have to put up with.

I'm doing most all my stuff on Linux now. It ain't perfect, but all the major graphic apps I like for prepress have settled on lcms for color management, plus Scribus has PDF-X/3 output that's so good it's said to better Adobe's own products. Interesting factoid: Ghostscript (the default Postscript interpreter for Linux) follows Adobe's Red Book so closely that it bitches about Illustrator EPS files that don't conform: "Floating point bounding boxes are not allowed in Level 1 Postscript."