Adobe XD, where did it go wrong?(goodlookingdesign.co.uk)
goodlookingdesign.co.uk
Adobe XD, where did it go wrong?
https://www.goodlookingdesign.co.uk/blog/adobe-xd-where-did-it-go-wrong/
195 comments
CC was the second time they burned people who loved their products. Pagemaker being replaced with InDesign drove a lot of us crazy too. I had been using Pagemaker since it was called Aldus pagemaker, stuck with it through quark becoming more popular, then when Adobe breathed new life into it, and also offered Photoshop.. I was all in. InDesign didn't just make me leave Adobe, it made me realize it was time to give ownership of that little newspaper hobby to someone else and do something else with my extra time. I hear from friends it's now a pretty decent tool, but I just lost interest in the whole field, since it was never something I did professionally anyway.
I am currently very happy with the Affinity Suite. Lots of updates, one time payment that does not cost a fortune. It’s great for both pro work and doing some hobby work.
I worked extensively with Adobe InDesign, InCopy, and Photoshop while working in magazines. Not much on designs but worked on existing files and templates form the designers as well as integrations.
After I left I was looking for a solution and couldn’t justify Adobe’s pricing for my own small project and picked up the Affinity suite for a song while it was on sale last autumn.
It’s great. It doesn’t have absolutely everything and I’ve had to learn new controls and all that but it’s not hard to learn and they’ve done everything I’ve needed them to do.
For a seasoned user of InDesign it’s entirely different and I could understand hesitation—I’ve known designers who tried and just couldn’t get the workflow down but for me it’s been fantastic.
After I left I was looking for a solution and couldn’t justify Adobe’s pricing for my own small project and picked up the Affinity suite for a song while it was on sale last autumn.
It’s great. It doesn’t have absolutely everything and I’ve had to learn new controls and all that but it’s not hard to learn and they’ve done everything I’ve needed them to do.
For a seasoned user of InDesign it’s entirely different and I could understand hesitation—I’ve known designers who tried and just couldn’t get the workflow down but for me it’s been fantastic.
Absolutely, and they are only on version 1 yet, with 10 free updates.
I love Affinity Photo Design Publish. Have the apps on iOS, Windows, MacOS.
I am very much a hobbyist, but I'm missing things I got used to in Photoshop.
If there's that one way to get a look that you've developed, it's disruptive to move to a different tool.
I've found this to be more difficult for creative work than for more procedural tasks. I can roughly translate between AppleScript or shell scripting or Python. But if a particular filter or plug-in isn't there, it's a lot of work to force it through a different pipeline.
I am very much a hobbyist, but I'm missing things I got used to in Photoshop.
If there's that one way to get a look that you've developed, it's disruptive to move to a different tool.
I've found this to be more difficult for creative work than for more procedural tasks. I can roughly translate between AppleScript or shell scripting or Python. But if a particular filter or plug-in isn't there, it's a lot of work to force it through a different pipeline.
No footnote support means it has limited uses. It's too bad.
Did they failed to present an acceptable transition route, or did it fail to satisfy a specific important use case, or did the interface not facilitate your workflow? I’ve done a ton of layout in InDesign and think it’s decent. I’d say the typesetting tools are fantastic, but it doesn’t exactly spark joy. I spent probably 12 hours total in PageMaker in a high school graphic design class 25 years ago, so I don’t have a real reference point. Curious what the tipping point was in your instance.
I understand your frustration in what Adobe is doing, but your post is just flat out wrong. Your projecting this annoyance onto everyone and this product too.
‘ So I'd say XD never had a chance because it launched after the customers left’, according to my search Creative Cloud has 26 million paid members and is only increasing, at a fairly healthy rate too.
I hate it too and so do most that pay it but there customers certainly didn’t leave and this certainly has nothing to do with XD failing, the post explains quite clearly the issues.
A lot of creatives that use/would use XD already have a subscription to creative cloud that would pay for it, so it’s irrelevant, you just wanted to moan about the subscription and attach that complaint to this.
‘ So I'd say XD never had a chance because it launched after the customers left’, according to my search Creative Cloud has 26 million paid members and is only increasing, at a fairly healthy rate too.
I hate it too and so do most that pay it but there customers certainly didn’t leave and this certainly has nothing to do with XD failing, the post explains quite clearly the issues.
A lot of creatives that use/would use XD already have a subscription to creative cloud that would pay for it, so it’s irrelevant, you just wanted to moan about the subscription and attach that complaint to this.
You can both be present physically and absent with your mind.
Yes, their cloud subscription is growing in numbers. And my company pays for a subscription for me, so I'm 1 additional user and $200 (or whatever) in additional monthly revenue. But we are only subscribers because they are holding our data hostage with their proprietary file format. As soon as any app with good enough Photoshop PSD and Adobe Illustrator AI import comes around, we'll jump ship.
With that in mind, the fact that XD would lock us into yet another proprietary file format from Adobe is a death blow. We decided not to use it before even evaluating it, because it would increase our vendor lock-in. That's why I said in my original comment: "XDs only chance is a truly open file format that other apps can also use". If XD files become worthless without an Adobe subscription, then we're not interested in producing them.
So technically you are correct that we're still a paying customer so we technically haven't left yet. But our mind and our loyalty is long gone. That's what I tried to say. People like my company do not wish to continue being a customer. Accordingly, they don't care about new products.
"you just wanted to moan about the subscription". No, I see this as a strategy mistake. Photoshop became popular because it was so easy for everyone to get a cheap old copy and start using it. Now that Adobe has locked out most of the hobbyists, where is the next generation of experts going to come from? Who is going to pay $600 annually just to practice with Adobe XD instead of using a free competitor?
I'd say you can see the same with 3ds max, which once was the undoubted king of 3d content creation software. By now, all the young people use Blender. It's free and almost as good. I predict in 10 years 3ds max will be obsolete and Blender will become the new standard.
Yes, their cloud subscription is growing in numbers. And my company pays for a subscription for me, so I'm 1 additional user and $200 (or whatever) in additional monthly revenue. But we are only subscribers because they are holding our data hostage with their proprietary file format. As soon as any app with good enough Photoshop PSD and Adobe Illustrator AI import comes around, we'll jump ship.
With that in mind, the fact that XD would lock us into yet another proprietary file format from Adobe is a death blow. We decided not to use it before even evaluating it, because it would increase our vendor lock-in. That's why I said in my original comment: "XDs only chance is a truly open file format that other apps can also use". If XD files become worthless without an Adobe subscription, then we're not interested in producing them.
So technically you are correct that we're still a paying customer so we technically haven't left yet. But our mind and our loyalty is long gone. That's what I tried to say. People like my company do not wish to continue being a customer. Accordingly, they don't care about new products.
"you just wanted to moan about the subscription". No, I see this as a strategy mistake. Photoshop became popular because it was so easy for everyone to get a cheap old copy and start using it. Now that Adobe has locked out most of the hobbyists, where is the next generation of experts going to come from? Who is going to pay $600 annually just to practice with Adobe XD instead of using a free competitor?
I'd say you can see the same with 3ds max, which once was the undoubted king of 3d content creation software. By now, all the young people use Blender. It's free and almost as good. I predict in 10 years 3ds max will be obsolete and Blender will become the new standard.
as someone from the 90s desktop publishing scene myself, I would say that the parent post is accurate from the seat of a person faced with the transition to cloud. 26 million subscribers and growing, reflects network power, ease of acquisition of new customers, institutional users, and just basically people on the further edges of the original "boom". Just because the current model does build and grow subscriptions per month, at those prices, under those terms, does not mean that the observations from the seat of an individual person, is wrong or invalid.
"After the customers left" might mean "after the customers who thrived in the previous era left", and then you would both be right.
"After the customers left" might mean "after the customers who thrived in the previous era left", and then you would both be right.
Enterprise / consumer split perspective.
Enterprise loves SaaS, because it solves problems they had (smoothing out purchasing, avoiding endless reauthorization and upgrade planning coordination), while not creating any problems (because they were always going to upgrade anyway). Hence the uptake and good numbers.
A lot of consumers hate SaaS, because it solves no problems they had (purchasing and upgrading were easy, if they chose), and creates new problems. They had previously been able to create indistinguishable output with an older version, albeit missing some features, to minimize recurring cost. And now that's no longer an option.
So you've made things easier for a group that spends a ton of money, but doesn't speak publicly on the internet (enterprise), which makes your metrics look nice. And you've made things harder / impossible for a group that does speak publicly on the internet (consumers), which makes your sentiment look bad.
So yes, both.
Enterprise loves SaaS, because it solves problems they had (smoothing out purchasing, avoiding endless reauthorization and upgrade planning coordination), while not creating any problems (because they were always going to upgrade anyway). Hence the uptake and good numbers.
A lot of consumers hate SaaS, because it solves no problems they had (purchasing and upgrading were easy, if they chose), and creates new problems. They had previously been able to create indistinguishable output with an older version, albeit missing some features, to minimize recurring cost. And now that's no longer an option.
So you've made things easier for a group that spends a ton of money, but doesn't speak publicly on the internet (enterprise), which makes your metrics look nice. And you've made things harder / impossible for a group that does speak publicly on the internet (consumers), which makes your sentiment look bad.
So yes, both.
I have used Adobe CC under a few companies. It has a bad habit of not allowing you to login, either producing a white screen or looping back to the login prompt. The only resolution has been to fully uninstall and reinstall it.
Very frustrating. Extremely hard to deploy via management tools.
Very frustrating. Extremely hard to deploy via management tools.
I should have caveated that: web-based SaaS. Adobe's installers have always felt like Microsoft-levels of legacy preservation ("We'll just wrap +1 layer over top, and avoid changing anything underneath") without Microsoft-levels of technical architecture talent.
What percentage are business users? My company pays for a license to creative cloud for me. But for personal use it is too expensive, so I use Affinity suite. If students use something cheaper like Affinity suite and many professionals use affinity suite for their personal use, there may come a time where businesses realize that they don’t actually have to pay out for creative cloud.
Let’s not forget that Photoshop has always been expensive and became the de facto photo editor because they were so far ahead of everyone when piracy was rampant. That’s the only way most people were Photoshop literate by the time they entered the job market.
This was discussed frequently inside Abobe, but the solutions always flowed back to more control instead of more openness. Now Adobe is going to push tech exoticism while suites like Affinity eat up the market.
This was discussed frequently inside Abobe, but the solutions always flowed back to more control instead of more openness. Now Adobe is going to push tech exoticism while suites like Affinity eat up the market.
To this day pirating adobe's stuff is straight forward. They don't seem to be trying really hard to sto piracy probably because they know their money comes from enterprise. To put things in perspective the same crack has been working for releases from the last 2 years. If they really wanted to keep piracy at bay they could have made the lives of people who don't pay harder.
Feedback to the ChildOfChaos: There were a lot of points made by the OP, which were not flat out wrong, and as you noted, are more nuanced than the OP expressed. For instance, on Macs, this is true with default settings “CreativeCloud, that universally hated DRM app that randomly maxes out your CPU,” where one has to hunt and kill Abode’s processes manually to get things under control. As for XD specifically, it was an inferior product to Sketch when it was launched, which slowed its adoption in addition to the subscription pricing (note that this is a US market-centric point of view and opinion). However, overtime XD improved (aside Figma did too), and individuals heavily invested in the CC integrations started getting enough from CC/XD to use it. The OP is likely giving a point and time opinion (at roll out), and some of the original issues presented as black-and-white are much more of shades of gray, especially when considering how things have changed with time.
"Adobe burned all bridges with their customers when they introduced CreativeCloud"
I don't like Adobe and don't use their apps any more, but their apps continue to dominate the design, illustration and publishing fields. That is unlikely to change any time in the near future.
I'm using the Affinity apps - the apps are successful and thriving, but making little dent on Adobe's influence on the industry. (Affinity proves an app doesn't need to displace or overtake an existing app, but can carve out their own successful market segment.)
Adobe were caught-out with the success of Sketch and Figma for UI design, and with the Procreate painting app on the iPad. My impression is that Adobe's alternatives (XD and Fresco for the iPad) don't share the same "mindshare" among designers as those other apps.
However, there are some Adobe apps like After Effects that simply don't have any serious competition. Also, there are thousands of tutorials for Adobe apps that continue to make them attractive to learn. I wouldn't be surprised if there are more tutorials for Photoshop than any other software (or even programming language) in existence.
Interesting aside: The file specification for .sketch files is available on the Sketch website. This means Adobe XD and Figma can import Sketch files. The reverse is not true: neither Figma or XD publish their file format specifications.
I don't like Adobe and don't use their apps any more, but their apps continue to dominate the design, illustration and publishing fields. That is unlikely to change any time in the near future.
I'm using the Affinity apps - the apps are successful and thriving, but making little dent on Adobe's influence on the industry. (Affinity proves an app doesn't need to displace or overtake an existing app, but can carve out their own successful market segment.)
Adobe were caught-out with the success of Sketch and Figma for UI design, and with the Procreate painting app on the iPad. My impression is that Adobe's alternatives (XD and Fresco for the iPad) don't share the same "mindshare" among designers as those other apps.
However, there are some Adobe apps like After Effects that simply don't have any serious competition. Also, there are thousands of tutorials for Adobe apps that continue to make them attractive to learn. I wouldn't be surprised if there are more tutorials for Photoshop than any other software (or even programming language) in existence.
Interesting aside: The file specification for .sketch files is available on the Sketch website. This means Adobe XD and Figma can import Sketch files. The reverse is not true: neither Figma or XD publish their file format specifications.
> Adobe were caught-out with the success of Sketch and Figma for UI design, and with the Procreate painting app on the iPad. My impression is that Adobe's alternatives - XD and Fresco for the iPad - don't share the same "mindshare" among designers as those other apps.
Yes, but that’s not because they were late to the party. They had the app for this kind of work in Adobe Fireworks and they shut it down with no migration path. That’s what opened the market up for Sketch and later Figma. Now that the latter exist, there’s no reason to pay Adobe’s extortionate prices, or buy into their monopolistic business practices.
Yes, but that’s not because they were late to the party. They had the app for this kind of work in Adobe Fireworks and they shut it down with no migration path. That’s what opened the market up for Sketch and later Figma. Now that the latter exist, there’s no reason to pay Adobe’s extortionate prices, or buy into their monopolistic business practices.
It’s insane they didn’t see what they had with Fireworks, it had absolutely everything people gushed over with Sketch but a decade earlier.
They killed it and half arsed added a few features to Il/PS and said “there just use those instead”
They killed it and half arsed added a few features to Il/PS and said “there just use those instead”
>> the Substance3D communities became a ghost town
This is the same time they added a dark pattern removing 3D support from Photoshop, which most of us had taken for granted for the last 10 years. Like we need to pay for a new subscription now and break our pipeline for fast painting models? They can fuck off.
This is the same time they added a dark pattern removing 3D support from Photoshop, which most of us had taken for granted for the last 10 years. Like we need to pay for a new subscription now and break our pipeline for fast painting models? They can fuck off.
Perpetual licenses to Substance products are still available on Steam [1], at least for now. They are more expensive, but so far there has always been a -33% discount on release.
[1] https://store.steampowered.com/app/1775400/Substance_3D_Desi...
[1] https://store.steampowered.com/app/1775400/Substance_3D_Desi...
That's just 1 out of 4 apps. You need at least Painter, Designer and B2M.
Plus it seems that in addition to buying this app, you also need to rent a subscription if you want access to the preset library (which used to be included for free).
Plus it seems that in addition to buying this app, you also need to rent a subscription if you want access to the preset library (which used to be included for free).
Painter, Designer, Sampler and Stager are all on Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/search/?developer=Adobe. B2M is no longer available anywhere, but I guess sampler is a replacement for it.
But yeah, it sucks that you have to get a subscription for the material library.
But yeah, it sucks that you have to get a subscription for the material library.
Can anybody recommend an Audition alternative that does not require a monthly subscription to use?
I'm a little bit in the music production scene, and literally never see or hear anyone uses Audition. Not on posts on reddit, not on tutorials on YT.
On it's wikipedia page it says that it's a DAW (and not exclusively an editing station), so the best and most popular DAWs today are those that have been so for the last two decades: Cubase, Pro-tools, Logic, Ableton. The first three have top notch audio editing capabilities, and none of them require a subscription.
Thanks. I'm mostly interested in the audio analysis workflows. Spectrum/frequency analysis, stereo/spatial analysis, chirp generation, perhaps basic additive synthesis capabilities (ability to generate waves with shape and frequency). Less interested on the DAW side (MIDI, Sequencing, VSTs, etc). The DAWs you've mentioned there are generally great, but are often less geared towards the workflows I'm after...
IZotope Ozone/Rx are on sale this weekend
Audition isn't really a music-production DAW - in fact, it doesn't even support MIDI or VST generator plugins. It's mostly an audio recorder and editing software for movie dialogue, game audio, podcasts etc.
Audition used to be Cool Edit Pro. I really loved the UI of that program back in the day. I don't know what it's like these days, but back then (either the late 90s or the early 2000s, I can't quite remember) it was great as a wave file editor and a multi-track mixer.
Ninja'd - was about to write the same but hit refresh beforehand. Syntrillium's Cool Edit Pro did have a multi-track recording and arrangement view, it was no longer a purely sample-based editor (Cool Edit 2000 and earlier did not have this feature, IIRC).
I also don't know how it has changed when it got taken over.
I also don't know how it has changed when it got taken over.
Actually pretty similar. Incremental changes build up over time but getting comfortable would take minutes, not hours.
Audacity then. It was open source until they got sold.
Audacity is audio Notepad. That it runs everywhere is a plus; on the other hand, it's super clunky, it doesn't act like any other DAW, and its editing behaviors are well behind the curve.
I use Logic Pro for most things and have a dedicated, old Mac to run it, but Reaper is quite good and like $60 if one's on Windows or Linux (and isn't nearly as inscrutable as Ardour). Ableton Live is another stand-by and it runs on a Mac.
But in 2022 it's hard to recommend Audacity for much of anything, even aside from their drama problems.
I use Logic Pro for most things and have a dedicated, old Mac to run it, but Reaper is quite good and like $60 if one's on Windows or Linux (and isn't nearly as inscrutable as Ardour). Ableton Live is another stand-by and it runs on a Mac.
But in 2022 it's hard to recommend Audacity for much of anything, even aside from their drama problems.
It's still open source.
I've always used it for voice over recording which it is good at.
Fairlight inside Blackmagic’s Davinci Resolve. Completely free.
https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/fai...
https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/fai...
Reaper. Seriously, it's amazing and solid and professional. Do a few tutorials to figure out its quirks and you are set for life.
https://www.reaper.fm
https://www.reaper.fm
There are many "Audition alternatives", but it's hard to recommend anything without knowing what you want it for. Audacity might be OK if your needs are very basic. Pro-tools is kind of the industry standard DAW. Reaper is sort-of-free and quite popular. Ardour is FLOSS and good (although with paid binaries). Izotope RX9 is brilliant for cleaning up audio clips. Mixbus is supposed to have a great emulation of classic analogue mixers. Hindenburg is popular with podcasters. Etc.
I might add that if you’re looking purely for a sample editor, so no multitrack, on OS X, Twistedwave for me feels closest to the CoolEdit I grew up on. Audacity’s is probably the first one to try because FLOSS. I struggle with its UI at times—although maybe they’ve implemented scroll to zoom since I last tried it. And I don’t like how everything’s conceptualised as a ‘project’ that needs to be exported, even when working on a single file. I just want to open a file, modify and save it. Gimp made a similar mistake at some point…
For simple audio track editing (not music production), use one of the forks of Audacity. Audacity started going spooky by adding telemetry and age restrictions. Good ones are Tenacity [1], and Audacium [2].
For music production, I've been using Studio One [3] for the last couple years, and it's truly the mosf straightforward and beautiful DAW I've ever used. Though, it's not free and open source, which is a downside for me. It's one of the few proprietary software I care to own.
Zrythm [4], however, has been catching my eye lately, and I'm looking forward to it maturing to the point where I can finally move to a FOSS DAW.
[1] https://github.com/tenacityteam/tenacity [2] https://github.com/SartoxSoftware/audacium [3] https://www.presonus.com/products/Studio-One [4] https://www.zrythm.org/en/index.html
For music production, I've been using Studio One [3] for the last couple years, and it's truly the mosf straightforward and beautiful DAW I've ever used. Though, it's not free and open source, which is a downside for me. It's one of the few proprietary software I care to own.
Zrythm [4], however, has been catching my eye lately, and I'm looking forward to it maturing to the point where I can finally move to a FOSS DAW.
[1] https://github.com/tenacityteam/tenacity [2] https://github.com/SartoxSoftware/audacium [3] https://www.presonus.com/products/Studio-One [4] https://www.zrythm.org/en/index.html
I used audition before it was bought by adobe, and it was a very good audio editor. But today, almost anything is better than audition.
A wonderful, if a bit ugly and “raw” DAW is Reaper. I use it for everything. The big contenders are Ableton Live and Apple Logic Pro. A lot of people, that create music, are using them. I like reaper the most because it is nimble and is still pretty complete.
Not knowing your specific use case, I use Reaper as my DAW, I'm a voice actor.
No subscription required, very reasonable pricing.
No subscription required, very reasonable pricing.
* FL Studio
* Ableton Live
* Reaper
* Ableton Live
* Reaper
Try Audacity?
I don‘t think Audacity is a great option anymore [0][1]. You might want to consider one of the forks (e.g. [2]).
[0]: https://hackaday.com/2021/07/13/muse-group-continues-tone-de...
[1]: https://www.techrepublic.com/article/the-audacity-how-to-wre...
[2]: https://github.com/tenacityteam/tenacity
[0]: https://hackaday.com/2021/07/13/muse-group-continues-tone-de...
[1]: https://www.techrepublic.com/article/the-audacity-how-to-wre...
[2]: https://github.com/tenacityteam/tenacity
Such an overblown issue IMO. And it was all rolled back anyway. They're actually trying really hard to improve audacity. Yes a few missteps happened but the backlash was way out of proportion, especially given how approachable and responsive they were about all the negative feedback. If they had stonewalled the community and told them to fuck off it would've been a different story but that is most certainly not what happened.
> Yes a few missteps happened but the backlash was way out of proportion, especially given how approachable and responsive they were about all the negative feedback.
This has become standard operating procedure. Push your agenda until you receive backlash, then claim it was all a big misunderstanding, and that you are listening to feedback. Let things calm down for a few months, then push the controversial changes anyway.
People are picking up on that, and won‘t accept it anymore. I think that‘s great.
Current leadership has shown their hand and the probable long-term direction they are headed.
Maybe it‘s an honest mistake, but the community no longer seems to extend the benefit of the doubt, which is totally understandable. Fool me 42753 times, shame on me.
This has become standard operating procedure. Push your agenda until you receive backlash, then claim it was all a big misunderstanding, and that you are listening to feedback. Let things calm down for a few months, then push the controversial changes anyway.
People are picking up on that, and won‘t accept it anymore. I think that‘s great.
Current leadership has shown their hand and the probable long-term direction they are headed.
Maybe it‘s an honest mistake, but the community no longer seems to extend the benefit of the doubt, which is totally understandable. Fool me 42753 times, shame on me.
Unfortunately Tenacity has mostly dropped off in commit activity. I wish it had taken off though.
> after the customers left
This is delusional. Creative Cloud is bigger than ever.
This is delusional. Creative Cloud is bigger than ever.
Yes, but look at Krita, for example. All of it functions are what people traditionally used Photoshop for. It has grown to be 25% of the Photoshop user base [1]. Adobe's revenue can grow even while its user-base is shrinking.
[1] https://krita-artists.org/t/krita-usage-statistics/29184
[1] https://krita-artists.org/t/krita-usage-statistics/29184
The market is bigger. And more fragmented, luckily.
Creative Cloud is an incredible deal if you want to do professional work.
And you can, last I check, get it at a monthly rate or get licenses for smaller packages, so it makes doing intermittent professional or hobbyist work more accessible to a wider range of people.
Previously it was $1k+ software costs barrier to entry for almost any professional or semi-pro activity via most software publishers.
So I really appreciate Creative Cloud.
And you can, last I check, get it at a monthly rate or get licenses for smaller packages, so it makes doing intermittent professional or hobbyist work more accessible to a wider range of people.
Previously it was $1k+ software costs barrier to entry for almost any professional or semi-pro activity via most software publishers.
So I really appreciate Creative Cloud.
Yeah. The subscription pricing is a bummer for hobbyists or people who infrequently need it professionally. But professional users bought updates regularly anyway and probably ended up spending more money. Beyond the actual total price tag, there was a zero percent chance I’d have been able to fork over a lump sum of well over a grand for Illustrator, Photoshop, Bridge, InDesign, Premier and Acrobat/Distiller. Now for $60/mo I get all those with constant updates, support in case something goes FuBar the night before a deadline, plus the option to pop into After Effects or Audition or anything else I need to. Heck, Adobe Fonts probably saves me more than $60 in some months.
I don’t have any loyalty to Adobe and would jump ship if a professionally viable alternative came out that was less proprietary, let alone cheaper, but most of the alternatives just aren’t. I do think that’s changing, so we’ll see though.
I don’t have any loyalty to Adobe and would jump ship if a professionally viable alternative came out that was less proprietary, let alone cheaper, but most of the alternatives just aren’t. I do think that’s changing, so we’ll see though.
Adobe is well settled in creative agencies, enough bridges still available.
> after the customers left.
Where's the data to back that up?
ADBE was $180 in 2018 and now $470 after maxing at below $700.
Where's the data to back that up?
ADBE was $180 in 2018 and now $470 after maxing at below $700.
Adobe offered me a reduced rate subscription over the phone after I cancelled my subscription. No qualifications mentioned. I accepted. A year and a half later I noticed I had been charged 3-4x the reduced rate each month for the last 6 months. I tried to get my money back, they refused. I cancelled my subscription and vowed never to touch Adobe products again.
I was in a position at my company to end our use of XD and immediately move to Figma. We've grown 3x since and Figma's been great. For personal work I prefer Sketch it looks and feels like a native app.
I was in a position at my company to end our use of XD and immediately move to Figma. We've grown 3x since and Figma's been great. For personal work I prefer Sketch it looks and feels like a native app.
Figma is great, but I do want to note that Adobe XD is free (or at least it was last time I checked).
It was free in the early days but over time teams and individuals were funneled into paying. At least in my region, you can still get a 7 day trial, but beyond that you have to pay.
Former Adobe employee here. IME, most folks at Adobe don’t really care about listening to customers, providing a great customer experience, or putting the customer first. Most of the organization was highly political with different BUs fighting each other for “status”, budget and promotions. Can’t blame them though. The photoshop money machine keeps going brrrr so why bother.
It's good though, because that attitude will sooner or later let the fortress collapse and we all want it that way.
> The photoshop money machine keeps going brrrr
This makes me wonder. Who is actually using Photoshop today and why?
In the past, these were graphics designers and photographers. The latter already migrated to Lightroom, Capture One etc. Designers have so many tools to choose from, why would they use Photoshop? I understand for long-time users it's just inertia, but new users are spoiled for choice.
This makes me wonder. Who is actually using Photoshop today and why?
In the past, these were graphics designers and photographers. The latter already migrated to Lightroom, Capture One etc. Designers have so many tools to choose from, why would they use Photoshop? I understand for long-time users it's just inertia, but new users are spoiled for choice.
> why
I work in the manga/webtoon localization industry, and all files received from the original publishers that aren't TIFF are INDD or PSD. There is no choice but to use photoshop and indesign. Recently, I had to cough up money for the pricey indesign server in order to be able to ingest the .indd files en masse. There's no other choice. At first I thought I could do it with a mix of humans converting to .idml (the xml zip slightly less proprietary format) and my own python!... but you still need indesign for that first part, and after weeks of python, I gave up trying to parse that nasty mess that is idml. Now I run an ugly indesign js script that also talks to photoshop via bridge to create workabke files. It's disgusting and I pay the adobe tax, but it works. P.S. protip: never export images from indesign using any other option besides PDF, Indesign's built in image renders are awful for manga. Tune all the pdf settings so there is no quality loss, then "print" the pdf to image using ghostscript
I work in the manga/webtoon localization industry, and all files received from the original publishers that aren't TIFF are INDD or PSD. There is no choice but to use photoshop and indesign. Recently, I had to cough up money for the pricey indesign server in order to be able to ingest the .indd files en masse. There's no other choice. At first I thought I could do it with a mix of humans converting to .idml (the xml zip slightly less proprietary format) and my own python!... but you still need indesign for that first part, and after weeks of python, I gave up trying to parse that nasty mess that is idml. Now I run an ugly indesign js script that also talks to photoshop via bridge to create workabke files. It's disgusting and I pay the adobe tax, but it works. P.S. protip: never export images from indesign using any other option besides PDF, Indesign's built in image renders are awful for manga. Tune all the pdf settings so there is no quality loss, then "print" the pdf to image using ghostscript
Have you tried Affinity Designer?
https://affinity.serif.com/en-gb/designer/
One-off purchase price, like Adobe apps used to be, and a very reasonable price at that.
https://affinity.serif.com/en-gb/designer/
One-off purchase price, like Adobe apps used to be, and a very reasonable price at that.
I love the afinity line but #1 affinity products only take in .idml, not .indd, so you still need indesign, and #2 affinity's own file formats are less well known that adobe's, therefore there are no tools out there to convert them or make them, and #3 affinity products do not support scripting (or have open enough file formats for me to make files) like adobe ones do, which is essential for creating files for the localization team to work on.
I figured that industry would use Clip Studio Paint EX?
"This makes me wonder. Who is actually using Photoshop today and why?"
Photoshop has unrivalled features - not just photo editing, but also digital painting, animation and even limited video editing. At one time, Adobe even added 3D features to Photoshop (which they later removed). Photoshop also supports a massive market of third-party add-ons like plugins, brushes, scripts, effects, LUTs etc.
In a different comment, I mentioned that no other software can rival Photoshop in learning resources. So yes, Photoshop is a monster in features, bloat, in clunky UI - and still dominant in design and photography fields.
Photoshop has unrivalled features - not just photo editing, but also digital painting, animation and even limited video editing. At one time, Adobe even added 3D features to Photoshop (which they later removed). Photoshop also supports a massive market of third-party add-ons like plugins, brushes, scripts, effects, LUTs etc.
In a different comment, I mentioned that no other software can rival Photoshop in learning resources. So yes, Photoshop is a monster in features, bloat, in clunky UI - and still dominant in design and photography fields.
CG artists have no real alternative. Digital matte painting and certain styles of concept art require a mix of painting tools, photobashing tools and plug-in integration that can’t be replicated with anything else efficiently.
Games studios, VFX studios, and other companies doing that kind of artwork are going to be licensing Adobe products for decades to come.
Games studios, VFX studios, and other companies doing that kind of artwork are going to be licensing Adobe products for decades to come.
I work in a game studio and Photoshop is more of an accessory than a required tool for my workflow now. Concept artists in my team are having a great time using Clip Studio. For the 3d department substance painter is the king. So adobe still wins
If you have legacy files as PSD, or your customers have them, then you need to keep purchasing Photoshop no matter what.
Because it's the industry standard, and I presume because it's still quite good. The only modern thing I have to compare it with is GIMP (probably not a fair comparison), but when I last used Photoshop it was already nicer than GIMP is now, and that was probably about 20 years ago.
Photographers have advanced retouching workflows which are not possible in Lightroom. Lightroom is like a point and shoot, Photoshop is like a DSLR
Nitpick: they’re complementary. LR has cataloguing/sorting/filtering/metadata handling features that PS doesn’t have, and has an “edit in Photoshop” option for the more complicated workflows you mention. Not many people would enjoy using Bridge and PS to sort their photos.
I am a professional Lightroom user that deals with about 700-1000 shots per week (automotive photography). I estimate that I use the Lightroom–Photoshop–Lightroom round-trip editing for retouch on about 10–20% of my shots. The pair taken together is really powerful stuff and I haven't found anything better for dealing with large volumes of photos, each of which requiring adjustment of some sort.
I'm a long-time Photoshop user (since 1994), and my business, Filter Forge, started as a Photoshop plugin. Nowadays all my design work is done in Figma, which is fantastic. My Photoshop usage nowadays is limited to editing and enhancing pixel images.
Modern Photoshop feels extremely bloated. Slow to start, slow to paste images, cumbersome in other aspects. Since I'm using it much less frequently than I used to, I'm considering switching to an open source equivalent -- like I did with my 3D needs: I already switched from 3DS Max to Blender.
Modern Photoshop feels extremely bloated. Slow to start, slow to paste images, cumbersome in other aspects. Since I'm using it much less frequently than I used to, I'm considering switching to an open source equivalent -- like I did with my 3D needs: I already switched from 3DS Max to Blender.
At least for designers who also do print, most of them will depend heavily on Illustrator, inDesign and Acrobat. And since you buy these programs in a package, you’ll also get Photoshop. So it doesn’t need to be the best at what it does… it just needs to be good enough. EDT. That, and, probably more important: schools keep pushing the Adobe Creative Suite on their students.
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Lightroom is not an alternative to photoshop for retouching.
There’s no real standard alternative for advanced retouching afaik.
Aftereffects and I design are also the industry standard in their areas.
There’s no real standard alternative for advanced retouching afaik.
Aftereffects and I design are also the industry standard in their areas.
More like, who is actually paying for photoshop... I get why people use it, it is the "best" app, and familiar..
Having any Adobe app on my computer means permanently sacrificing a large chunk of resources to CreativeCloud. I'm happy with Photoshop eating ram&cpu when it's running, but the 24/7 background DRM daemon is absolutely unacceptable.
Too bad Adobe has grown so large that the technical people have lost all power. It happens to all companies: they build marketshare and reputation with technical excellence, but eventually reach some sort of singularity where every single reasonable dev departs.
The only thing left for a company at this point is maximizing revenue from enterprise/government contracts, and usually dwindling out after a private equity reverse takeover/merger with a company you've never heard of.
Management is in a tough spot, because changing their ways might decrease revenues, which would hasten their demise. Imagine the reaction from Adobe's shareholders if they announced they're cutting prices to a third and dropping all DRM..
Too bad Adobe has grown so large that the technical people have lost all power. It happens to all companies: they build marketshare and reputation with technical excellence, but eventually reach some sort of singularity where every single reasonable dev departs.
The only thing left for a company at this point is maximizing revenue from enterprise/government contracts, and usually dwindling out after a private equity reverse takeover/merger with a company you've never heard of.
Management is in a tough spot, because changing their ways might decrease revenues, which would hasten their demise. Imagine the reaction from Adobe's shareholders if they announced they're cutting prices to a third and dropping all DRM..
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Is it not possible to close the daemon while not running Adobe software and only start it when using them?
Unrelated to the primary topic, but I have been trying out a new free (as in beer) app called lunacy [1] for prototyping and the experience has been great.
I am not a UX professional so can't comment on feature parity with Figma etc.
It was however interesting to discover that the native cross platform app was powered by dotnet core & the open source Avalonia framework[2]. It looks quite polished and the framework seems to have come a long way since I tried a few years ago.
[1] https://icons8.com/lunacy [2] http://avaloniaui.net/
I am not a UX professional so can't comment on feature parity with Figma etc.
It was however interesting to discover that the native cross platform app was powered by dotnet core & the open source Avalonia framework[2]. It looks quite polished and the framework seems to have come a long way since I tried a few years ago.
[1] https://icons8.com/lunacy [2] http://avaloniaui.net/
At first glace it doesnt work from browsers - AFAIK, only PenPot[1] does, that too only 60% of Figma features.
[1] https://penpot.app/
[1] https://penpot.app/
Thanks for the the tip on a new product! Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of free products become paid products over time. It's nearly impossible to sustain growth without income. That being said, I gladly pay for Figma. It's that good.
Speaking on behalf of a group of more recent leaders at the helm of creative products at Adobe, this thread is obviously frustrating and hard to read but also motivating. Many fair criticism and suggestions, and many of these are now (finally) being addressed. We have undertaken a massive effort to deliver web apps that are deeply collaborative, cloud services that are resilient, and are rearchitecting many of our apps (some decades old!) to be more performant (less memory hog) and incorporate some pretty mind-blowing ai capabilities that save tons of time in creative workflows. The policy stuff is being updated and redesigned for clarity, and our daily challenge is to innovate and build next generation experiences while not tampering with the muscle memory of our legacy customers. Admittedly, this has slowed development of certain products in the past. But as I look around the team these days, people are here for the mission and determined to do the hard work. The shift to subscription was before my time, but modern apps are cloud enabled and we see a ton more ways to leverage this model for customer value (including today’s 20k+ fonts, stock, ai tools computing in cloud, collab, web apps…). Ultimately, my hope is that the next generation of creative will work together better than ever (interoperability, dev ecosystem will be important across many of the point solutions emerging), enable new forms of collaboration, and unlock new possibilities (via ai, new approaches to democratize 3d creation, new mediums emerging like AR/VR). But it is up to the Adobe team to absorb the feedback and show rather than tell.
I don't use Adobe products anymore. Too many dark UX patterns and bad business practices, e.g. pulling all user access in Venezuela, taking away the ability to earn money - the entire country - back in 2019 [0]. This couldn't have happened before the move to the subscription model.
I recently had to use Adobe XD. The installation process - extremely bad UX and the Adobe cloud thing - bloatware. On top of that... trying to open the XD file a week later, it asks me to login first before I can use the app. And you can only export to PDF 3 times - otherwise you have to upgrade.
In my view Adobe is user hostile.
Not sure how you can turn around that ship - Adobe has a shareholder value uber alles mentality.
But thanks for trying.
[0] https://www.pcmag.com/news/adobe-pulls-all-user-access-in-ve...
I recently had to use Adobe XD. The installation process - extremely bad UX and the Adobe cloud thing - bloatware. On top of that... trying to open the XD file a week later, it asks me to login first before I can use the app. And you can only export to PDF 3 times - otherwise you have to upgrade.
In my view Adobe is user hostile.
Not sure how you can turn around that ship - Adobe has a shareholder value uber alles mentality.
But thanks for trying.
[0] https://www.pcmag.com/news/adobe-pulls-all-user-access-in-ve...
> modern apps are cloud enabled and we see a ton more ways to leverage this model for customer value (including today’s 20k+ fonts, stock, ai tools computing in cloud, collab, web apps…)
I think the average consumer doesn't care about this and it makes sense from corporate strategy standpoint - this is your bread and butter. It generates enormous cashflows. But you're not going to get good reception on HN - we wan't none of these features. We want 2008 version of Adobe products. Install. Get the job done. Close it. We're happy to pay for that.
Also, let's cut to the chase, Adobe's advertisement platform is where its shareholders wants it to go: https://business.adobe.com/products/advertising/adobe-advert...
I think the average consumer doesn't care about this and it makes sense from corporate strategy standpoint - this is your bread and butter. It generates enormous cashflows. But you're not going to get good reception on HN - we wan't none of these features. We want 2008 version of Adobe products. Install. Get the job done. Close it. We're happy to pay for that.
Also, let's cut to the chase, Adobe's advertisement platform is where its shareholders wants it to go: https://business.adobe.com/products/advertising/adobe-advert...
> We're happy to pay for that.
Preferably once, not monthly.
Preferably once, not monthly.
I pay monthly $7.99 or whatever for Jet Brains products. Predictable and sustainable revenue stream makes good business. And it is cheap enough for the value I get from it. Totally OK IMO. I charge a subscription fee of $X/year to my employer for my services ;-) which keeps me alive, pays the bills and everything stays healthy.
Those are all valid points, but software subscriptions still make me extremely uncomfortable. I'm not a fan of subscription services in general, but that's a little off-topic.
Paying a monthly fee to Adobe in particular strikes me as a horrible proposition: extortionate early termination fees, constant price increases, the inability to use the software whenever their servers or CC program throw a fit, finding that your programs were broken by an update you didn't ask for... And, of course, there's the fact that you're essentially locked out of your own files if you ever terminate your subscription, even if you were a paying customer for years.
I really miss the days where you could just pay for something and have it.
Paying a monthly fee to Adobe in particular strikes me as a horrible proposition: extortionate early termination fees, constant price increases, the inability to use the software whenever their servers or CC program throw a fit, finding that your programs were broken by an update you didn't ask for... And, of course, there's the fact that you're essentially locked out of your own files if you ever terminate your subscription, even if you were a paying customer for years.
I really miss the days where you could just pay for something and have it.
But Jetbrains allows you to "own" a version of their product after you have paid for 1 year. So if you decide to stop your subscription you still have at least something to use for your existing files. You don't get something like that with Adobe. Everything is gone if you stop paying.
Hi Scott, you might want to see a recent HN thread about Adobe's billing practices here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30222165
It is a manipulative trick to offer users a 7 day free trial, and then lock them onto an annual plan, with penalty for early termination.
It is a manipulative trick to offer users a 7 day free trial, and then lock them onto an annual plan, with penalty for early termination.
yes - we addressed this on the twitter thread and also posted the new design that addresses the concerns. originally, the “buy annual, billed monthly” was a response to customers who use CC for years and wanted a 30%+ discount, but didn’t want to pay all up front. But UX needed to be improved and team had responded.
I think the issue isn't about fixing it, which is nice but how did this happen in the first place and what kind of marketing culture is being cultavated inside of Adobe. It didn't happen by chance. It was a deliberate dark pattern to screw the gullible customer.
Yes, particularly when considering how much of text is all over that page [0].
An extra sentence saying something to the effect of '50% of any remaining annual plan will be charged on early termination, [see more details link]' could have been easily incorporated without disturbing the Zen of the page.
[0] https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FK0pes-WQAM8bkK?format=jpg&name=...
An extra sentence saying something to the effect of '50% of any remaining annual plan will be charged on early termination, [see more details link]' could have been easily incorporated without disturbing the Zen of the page.
[0] https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FK0pes-WQAM8bkK?format=jpg&name=...
It's impressive, really and still having the edge over your competitors, if it was this simple to "overtake" Adobe, this thread or other complaints would be far less.
I'm not that long in the tech industry.
I'm not that long in the tech industry.
>> I just couldn’t believe how reactive the XD team were at releasing new features.
Yeah, this pretty much sums up the disappointment for anyone who's still paying for Adobe these days.
Everything they have feels like legacy software. There's no one at the helm. They are hanging on and their stock price is still going up, purely because of inertia and the effect of their monopoly on photoshop. [edit, I just checked and it's finally going down. Hooray.]
Adobe is no longer in a position to compete with anything new that comes along. They're going to ride their current software and locked-in users to the grave. They're currently at what, almost $500 a share? There has never been a company more over-extended and overpriced. They're fucking doomed, and the sooner they go down the better for everyone in the creative industry.
Yeah, this pretty much sums up the disappointment for anyone who's still paying for Adobe these days.
Everything they have feels like legacy software. There's no one at the helm. They are hanging on and their stock price is still going up, purely because of inertia and the effect of their monopoly on photoshop. [edit, I just checked and it's finally going down. Hooray.]
Adobe is no longer in a position to compete with anything new that comes along. They're going to ride their current software and locked-in users to the grave. They're currently at what, almost $500 a share? There has never been a company more over-extended and overpriced. They're fucking doomed, and the sooner they go down the better for everyone in the creative industry.
I'm so grateful that I paid for a copy of the Master Collection back in 2010ish. When I need to do design the older software still does everything I need.
I did too, but I have to pull out old hardware to use it. It won't run on an M1 Mac.
I love Photoshop. Their hotkeys are a muscle memory in my brain for 10+ years.
I hate CreativeCloud. It eats resources and I found gigabytes of random trash logs it writes.
I wish I could download and use Photoshop on its own.
When I get a new laptop, I won’t install CreativeCloud.
Has anyone got recommendations for photoshop alternatives? For graphic/web design only stuff, editing, cropping, adjusting pixels and stuff like that.
I hate CreativeCloud. It eats resources and I found gigabytes of random trash logs it writes.
I wish I could download and use Photoshop on its own.
When I get a new laptop, I won’t install CreativeCloud.
Has anyone got recommendations for photoshop alternatives? For graphic/web design only stuff, editing, cropping, adjusting pixels and stuff like that.
Pixelmator Pro is excellent.
Photoshop’s workflows are etched into my muscle memory, so while I like Affinity Photo, it’s just different enough to be frustrating.
Pixelmator Pro on the other hand works exactly how I expect. It’s quick, fully featured and just plain pleasant to use. Thoroughly recommended.
Photoshop’s workflows are etched into my muscle memory, so while I like Affinity Photo, it’s just different enough to be frustrating.
Pixelmator Pro on the other hand works exactly how I expect. It’s quick, fully featured and just plain pleasant to use. Thoroughly recommended.
Same here with the muscle memory. It's nice to hear that Pixelmator is compatible with it. BTW, do you use it on Windows or on a Mac?
Fairly sure it’s Mac only. It’s not a 1:1 replacement, but is similar enough for someone like me who’s used Photoshop for 25+ years to pick up quickly.
Whereas I often find myself having to search through help pages and forums when using Affinity Photo.
For many years I didn’t consider a computer a computer until it had Photoshop on it, but since moving to Pixelmator, Affinity and Figma I’ve been able to ditch Adobe completely.
Whereas I often find myself having to search through help pages and forums when using Affinity Photo.
For many years I didn’t consider a computer a computer until it had Photoshop on it, but since moving to Pixelmator, Affinity and Figma I’ve been able to ditch Adobe completely.
I was in a marketing research session for Adobe years ago. When they asked me if I’d be happy to pay a monthly subscription for their software instead of the version upgrades, I started openly cursing.
Find a copy of Photoshop CS6. Newer features are not worth the CC grief.
If all you need is Photoshop, that's true. But, IME, nothing steps to Premiere and After Effects, particularly in combination. And modern Premiere is worth paying for, for performance if nothing else. Going back to the scary old days of stuff like Voukoder--no thank you.
(No, definitely not Resolve.)
(No, definitely not Resolve.)
I recently tried Blender for video editing and was very pleasantly surprised.
Why do you think Resolve is not up to the job?
It's not Premiere. That might sound flip, but Premiere is a learned skill and I have yet to discover really compelling reasons beyond price (which isn't actually that expensive) to use Not Premiere. From a feature perspective its workflow options are sub-par; for example, it doesn't directly interface with After Effects. AE Live Templates in Premiere alone has saved me hours of time rendering out of After Effects. And AE, too, is not optional; while I like AE a lot less than I do Premiere, it sticks because--and there's a theme here--nothing else really does what After Effects does while integrating into an NLE. The ecosystem matters.
I think Resolve is fine if you don't know other tools or your needs are small. I've used it in a pinch before when I didn't have any other options, it's totally usable. And there are some tools (grading, obviously) which are absolutely top notch, and if you are in an all-Blackmagic recording stack I can definitely see some benefits to ease-of-use when, say, pulling video recorded from an ATEM Mini and some Blackmagic cameras. But it's a limited editor with limited compatibility with everything else in my workflow and those of the folks I know.
I think Resolve is fine if you don't know other tools or your needs are small. I've used it in a pinch before when I didn't have any other options, it's totally usable. And there are some tools (grading, obviously) which are absolutely top notch, and if you are in an all-Blackmagic recording stack I can definitely see some benefits to ease-of-use when, say, pulling video recorded from an ATEM Mini and some Blackmagic cameras. But it's a limited editor with limited compatibility with everything else in my workflow and those of the folks I know.
Another vote for Affinity Photo and the Affinity apps in general actually:
https://affinity.serif.com/
https://affinity.serif.com/
Affinity photo
It was the name xD
Its dependency on that malware AdobeCloud didn’t help either. You can’t delete it, you can’t turn it off, and it randomly maxed out the CPU.
Adobe has good products but their business practices disgust me and they need a kicking.
Its dependency on that malware AdobeCloud didn’t help either. You can’t delete it, you can’t turn it off, and it randomly maxed out the CPU.
Adobe has good products but their business practices disgust me and they need a kicking.
There is an uninstaller for the cloud client available. It does what it says actually.
Back when I last used it was harder than it should have been.
One of the Cs in CC must stand for the clap.
One of the Cs in CC must stand for the clap.
Can you use the installed products after uninstalling CC? Because you need CC to install the products.
> It was the name xD
As if "Figma balls" were any better…
As if "Figma balls" were any better…
I just can’t shake the feeling that whenever I have to use Adobe software, it’s trying to do its hardest to make my life miserable.
Creative Cloud is the worst piece of software ever conceived. And why do I have to update the updater to then update creative cloud before I can update an app that refuses to open otherwise? It’s just pure madness and I really wish the market would finally put an end to this and just refuse to engage with Adobe’s malicious pricing and subscription policies.
Figma on the other end, feels like a good friend that has my best interests in mind. Hope it’s going to stay like this for a while.
Creative Cloud is the worst piece of software ever conceived. And why do I have to update the updater to then update creative cloud before I can update an app that refuses to open otherwise? It’s just pure madness and I really wish the market would finally put an end to this and just refuse to engage with Adobe’s malicious pricing and subscription policies.
Figma on the other end, feels like a good friend that has my best interests in mind. Hope it’s going to stay like this for a while.
Adobe is a horrible company that scams customers and organisations that wants to use their software - can't wait until they sink.
That said it's incredible to me how many huge organisations have ticket systems with age old and easy-to-fix backlogs with issues that just doesn't get fixed - like the team has completely left the building. I'm thinking Google and Apple here in particular. After doing full stack agile development i know it can be difficult and complex - but not that difficult to check forums and fix various issues each month.
That said it's incredible to me how many huge organisations have ticket systems with age old and easy-to-fix backlogs with issues that just doesn't get fixed - like the team has completely left the building. I'm thinking Google and Apple here in particular. After doing full stack agile development i know it can be difficult and complex - but not that difficult to check forums and fix various issues each month.
It's not that difficult or complex. But imagine a team of 5, 10, 100 devs - each one has a family to feed and a job to keep. No one goes to those orgs as a dev because they aspire to change the world. You have to do what the product managers say the hot topic of the day is and it's never "go to the forums and fix issues" or "choose the most upvoted bugs and work on them". It's always the latest hype and headline-grabbing feature to work on that will get people promoted and some products off the shelves. Real users care about real issues, but they're already onboard.
This is a problem with agile processes, which leave no room for ownership or "extra curriculum" work without micromanager approval.
Not going to happen. I feel the same way about AutoDesk. Both horrible monopolies that prevent users from escaping their ecosystems.
Slightly off topic, but as soon as there’s a Lightroom competitor which can sync photos and edit between iOS and Mac, and has most of the fundamental editing features, I’m done with Adobe. I don’t mind a subscription model necessarily but their prices are too high and I hate that every year I have to barter with their support to get a cheaper price.
If such a tool already exists please let me know! I love being able to edit photos on my iPad or Mac without having to worry about manually syncing anything, and Apple Photos is a bit too basic.
If such a tool already exists please let me know! I love being able to edit photos on my iPad or Mac without having to worry about manually syncing anything, and Apple Photos is a bit too basic.
Affinity is supposed to be working on the DAM aspect that is missing from all the competitors/options others will likely post. I look every year before re-upping my LR sub and nothing comes close. Being able to pick up any device from my iPad, iPhone or Mac and work on photos from where I left off is pretty awesome. The closest thing is Photos.app, but then I'm missing all the LR advanced functionality.
Haven't tried it personally, but Darktable is supposedly about on par with Lightroom. Stronger in some areas, weaker in others.
For syncing you can use your favourite cloud storage.
Edit: Of course, it's not available for iOS...
For syncing you can use your favourite cloud storage.
Edit: Of course, it's not available for iOS...
For sync you can just leverage iCloud, for editing two macOS/iPadOS apps come to mind:
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/darkroom-photo-video-editor/id...
https://apps.apple.com/app/pixelmator/id1444636541
Of course both don't have every Lightroom feature, but that might be a boon to many like me.
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/darkroom-photo-video-editor/id...
https://apps.apple.com/app/pixelmator/id1444636541
Of course both don't have every Lightroom feature, but that might be a boon to many like me.
Do the edits sync? Like I can start editing a picture on my iPhone, continue tweaking it on my iPad, then do final edits on my Mac, all using iCloud? Super cool if so
[deleted]
Make sure that it doesn't lock you in, though.
Some months back somebody, in a HN thread, posted a link to an Adobe forum post where Adobe linked to an older version of Photoshop that was free and legal to download. It didn't require their cloud solution, and they also provided a serial number for it.
I've tried several times to find that link again, but always failed. Does this ring a bell with somebody?
I've tried several times to find that link again, but always failed. Does this ring a bell with somebody?
Yip, does ring a bell. I believe it was the CS2 version. I also remember downloading it some 6-7 years ago on Windows.
Amazing, so it's not my brain playing games with me. Any chance you would be able to find the link, I don't seem to have the skills.
Perhaps this? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24865636
Yes, that is it, thank you so much!
However, reading it now I'm not entirely sure if it's still possible to install this...
However, reading it now I'm not entirely sure if it's still possible to install this...
After reading all the links from that HN post, I've come to the conclusion that it's not possible to use download and install CS2/CS3 anymore. Thanks to all that helped, much appreciated.
Question. How does CS2 and CS3 compare to Gimp nowdays?
In one team I work on the designer uses XD. Receiving designs feels like jumping back to the early 00s when I'd often work from .psd files.
The other teams go from a very rough sketch (often in Excalidraw) to a HTML prototype. Everything about this approach is better. Being able to put the prototypes in front of users for research is worth its weight in gold.
The other teams go from a very rough sketch (often in Excalidraw) to a HTML prototype. Everything about this approach is better. Being able to put the prototypes in front of users for research is worth its weight in gold.
It seems to me Figma is the market leader on this now, at least from what I can see online. What are other people impressions?
I still wish Adobe hadn’t killed Fireworks when they purchased Macromedia. It was such a brilliant package, by far the best ui design tool at the time.
I still wish Adobe hadn’t killed Fireworks when they purchased Macromedia. It was such a brilliant package, by far the best ui design tool at the time.
"It seems to me Figma is the market leader on this now"
This is my impression too. Adobe XD has always been in 'catch-up' mode to rivals Sketch and Figma.
I was sceptical a complex, feature-rich design tool could be possible in the browser, but Figma proved me wrong. Not only that, Figma has proved to be serious competition to rival Sketch which is a native desktop Mac-only app (with all the speed and functionality advantage of a native app.)
Both Sketch and Adobe XD are also hampered by the fact that sharing designs or collaborating with others is harder compared to Figma. Sketch and Adobe XD were designed with the focus on single-user desktop app use, not the multi-user (cross-platform) collaboration scenario common today.
Both Sketch and XD allow you to share designs by uploading screenshots or files to their 'cloud' or hosting services. But editing is still required in the desktop app - unlike Figma where the browser is the app (although there are Figma Electron desktop apps for offline use).
Adobe XD has a feature called 'co-editing' where multiple users can edit a file at the same time - but each user must have the XD app installed.
Figma is even encroaching on the territory of other online tools like Miro. For example, Figma can be used as a digital whiteboard - ideal for a mixed team of developers, managers, designers and any other stakeholders. This is simply not possible in Sketch or Adobe XD.
This is my impression too. Adobe XD has always been in 'catch-up' mode to rivals Sketch and Figma.
I was sceptical a complex, feature-rich design tool could be possible in the browser, but Figma proved me wrong. Not only that, Figma has proved to be serious competition to rival Sketch which is a native desktop Mac-only app (with all the speed and functionality advantage of a native app.)
Both Sketch and Adobe XD are also hampered by the fact that sharing designs or collaborating with others is harder compared to Figma. Sketch and Adobe XD were designed with the focus on single-user desktop app use, not the multi-user (cross-platform) collaboration scenario common today.
Both Sketch and XD allow you to share designs by uploading screenshots or files to their 'cloud' or hosting services. But editing is still required in the desktop app - unlike Figma where the browser is the app (although there are Figma Electron desktop apps for offline use).
Adobe XD has a feature called 'co-editing' where multiple users can edit a file at the same time - but each user must have the XD app installed.
Figma is even encroaching on the territory of other online tools like Miro. For example, Figma can be used as a digital whiteboard - ideal for a mixed team of developers, managers, designers and any other stakeholders. This is simply not possible in Sketch or Adobe XD.
> Figma has proved to be serious competition to rival Sketch which is a native desktop Mac-only app (with all the speed and functionality advantage of a native app.)
Hats off to the Figma dev team because it actually blows Sketch out of the water in performance, smoothness and stability. Really makes you question the supposed native app advantage when you have such a highly capable team.
Hats off to the Figma dev team because it actually blows Sketch out of the water in performance, smoothness and stability. Really makes you question the supposed native app advantage when you have such a highly capable team.
And this collaborative feature in Figma is GOLD. It improved how my team worked significantly.
Annoyed by them axing Fireworks, really bitter about them killing off Freehand. It was so much better than Illustrator.
I feel the same, but I've been talking to other designers who still prefer sketch for its way of handling design systems and jump into XD for prototyping or vision setting.
Despite its little quirks, I believe Figma has the best dynamic of this space. I also can't be happier to ditch an Adobe product for a valid alternative.
Despite its little quirks, I believe Figma has the best dynamic of this space. I also can't be happier to ditch an Adobe product for a valid alternative.
Sketch + Framer is my go-to combo these days, with Zeplin for documentation and handoffs.
For some reason, Figma has just never felt right to me.
For some reason, Figma has just never felt right to me.
Complete opposite experience. Dropped Sketch for Figma and never looked back.
Product manager over at Figma - would love to know the quirks you mentioned!
It is. However it's unbearably slow when generating previews for prototypes. XD and Sketch are great for quick prototyping and Figma for actually implementing a large scale design system.
Less fluff more buff is something I experience in a variety of products, and the one I interact with a lot on a daily basis (a cloud accounting tool) has this exact problem.
I was just thinking, as a part of the compensation issues of PMs (release feature, get promoted), are we killing the 'back end' teams in favour of 'front end' teams, because they are more visible?
It seems like requests on core and productivity improvement/power user features are always just forgotten about. Not because they're 'harder to implement' or whatever, but because back end doesn't get the resource and manpower they need?
I was just thinking, as a part of the compensation issues of PMs (release feature, get promoted), are we killing the 'back end' teams in favour of 'front end' teams, because they are more visible?
It seems like requests on core and productivity improvement/power user features are always just forgotten about. Not because they're 'harder to implement' or whatever, but because back end doesn't get the resource and manpower they need?
We use XD with our design team and they all love it. On the dev team we’ve been given Figma prototypes and I think XD’s are significantly better. And the last few updates to XD have been really helpful (hover state toggles being the one that the dev team appreciates the most).
I still prefer Balsamiq for designing functionality and user flows. So nice to use.
Comparing lo-fi prototyping to UI design tools is comparing compilers to virtual machines. They are used at different stages of the process and can actually be used together by the same team.
I found a tool that has similar functionality, but a better free tier. Check out MockPlus https://mockplus.com
Same here, don't need anything more complex.
Most likely reason for such fall from grace in update speeds? They lost the savant senior dev (or two) keeping their project together.
I came here to make this exact same comment.
It really seems like they lost the few key people that were holding the whole thing together, either to another company or just to the void due to bad management.
I would love to understand more about this change.
The more I mature as an engineer, the more I see the value of few engaged Individual Contributors that behind the scenes are driving the product and steering management decisions.
It really seems like they lost the few key people that were holding the whole thing together, either to another company or just to the void due to bad management.
I would love to understand more about this change.
The more I mature as an engineer, the more I see the value of few engaged Individual Contributors that behind the scenes are driving the product and steering management decisions.
Yup, this exactly.
It is often under-appreciated how much an active corporate engagement model is due to 1 or 2 highly motivated employees. Once they leave, engagement drops because it wasn't something being driven from management or PMs.
It is often under-appreciated how much an active corporate engagement model is due to 1 or 2 highly motivated employees. Once they leave, engagement drops because it wasn't something being driven from management or PMs.
Figma has a lot of features, but it just isn't snappy and a very frustrating experience a lot of times. For this reason alone, I prefer XD. I spend less time fighting the tool.
I'm a developer, so I'm mostly viewing the designs rather than making them, but I also find Figma to be clunky and awkward. I much prefer Zeplin and XD.
And with as much bullshit as Adobe throws at you with creative cloud, at least you can export .xd files.
And with as much bullshit as Adobe throws at you with creative cloud, at least you can export .xd files.
> I'm a developer, so I'm mostly viewing the designs rather than making them, but I also find Figma to be clunky and awkward. I much prefer Zeplin and XD.
Also a dev and I also found Figma to be kind of clunky at first compared to other options. It has gotten much better though, they will never be on the level of Sketch but at the same time the biggest obstacle that Sketch has is that it's a Mac only desktop app.
Figma might be clunky, but I found it's flexibility to be a massive benefit over other tools.
Also a dev and I also found Figma to be kind of clunky at first compared to other options. It has gotten much better though, they will never be on the level of Sketch but at the same time the biggest obstacle that Sketch has is that it's a Mac only desktop app.
Figma might be clunky, but I found it's flexibility to be a massive benefit over other tools.
To me that clunkiness was just not understanding/utilizing the true power of the tool. Once you work past that uncomfortable phase there is a eureka moment when it all snaps into place and you can't imagine doing it any other way. There is not a single Sketch feature I wish I had in Figma.
You can export .fig files as well.
Interesting. I’ve switched from Sketch to Figma, because Sketch was unbearably slow.
It's probably worth noting the history. I think Tom Krcha ( https://twitter.com/tomkrcha ) led initial work of Adobe XD and is long gone from there.
I could argue XD has it's place in enterprise environments where it's more painful to purchase outside of Adobe and it's good enough to do basic UX visioning/mockup.
I could argue XD has it's place in enterprise environments where it's more painful to purchase outside of Adobe and it's good enough to do basic UX visioning/mockup.
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I’ve never heard anyone say “I like Adobe”. It’s seems to be universally hated, and rightly so.
It seemed to me that the XD team was always quite small. I found it interesting that Adobe never put that much resources into UI design. Maybe the market isn’t very profitable. You would think it would be huge because so many companies need to design UIs.
Probably a business model issue. Since the software is sub-par, and they were late to the party, they are forced to give it for free to even be considered.
I also suspect XD don't bring many synergies with other Adobe products like Illustrator does.
Given this, it might be difficult to justify a proper budget to compete with the market leaders
Given this, it might be difficult to justify a proper budget to compete with the market leaders
Companies don't see the value.
There should be almost always a ui/ux designer, but it's basically at the bottom of the list..
Hence, not much money to be made.
There should be almost always a ui/ux designer, but it's basically at the bottom of the list..
Hence, not much money to be made.
People use Adobe apps because they're integrated (in terms of licensing and workflow) with other Adobe apps, and because they need to collaborate with other people who use Adobe apps. I guess none of that is much of a selling point for XD.
Really? Dark cyan on light pink? Where did the colors go wrong?
It does reduce readability a lot.
Why do people feel the need to make websites barely readable by going for low contrast?
Why do people feel the need to make websites barely readable by going for low contrast?
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What would people here suggest as the alternative software?
Alternative to XD? Figma for ux/ui design + basic prototyping, Framer for slightly advanced prototyping.
You can go a long way with pen and paper + Google Drive or email.
Bold statement to make on HN.
Affinity Photo and Affinity Designer. Pay once, own forever.
I don't get this. He used XD for YEARS without bullets or pages or some other features? How does a professional front end developer manage to do that?
I find XD has better performance than figma but CC cloud is cancer so i dont recommend it
well, there also was FrameMaker, one of the parents of most later desktop-publishing things.. decades before (and it even was kind-of-programmable), and then they bought it, and killed it as well.
only Their thing or no thing.
only Their thing or no thing.
Wait, for real? There are no bullet points /lists?
This is just sad..
This is just sad..
Also, before, companies, schools, and universities could purchase a few perpetual licenses and use those for teaching. Now, they would need to spend much more on person-bound license rentals.
So I'd say XD never had a chance because it launched after the customers left.
I'm still being held hostage by them to access my old files, but for every new project, I go out of my way to avoid using any Adobe-specific file format. If others do the same, then XDs only chance is a truly open file format that other apps can also use.
EDIT: If I remember correctly, I released my first self-developed plug-in for Photoshop 5 around 1999. So I've been using Adobe products for a long time. Back then, plugins for hobbyist power users were a big market. Nowadays, that market is dead. All the hobbyists went to Gimp and Inkscape.
Similarly, the Substance3D communities became a ghost town more or less overnight when Adobe purchased the company and then removed Indie pricing. It went from $99 one-time on Steam to $49/month (min 12 months, so $588 annually) as part of Creative Cloud. Suddenly, Marmoset - their long-term competitor - became very attractive at a one-time $119 for students for a perpetual license. I also lost access to my old files there.