Dear Adobe // Blog

First After Effects, then InDesign and now Photoshop, perhaps the best known Adobe product ever.  Zorana Gee, Photoshop Product Manager has assembled some good responses to the top Photoshop gripes here on Dear Adobe.  Gee also took some time to respond to some general gripes so you might want to get a sandwich, there’s a whole lotta response coming up. 

Photoshop Responses

1.) Better font browser in Photoshop, please? #224

Adobe: Good idea - will look into ways of how we can better manage and display fonts. The challenge here is with performance as the more information we give, the more time it takes to initialize.

2.) please either make the vector tools in Photoshop work like completely like Illustrator, or just leave them out. Their half-assedness is aggravating. #511

Adobe: PS is a pixel-based application so inherently it will do things different and face different challenges than a vector-based application like Illustrator.

3.) Enable auto-recover for Photoshop, so when it inevitably crashes for the 9th time today I can get back to the corporate schlock I was working on. #28

Adobe: Good idea.

4.) Please make photoshop give my ram back when I quit #354

Adobe: PS does give all RAM back upon quitting; however, some Adobe processes do keep some of the resources running. I agree that this shouldn’t be happening.

5.) Let me change the opacity on multiple layers at once! #51

Adobe: The way you can do this is to create a layer group and then adjust Opacity on that group.

6.) Can you please save the history in my PSD files so I can come back to a project later and use the history brush? #627

Adobe: Currently the history log can be saved in the file as metadata and/or as a text file (general preferences). This is a text representation of what you did - as it appears in history/actions panel. I imagine this request is to record individual brush strokes which would result in a very huge file - hundreds of numbers representing the location of each tool at that time.  The history brush paints in pixels from a previous history state - for that particular document. If you wanted to paint in exact pixels from that state - there are certainly easy ways to do this in PS (clone, save composite as a pattern). To save the history snapshot in the file is a great idea.

7.) “Photoshop cannot save this file because it is open.” Thank you, thank you, thank you. #350

Adobe: I’m not sure what this means.

8.) I want the Photoshop launch time to be faster #850, 136

Adobe: I agree. This should be our priority in moving forward. Performance is always a focus for us - not just in launch times. We continually evaluate the product and weigh the benefits of improvements and new features with respect to launch time and general performance enhancements to offer an improved overall experience in Photoshop.

9.) You are the ones who invented OpenType - so why doesn’t your application Photoshop support OpenType glyphs??? #948

Adobe: PS does support OT glyphs and OT features. Are there specific glyphs that are problematic?

10.) Dotted lines in Photoshop would be swell. #430. 316, 405

Adobe: I agree! The only way to do so is through styles for shapes (dotted lines) and also by creating a pattern for brushes.

11.) let me open up animated gifs. why did you REMOVE a feature?! #120,  #959, #674

Adobe: We never had this in PS; however, we did lose this when we stopped shipping IR with PS. You can still use IR build with your current PS version. The ability to do this directly in PS would be a big win.

12.) Do you ever listen to your tech support team? How about gathering the top problems that people call in about and FIXING them? Or even posting FAQs based on the help calls. #947

Adobe: We work very closely with our tech support team and all issues get recorded and high-volume issues definitely get through to the team. For high volume problems or areas that need specific customer attention, we create tech notes for on adobe.com/support where technical workarounds and details are provided. We always address top concerns and bugs but don’t always get to resolve them in the next release. As Kevin Connor mentioned in a prior blog, we take these top requests our customers give us very seriously and always leave time in our development schedule to address the ones that we can (see JDI days). Certainly public sites and forums such as this one helps us shape and prioritize this list.

13.) In Photoshop, after using the text tool (and hitting enter) I hit ‘v’ to choose my cursor, but no, instead you change the typeface of the active layer to Verdana. Thanks, that’s exactly what I wanted. #188

Adobe: This should be fixed in CS4.

14.) Please let me customize the Photoshop tools palette. As a photographer, I will never ever use the Pen tool, but I want Healing Brush and Patch Tool on top. #949

Adobe: For PS CS4 we have added a new utility that allows you to create your own customizable panel containing tools, menu items, notes, scripts and widgets. This is available on adobelabs.com. More information can be found on John Nack’s blog: http://blogs.adobe.com/jnack/2008/10/introducing_ado_1.html

Of course this isn’t the end all and we will continue to make PS more customizable where it makes sense and allow users to only expose areas of the application that they want.

Adobe: This is a good idea and it’s true, our ability to place grids/guides needs much improvement in addition to making them layer-based.

Adobe: In CS4 we’ve enabled Open GL drawing which allows us to have smoother renders of type, curves and lines - this can be seen at all zoom levels.

General Bitching / Multiple Products Responses

1.) You know what would be nice? Finally standardizing the interface between ALL of your applications. #19, #101

Adobe: With every release we make huge efforts to streamline our apps and offer consistent UI and workflows (i.e. CS4 and the application frame bar with all shared tools amongst suite apps). Suite applications started as individual products and were created at different times; therefore can’t be accomplished in one release.

2.) can Photoshop and Illustrator (and InDesign, etc.) please just work the same? Same guides, same text tools, etc. #36

Adobe: We continue to integrate our applications and improve to make workflows, tools, etc. more consistent where it makes sense. Each application serves a different set of customers and defining the right one to mimic wouldn’t work for everyone.

3.) give the same keyboard shortcuts to the same functions no matter what app. if you say you’re going for consistency, then be fucking consistent. #294, #93

Adobe: Again, would be great but which application would we mimic? We do allow all our keyboard shortcuts to be customizable; however, we could probably make presets that allow users to set a suite-wide change as they feel is appropriate.

4.) Please stop keeping the PC and Mac versions separate. One combined version, one license. How hard is that? #950

Adobe: For an 18+ year old product, merging 2 separate binaries is extremely “hard”. We do recognize that more customers are working cross-platform now and with our newer applications (i.e. Lightroom) we do create a single binary. However, in terms of licensing and serialization, Adobe is working on a plan to improve this process for our customers.

5.) Why the hell do I need both “Adobe Help Viewer 1.0″ and “Adobe Help Viewer 1.1″? This is the laziest excuse for terrible programming imaginable. At least make an effort to hide your incompetence. #637

Adobe: You don’t need both. In CS4, we don’t use Adobe Help Viewer at all and all Help can be found online. If you still have this viewer on your system you may need it for other apps (i.e. Elements).

We’ve been emailing with Kevin Connor, V.P. Product Management of Professional Digital Imaging at Adobe and he shared with us a glimpse into how Adobe’s developers are working on improving their software.  Kevin writes:

A number of product teams are starting to incorporate “just do it” days into their development cycle. The idea is that the entire engineering team will take a break from their normal feature work and pick off some small product enhancements that can be implemented in a day or less. We’ve always tried to squeeze in these things where we can, but scheduling some formal days to focus on these smaller user requests will hopefully give us some extra momentum in getting them done. Dear Adobe can be one of several sources of inspiration for what things to tackle on these days.

Personally, I think this is really exciting.  Looking at the gripes submitted to Dear Adobe, this is mostly what people want.  They’re not pining for crazy new features, but want a program that works logically, smoothly and consistently.  Here’s hoping to see the benefits of these “just do it” days soon!

UPDATE (11-12-2008):

In a follow up email, Kevin also offers some ideas about what might be fixed in these ‘just do it’ days:

Generally, they’d be things that would never make it into our top-level marketing materials, but things that existing users would notice and appreciate—minor enhancements to how existing features function, rather than entirely new features. Of course, what can really be implemented in a day is also a function of how things are coded in the first place.

He goes on to provide some examples of some things that were changed in CS4 that would probably be well suited to one of their ‘just do it’ days:

Though we didn’t schedule formal “just do it” days for the CS4 development cycle, there are a number of changes in that release that would be typical of what we might tackle this way. Some examples include:

- Changed the default color of the Stroke layer effect to black (formerly red). Ideally we would have liked to make this sticky so that it would remember your last setting, but that actually would have taken more than a day’s work to change all of the logic, and we couldn’t spare that time.

- We made a bunch of shortcut-key changes. These included freeing up the Cmd-~ shortcut so that it would be available on the Mac for application switching, and adding single-key shortcuts for moving among frames in video clips.

- The new “Bird’s Eye View” feature wasn’t exactly a user request, but it falls into the category of something an engineer was able to implement serendipitously based on some other work he was doing. It wasn’t part of our original product plan. Basically, it allows you to hold down a shortcut key to instantly zoom out to see your full image, navigate to the portion you want to see, and then release the shortcut to instantly zoom back in.

- Save for Web now has improved options for exporting metadata (while maintaining copyright info), and also can convert to sRGB directly within the dialog.

Not to be out done by his compatriots, Michael Ninness, Senior Product Manager for InDesign, took some time to respond to the gripes listed here on Dear Adobe.  He’s sent along alot of tips and workarounds for some common problems and even addresses the dreaded Cmd+H / Leopard issue.

In other Dear Adobe/InDesign news, we’ve also earned some fans in the InDesign QA department.  James Roche writes in:

As much as I can vouch for the InDesign team, we follow up on each piece of customer feedback that we see, so this is a great central location for collecting and scoring frustrations in our user ranks. Thanks!

So, InDesign fans, read on to see what the future may hold for your layout program of choice and maybe learn something you didn’t know.

1.) Why is the color picker different in all the CS apps? Why can’t I use an eyedropper in the color picker in InDesign? #146

Adobe: Short answer is because they were all implemented at different times by separate teams. If only we could copy and paste code between the apps! This is the kind of stuff we are trying to change. Good feature request for an eyedropper in the InDesign color picker. Illustrator needs one as well.

2.) Please give us color management for grayscale images in InDesign. It’s a huge pain without. Direct RGB to grayscale conversion without a trip to Photoshop would also be very useful. #984

Adobe: I hear you. We are at least exploring RGB to grayscale when exporting to PDF for CS5.

3.) Please give us an option to “Save all user defined settings” to a USB-memory stick (Preferences, workspaces, actions, presets, profiles, custom brushes, custom patterns, etc.). And a way to load those whenever you want. #1163

Adobe: Great idea. And a way to push those to multiple computers in multi-user environments.

4.) InDesign should be able to make PDF forms directly. #1334

Adobe: I agree. While this isn’t what you are asking for, using the form fields recognition feature in Acrobat 8 and higher does ease the pain somewhat. Here is a link to a useful post over at InDesignSecrets.com about this process: http://indesignsecrets.com/automated-forms-with-acrobat-8-and-indesign.php

5.) Why doesn’t InDesign respond to “Cmd+H”? Why can’t I hide InDesign on Leopard? Why can’t I switch back to InDesign after I’ve hidden it on Leopard? #212, #1258, #1726, #2140

Adobe: These are all valid (and related) gripes, and we continue to work with Apple to try to resolve them. Adobe knows it’s painful. Apple knows it’s painful. Please know that we are not ignoring this issue; we want it fixed as well, as it is both embarrassing and frustrating! For now, if Cmd+H stops working for you, you’ll need to force quit InDesign and relaunch. (If you had any InDesign documents open before having to force quit, your “session” should be restored for you when you relaunch InDesign.) From that point on, Cmd+H should work properly until the next time you restart your Mac.

6.) Can you imagine what we have to go through if we have to reorder rows in an InDesign table?! Can you? I mean it even works in MS Word! #1738

Adobe: Yes, it is painful. We made some progress with improving Table editing in CS4 by finally letting you see the table text content in the Story Editor. That at least makes it possible to edit overset text in table cells. Obviously, we’ve still got some work to do on reordering (and sorting) table rows and columns.

7.) InDesign just deleted (not moved to the Trash, just deleted!) all my links because I tried to replace a packaged file with a new version of itself. I bill by the hour, so thanks! #832

Adobe: There isn’t enough info in this gripe for me to fully understand what was going on, and what to suggest. I can say that we’ve significantly improved the entire Links functionality in CS4 (It was a complete rearchitecture). I’m hoping these improvements help whoever submitted this gripe.

8.) Why doesn’t InDesign recognize sub-layers when placing Illustrator files? Cause, man, it should. #1435

Adobe: It’s a personal pet peeve of mine as well, and it is high on my list to address in CS5. That would let me change the stacking order and visibility of objects, and let me rename and lock/unlock them all from the Layers panel. I’m thinking that would make a lot of people happy.

9.) A scrubber bar for font size in InDesign would be very welcomed! Why is it in Photoshop but not InDesign? Crazy! #1147

Adobe: For now, in pretty much all the CS apps, you can invoke a “virtual” scrubby slider for any text edit field. Either click into the field, or click on the label next to the field to select the entire contents of that field. Then, you can use your up and down arrow keys to change the values; hold down the Shift key as well to increase the jump values. Press the Enter key when you are done.

10.) InDesign needs to work for left-handers too. Let Alt bring up the scroll hand too! #1082

Adobe: Either Alt key should give you the Hand tool when you are editing text. The Spacebar gives you the Hand tool when you are not using the Text tool.

11.) Could you, please, make InDesign work properly with OS X Leopard? #1701

Adobe: I’m guessing this gripe has to do with issues beyond the Cmd+H gripes. The Mac OS X 10.5.4 update has resolved a number of issues when running InDesign on Leopard. Check out Tim Cole’s blog on this topic for more details: http://blogs.adobe.com/indesignchannel/2008/06/indesign_leopard_1054_nav_serv.html

12.) Please reconsider FrameMaker for Mac: meaning write something for Mac that a technical writer of long documents can USE. Not InDesign, it’s shit for long technical documents. #1902

Adobe: No Macintosh version of FrameMaker has been frustrating for some. We’ve gradually been increasing the InDesign long document features and capabilities version over version. In CS4, InDesign has added Cross References and Conditional Text.

13.) InDesign text columns controlled in a paragraph style! Saves me time clipping text and making frames. That’ll be all for now. #373

Adobe: You can change the number of columns in a text frame by choosing Object > Text Frame Options, or pressing (Cmd+B) [Ctrl+B]. For bonus points, you can include the number of columns when defining an Object Style. Also, Object Styles can include Paragraph Styles in them as well.

14.) I would like to copy from InDesign and paste into Illustrator, instead of saving out an EPS, placing and embedding it, then deleting the EPS I had to make. #2124

Adobe: You can copy and paste from Illustrator into InDesign, or from InDesign to Illustrator; no need to save an EPS from AI or ID first. In version CS3 and higher, the clipboard preferences for each application need to be set to “prefer PDF”. To check your prefs in each app, press (Cmd+K) [Ctrl+K], then choose the respective “clipboard” section. For Illustrator, turn on “Copy as PDF” and for InDesign, turn on “Prefer PDF When Pasting” and “Copy PDF to Clipboard”.

15.) If you want to relink an image, could it please be possible to get straight to the folder in which the original image sits? It was possible in other versions, but not anymore. #4025

Adobe: Fixed in CS4, and you now have a choice. Press (Cmd+K) [Ctrl+K], to open up Preferences, and click on the File Handling section. At the bottom of the dialog, you can choose an option for the “Default Relink Folder” option. Your choices are “Original Relink Folder” or  “Most Recent Relink Folder”.

16.) Embedding an AI file in InDesign and then changing the layer order or layer naming in Illustrator will ruin the linkage of all the embedded Illustrator data in InDesign. Thus the Object Layer Options Dialog becomes unusable! Please fix this!!!! #1074

Adobe: You can get the behavior you want by changing the Object Layer Options for the AI file you’ve placed in InDesign. By default, InDesign honors any local layer overrides you’ve made within InDesign via the Object Layer Options dialog. To honor the changes you make to the file in Illustrator instead, selected the placed AI file, right-click on it and choose “Object Layer Options…” Then change the “When Updating Link” pop-up menu from “Keep Layer Visibility Overrides” to “Use PDF’s Layer Visibility”.

17.) InDesign Character/Paragraph styles are a mess. Allow me to apply more than one style to a bit of text. Also, external (linked, centralized) style sheets with directly editable code. Ideally, move everything to an extended/customized CSS based system. #1344

Adobe: Linking to an external style sheet sounds like an interesting feature request. I could see how that would be powerful, but could also potentially cause unintended results for some when updating the external style sheet. This isn’t exactly what you are asking for, but you can synchronize style sheets across multiple InDesign documents when using the Book feature.

18.) Please let me choose CMYK or RGB mode in when creating a new document (New Document window) and choose or change it in the Document Setup window. And when I’m in CMYK mode, for the love of god, let black be true black! Rich black is not as popular as your InDesign and Illustrator teams seem to think it is! #2710

Adobe: Amen! If you choose RGB, have the Color panel switch to RGB sliders automatically, have the Proof Set up change to an sRGB profile, and change the Transparency Blend Space to Document RGB. How about we throw in pixels as a measurement system while we are at it? Hmm… this would really make it easier to set up a document that is going to be published to a digital format rather than be printed. Crossing my fingers for CS5.

Now that the CS4 cat is out of the bag, the good people on the After Effects team have graciously taken the time to respond to most of the top 25 After Effects gripes here on Dear Adobe (a couple were left out as they were misfiled at the time they pulled the report).  In their response Michael Coleman, Product Manager for After Effects, also writes:

I know folks wonder where web form suggestions go, but I can assure you that the feedback received here goes directly to a real person on the After Effects team. Here’s the URL: http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/mmform/index.cfm?name=wishform

There seems to be a good mix of responses; some have already been addressed in CS4 and others have jsut been deemed ‘good suggestions’.  In closing, we’d like to thank Michael Coleman and Ellen Wixted (Product Marketing Manager for After Effects) for taking the time to get these responses together and that we hope that other product teams might consider taking a peek at their own Top 25.  Without further adue, After Effects gripes and their responses:

1.) I want to buy After Effects. JUST After Effects. Help me out, willya? #1332

Adobe: After Effects has always been available to be purchased separately.

2.) Multiprocessing that doesn’t slow down After Effects renders as often as it speeds them up would sure be handy. Barring that, AE should be smart enough to detect when the MP overhead is exceeding its benefit. #1339

Adobe: After Effects CS4 has a brand new preference panel to match the number of CPU cores used for rendering with the available RAM. This will help optimize multi-core rendering. In addition, CS4 will also allow you to limit the number of cores being used for rendering in order to leave some processing power for other applications you are using at the same time. There are also numerous small improvements to multi-core rendering under the hood of CS4.

3.) The option to import text layers from PSDs into After Effects as a text layer and not rasterized pixels. #1573

Adobe: Use the “Convert to Editable Text” menu commmand. Available in After Effects 6.0 or later.
http://livedocs.adobe.com/en_US/AfterEffects/8.0/help.html?content=WSB0C11C4A-7F82-4fdf-81DD-3E39B052541A.html

4.) Support OpenFX plug-ins in AfterEffects (and Photoshop), it’s an open standard accepted by almost the entire visual effects industry. #1630

Adobe: We are generally supportive of open efforts, but there are currently far more native After Effects plug-ins available than OpenFX. In addition, virtually all OpenFX effects are already available in a native After Effects version. Looking toward the future, Adobe is developing technology to allow you to use the same effects across multiple hosts and platforms, which offers several distinct advantages to developers and customers. This technology is called ‘Adobe Pixel Bender’. For more info, see http://labs.adobe.com/wiki/index.php/Pixel_Bender_Toolkit on the Adobe labs web site.

5.) Why do I still have to do RAM previews in After Effects? And why does AE still do pixel aspect ratio correction by dropping or adding columns of pixels? It’s 2008, not 1995, folks. I know you know how to properly scale images without making them look like crap, so why don’t you do it in your viewports? #1310

Adobe: We’re always working on increasing performance. Given today’s computing platforms, though, RAM previews are a fact of life with complex, deep compositions in real-world projects. Better Pixel Aspect Ratio scaling is a good feature request.

6.) more 3D in after effects. #1881

Adobe: Good feature request.

7.) Let us copy text from another app and paste it in After Effects’ text tool. #1568

Adobe: You can currently copy and paste text into After Effects.

8.) Why can Photoshop import 3D models but After Effects can’t? How does that even make sense??? #1979

Adobe: Good request. In the mean time, After Effects CS4 is compatible with 3D layers from Photoshop CS4 PSD files. 3D PSD layers can be animated as real 3D objects in After Effects CS4. 3D objects, therefore, can be brought to After Effects via Photoshop.

9.)  why is Actions feature available in Photoshop but not in After Effects? #1280

Adobe: Good feature request.

10.)  After Effects is a FANTASTIC application and THE BEST Adobe product. Please let the other teams learn form the After Effects team.

Adobe: Thank you! We work closely with the other teams and we’re always working together to make the best products possible. It’s a little known fact that many great things in After Effects are contributed from all over Adobe, and we’re collaborating more and more with each release.

11.) Make After Effects graph editor more intuitive/usable.

Adobe: The graph editor has recently been redesigned with customer input. Please provide specific suggestions for improvement and we’ll take a look at incorporating more feedback into future versions..

12.) Would it kill you to update the filters in After Effects so that they can all work in all color resolutions? 8 bit is not enough.

Adobe: Most effects have been already updated to work in 32-bit color space. In After Effects CS4 we have also upgraded the 3D Channel effects to 32-bit. Help us prioritize your top plug-ins for conversion by providing a list of the ones you use most frequently that are not already 32-bit.

13.) Can we get inverse kinetics in After Effects already?? #3403

Adobe: Good feature request. (Check out Flash CS4, by the way — it has IK!)

14.)  I Love After Effects! #2561

Adobe: Thanks! So do we!

15.) After Effects automatically comes forward after renders are completed. (disrupting work in other applications) #1293

Adobe: Most people are not experiencing this issue, but it is not the intended behavior. Will investigate.

16.) Make the text tools the same for After Effects as in Photoshop… I keep hitting ‘T’ and opening opacity! #1603

Adobe: We’ve given the ‘t’ shortcut to opacity since it’s more frequently used in After Effects. We’d like to have customizable keyboard shortcuts someday, but in the meantime in After Effects, use cmd+T on the mac and ctrl+T on windows.

17.) After Effects: Syncing animation to audio is important. Why must you make so, so hard? #2344

Adobe: You can play audio in realtime while creating timeline markers for animation synchronizing. See this page for more info:
http://livedocs.adobe.com/en_US/AfterEffects/8.0/WS3878526689cb91655866c1103906c6dea-7e62.html

18.) Make After Effects save a shadow copy of the project automatically before rendering starts, OR make After Effects not crash while rendering. Up to you #6617

Adobe: Good suggestion. While crashing is rare, you can also enable Auto-Save in the preferences for additional project backups.

19.) After Effects: Variable feathering on masks. Why I must make sooooo many masks!? In Full HD!? 60 freakin’ i!? #2332

Adobe: Good suggestion.

20.) I love to scroll through hundreds of layers in After Effects. Layer groups or folders I could collapse or turn off would be more 21st century than a frikkin’ nose-over-wall icon!!!! IT’S THE 21st CENTURY!!! #2433

Adobe: After Effects CS4 has a very handy new search field in the timeline and project panels that is a great way to quickly get to the layer or property you’re looking for. This dramatically reduces or eliminates timeline scrolling.

21.) Could you please consider adding Private Use Area access to ligature glyphs and to alternate glyphs in fonts such as Garamond and Arno so that people using non-OpenType applications could use them to produce graphics? Maybe special PUA-access versions of the fonts? #954

Adobe: Good suggestion.

22.) Please let me open “legacy” files—I paid for both versions, why can’t I open old files with new programs without having my paths be all fricked up. #4147

Adobe: All version of After Effects will open and render old project versions. Note that if you have moved the source files, you may have to re-link the source files to the project.

23.) After Effects: I’d like use of vast amounts of RAM I’ve purchased. Why can’t you see it? Love- OSX #2320

Adobe: After Effects can currently use 3-4 GB per core for RAM previews and renders. More RAM per core is a good suggestion.