Adobe set to take the wraps off Creative Suite 4.0

[AppleInsider]

Adobe plans to offer its customers the first overview of Creative Suite 4.0 later this month and could be ready to deliver the software to market as early as this fall, according to those close to the company.

The Mountain View, Calif-based software maker released public betas of CS4-bound applications Dreamweaver, Fireworks and Soundbooth in late May, but has kept secret its plans for some of the suite's more prominent components, namely Photoshop and Flash.

That's about to change. The company this week began notifying its customers that it intends to host a webcast covering its next-generation software bundle at 1:00 p.m. Eastern time on Tuesday, September 23rd.

"Are you ready for something brilliant?," the company wrote on the digital registration form for the presentation. "Be one of the first to see Adobe Creative Suite 4.0 in a special web broadcast."

Word of the event comes amid an increasing number of reports from Adobe's partners who say the company is aiming for a near 18-month refresh cycle of its bread and butter software suite, with a release as early as October. This comes despite earlier claims of an October release that were hotly contested by company representatives.

Creative Suite 3.0, which delivered universal binaries of all major component applications for the Mac, was announced in March of 2007. Adobe offered several different editions or bundles of the suite when it began shipping between the months of April and June that year.

People familiar with the ongoing development of Creative Suite 4.0 say a good chunk of Adobe's resources for the project were devoted to bringing two applications acquired from Macromedia -- Dreamweaver and Fireworks -- up to spec with its existing flagship offerings. However, the company is expected to tout a handful of significant enhancements to both Photoshop and Flash.

For example, the company is expected to announce that Photoshop CS4 (codenamed Stonehenge) will be capable of pulling in 3D objects as wireframes. Although UV mapping won't be supported, the feature will reportedly allow sales teams to perform quick color changes and color corrections.



The new version of Photoshop will also feature a Flash services panel, natural canvas rotation, content aware image resizing and deliver 64-bit support for Windows users.

Separately, Adobe is planning a slew of enhancements in Flash CS4 (codenamed Diesel) that have resonated well with early testers, leading some to bill upgrade as "the best thing" to happen to Flash in quite some time. Among these will be a completely new "and proper" timeline dubbed Motion Editor, as well as a new object-based motion tween model.

Other enhancements bound for Flash CS4 reportedly include an "Inverse kinematics" tool for building complex animations and 3D rotation support.

[ View this article at AppleInsider.com ]

[palegolas]

The flash things you mentioned sound really promising! But what Flash need the MOST is a stable and solid interface. ( It's very buggy.)
I know Flash is the deal, but what about Director? It's a great and simple tool that has been used a lot for making dev tools, map editors, pixel animation exporters and stuff amongst network. Would love to see a priper update. It's not even universal binary yet!

[SpamSandwich]

They're turning Flash into a full-fledged interactive 3D viewer... wow.

[nagromme]

Agreed about Flash's UI--needs SERIOUS help--but the same is somewhat true for CS3 as a whole, Photoshop included. These apps (well, not Flash!) used to be 99.9% stable and smooth, but these days they run maybe 95%. And I despise Adobe's docking thing, especially the sluggish fade-in and fade-out you get sometimes.

Polish up these apps to the FEEL quick and stable and I'll be happier than any new features could provide!

Once upon a time when people said Apple should make a Photoshop competitor I thought--great, but I won't buy it. I'm happy with Photoshop.

I can't say that anymore. I WOULD consider a competitor now, and I hope a real contender emerges. Meanwhile, I'll keep my CS4 money. Chances are I'll get CS5 (with 64-bit support?) but if something else comes along that would be great.

Also agreed on Director. I still use it in Rosetta--it's great for certain things. Luckily, it does seem to be surviving. Between RealBasic, Flash (2D) and Unity (3D) I may not need Director, but I certainly wouldn't mind working with a new director if one of my clients asks for it.

[Wally]

Originally Posted by nagromme

Agreed about Flash's UI--needs SERIOUS help--but the same is somewhat true for CS3 as a whole, Photoshop included. These apps (well, not Flash!) used to be 99.9% stable and smooth, but these days they run maybe 95%. And I despise Adobe's docking thing, especially the sluggish fade-in and fade-out you get sometimes.

Polish up these apps to the FEEL quick and stable and I'll be happier than any new features could provide!

Once upon a time when people said Apple should make a Photoshop competitor I thought--great, but I won't buy it. I'm happy with Photoshop.

I can't say that anymore. I WOULD consider a competitor now, and I hope a real contender emerges. Meanwhile, I'll keep my CS4 money. Chances are I'll get CS5 (with 64-bit support?) but if something else comes along that would be great.

Agreed. I hate the instability of Photoshop and InDesign in CS3. I did a completely clean install too (zero-out the drive and re-installed Leopard), and it still runs like a dog on a MacPro. I could care less about CS4 unless it promised some serious stability enhancements. I say forget about 64-bit support - give us muti-core support! And for the love of god - stop trying to make Photoshop a one-all program, make it the best at what it used to be - photo manipulation.

[SS3 GokouX]

That is the ugliest press invite I have ever seen. What the hell, are there no designers actually working within Adobe? Those date boxes... yikes.

Still, this Fall still feels too soon. The Production and Master CS3 bundles only came out like 14 months ago.

[Virgil-TB2]

Prepare to be under-whelmed!

All I can say is that if Adobe is thinking of releasing a new CS suite every 18 months, it has to be literally hundreds of dollars cheaper to make it worthwhile.

Based on past performance, this will likely be only slightly less of a dud/rip-off/heap of dung than the last suite.

[Virgil-TB2]

Originally Posted by SS3 GokouX

That is the ugliest press invite I have ever seen. What the hell, are there no designers actually working within Adobe? Those date boxes... yikes.

Still, this Fall still feels too soon. The Production and Master CS3 bundles only came out like 14 months ago.

I think the squares are supposed to represent the ugly-ass icons they use now. But I agree, this is one ugly invitation. It looks like something advertising an event in Second Life or something. i.e. - something your mum might have made.

[Crtaylor]

I am really looking forward to the CS4 release. It sounds really promising. (I know I've posted a comment on this site mentioning that I'd never use their products again, but I was experimenting with GIMP.) I especially hope they integrate that THERMO product into the suite as well (see Adobe Labs for more details). That would really streamline the creative process. I was psyched when CS3 was released and I will still be psyched three weeks from now!

[Wally]

Originally Posted by Crtaylor

I am really looking forward to the CS4 release. It sounds really promising. (I know I've posted a comment on this site mentioning that I'd never use their products again, but I was experimenting with GIMP.) I especially hope they integrate that THERMO product into the suite as well (see Adobe Labs for more details). That would really streamline the creative process. I was psyched when CS3 was released and I will still be psyched three weeks from now!

I didn't know Adobe staffers frequent AI!

Wow!

[Unicron]

How about After Effects CS4? Illustrator?

[Frank777]

Adobe may try the "it's all Apple's fault" excuse, but unless there is something special in this for Mac users (or a lower price point), I suspect most Mac users will pass on a suite that is clearly inferior to its Windows counterpart. Call us when CS5 arrives.

[Crtaylor]

Originally Posted by Wally

I didn't know Adobe staffers frequent AI!

Wow!

I'm not an Adobe staffer; just a college student.

[gastroboy]

Originally Posted by AppleInsider

Adobe plans to offer its customers the first overview of Creative Suite 4.0 later this month.

I hope they remember to brush the flies off it before they do.

I look forward to every expensive new upgrade from Adobe to be an ever increasing pile of @#$!

Come on small software projects like Pixelmator and show Adobe what they used to be, and maybe could be again, if they paid any attention to their Mac origins.

[melgross]

I obviously don't agree with most of the comments here. Photoshop CS4 will have a lot more than what is mentioned here, including productivity enhancements. I'm still under NDA, so I can't say more yet.

[ThePixelDoc]

Is it just me, or is the software and OS industry as a whole getting worse?

Seems that over the last few years, little or no innovation is being added to upgrades, other than GUI tweaks and existing bug fixes. Shouldn't these be free, and added as patches on an ongoing basis?

However, with expected double-digit growth from the market ANAL-cysts, is it any wonder? It starts to become impossible to maintain. Also, anybody notice how it seems that the software ind. is always moving closer to becoming a monopoly within it's area of "expertise"?

For example, now that Adobe swallowed MM, FreeHand was killed... and Illustrator still looks like 1999. No competition whatsoever in the vector/layout market, so why bother (from Adobe's point of view).

Anyway, it recently seems we've been taking 2 steps back to go one step forward, to use a cliché... overall. OSes on both sides of the divide included.

[SS3 GokouX]

That's great that Photoshop is getting enhancements. But just because one flagship app is getting new features does not warrant an update for the entire suite. Unless these "productivity enhancements" are shared among the whole suite, and not just Photoshop and Flash.

Someone wake me up when we hear some decent After Effects news.

[embee]

Originally Posted by ThePixelDoc

Is it just me, or is the software and OS industry as a whole getting worse?

...

Anyway, it recently seems we've been taking 2 steps back to go one step forward, to use a cliché... overall. OSes on both sides of the divide included.

I agree with you as far as Adobe is concerned. I'd rather they just spend another 18 months streamlining CS3. It's a bloated piece of crap.

Let's hope that developments like Chrome and Snow Leopard are a step in the right direction, though, as far as responsible coding is concerned.

[jamiec]

Originally Posted by palegolas

The flash things you mentioned sound really promising! But what Flash need the MOST is a stable and solid interface. ( It's very buggy.)
I know Flash is the deal, but what about Director? It's a great and simple tool that has been used a lot for making dev tools, map editors, pixel animation exporters and stuff amongst network. Would love to see a priper update. It's not even universal binary yet!

Director 11 has been out for a few months and the Mac version requires an Intel Mac -- I'd be very surprised if they were still using Rosetta. If by "universal" you mean that you're waiting for a new version that goes back to supporting older PPC Macs for authoring (instead of just playback), I wouldn't hold your breath.

[JNack]

Hi there,

For reference, I didn't "hotly deny" any particular announcement or shipping date for the next version of Photoshop and other products. I denied that I'd made any statements about when the apps would ship, and I took issue with some media outlets for simply fabricating details (and others for blindly echoing those fabrications).

J.

[melgross]

Originally Posted by JNack

Hi there,

For reference, I didn't "hotly deny" any particular announcement or shipping date for the next version of Photoshop and other products. I denied that I'd made any statements about when the apps would ship, and I took issue with some media outlets for simply fabricating details (and others for blindly echoing those fabrications).

J.

Ok, I must be missing something here.

Who are you?

[SS3 GokouX]

Originally Posted by melgross

Ok, I must be missing something here.

Who are you?

Check the Photoshop about box.

[anderson04]

I've been pretty upset with adobe like the rest of you, especially about leaving the CS3 bugs in the dust just moving on...

A little birdy told me that CS4 is going to knock our socks off. I would expect the full suit to be available by November.

[Frank777]

Nice to see Adobe knows we exist...

I'm sure CS4 has made improvements. Adobe's 18-month dev cycle always means a few new whiz bang features (even if they're just eye candy) to justify the upgrade price. Apple does the same thing with OS upgrades.

I personally hope InDesign has either received its own integrated text database, or has received the ability to easily pull articles and photos from a Filemaker database. That feature might do it for me.

But regardless, Mac users do not react well to a developer releasing software on the platform that is less advanced than their Windows offering. Microsoft and Intuit have been long despised for this selfsame reason. Once Adobe officially joins that crowd, the calls for an Apple competitor to Photoshop will be deafening.

[melgross]

Originally Posted by SS3 GokouX

Check the Photoshop about box.

Ah, ok, I know a few of the guys, but too many to remember.

[melgross]

My experience is that Adobe does listen. It's just a very big, slow ship to turn around.

[ChristopherSEA]

Adobe has done a crapy job of making the various applications inside the Suite consistent.

InDesign has a style sheet system (text and object) that works very well.

Illustrator on the other hand is painful to use. It makes me insane. It's like you have to learn a completely new and inconsistent (and less well implemented) object style system for Illustrator.

Illustrator is my really big gripe. It's become more and more bloaty and painful to use.

[Wally]

I don't think Adobe does listen because I've endured upgrades since Photoshop 7 and it just keeps getting slower on newer equipment. The creative suite is like the Vista of the Mac world. I'm baffled that they just won't get it right.

What I think all of the Adobe developers need to do is take a gander over at dearadobe.com and read some of the feedback they're getting from their actual users. When I start seeing performance enhancements then I'll believe that "they're listening".

[Wally]

Originally Posted by Frank777

Mac users do not react well to a developer releasing software on the platform that is less advanced than their Windows offering. Microsoft and Intuit have been long despised for this selfsame reason. Once Adobe officially joins that crowd, the calls for an Apple competitor to Photoshop will be deafening.

Agreed. But Adobe won't ever care - because there still hasn't been a real competitor for them. It will just be business as usual - bring on the same bloat crap.

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by SpamSandwich

They're turning Flash into a full-fledged interactive 3D viewer... wow.

I thought they had that already. Just that it's not widely used.

Originally Posted by SS3 GokouX

That is the ugliest press invite I have ever seen. What the hell, are there no designers actually working within Adobe? Those date boxes... yikes.

Still, this Fall still feels too soon. The Production and Master CS3 bundles only came out like 14 months ago.

But much of the software came out several months before that, didn't it?

Originally Posted by Wally

I didn't know Adobe staffers frequent AI!

Wow!

Thanks for contributing to a needlessly toxic environment! I mean, someone saying something good that we disagree in must be an astroturfer. Yeah, sure.

Originally Posted by ThePixelDoc

However, with expected double-digit growth from the market ANAL-cysts, is it any wonder?

Maybe you'd be more convincing if you didn't use the crude language?

[cygnusrk727]

Originally Posted by Unicron

How about After Effects CS4? Illustrator?

Apparently Illustrator CS4 is getting "better" implemented multi-page documents and multiple artboards. Looks like a "better" gradient type tool. I'm sure there is more.

http://www.adobeegitim.com/dersler/d...=77&dersno=641

[OUkimber]

Originally Posted by melgross

Ah, ok, I know a few of the guys, but too many to remember.

He's kind of a big deal.

[Frank777]

I got the invite, but I don't see the point of sitting at a webcast at my desk. This ain't gonna be a Jobs keynote.

Is there anything to be THAT excited about? I'll just let the Mac web distill the news for me and figure out whether an upgrade is warranted.

[tonton]

Originally Posted by ChristopherSEA

Adobe has done a crapy job of making the various applications inside the Suite consistent.

InDesign has a style sheet system (text and object) that works very well.

Illustrator on the other hand is painful to use. It makes me insane. It's like you have to learn a completely new and inconsistent (and less well implemented) object style system for Illustrator.

Illustrator is my really big gripe. It's become more and more bloaty and painful to use.

I absolutely hate Illustrator. I pretty much was forced to quit graphic design work when FreeHand was killed.

[melgross]

Originally Posted by OUkimber

He's kind of a big deal.

I haven't been in the business for almost five years, and dealt with the same people since 1990. I know Thomas Knoll, if that makes you feel better.

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by Frank777

I got the invite, but I don't see the point of sitting at a webcast at my desk. This ain't gonna be a Jobs keynote.

Is there anything to be THAT excited about? I'll just let the Mac web distill the news for me and figure out whether an upgrade is warranted.

I think an Adobe presentation might be worth seeing at least once. You're right, it's not the same, but I think the presentation is more utility to a user than a Stevenote.

I've seen two or three presentations by Adobe people and I thought they were pretty interesting even though I wasn't into the software in question. While seeing them in person might be coloring my perception, I thought the presenter did a lot better job showing the features in use than the "Mac web" did writing about the features in question.