Well, I can say to read the many books on the subject. Better looking doesn't mean "sexy". It can mean, clean, straightfoward, easy to interpret, uncluttered, etc.
One of the biggest propbems it that many people think that by getting more information on one "slide" they can have a more efficient presentation. In order to do that they need some complex - i.e. "sexy" chart.
That's wrong. Presenting LESS information per chart, and doing it well, with more charts presented as you explain the numbers, leads to more understanding.
I'm not saying that the standard templates are the nicest. But most are fairly simple, and the colors are designed not to distract from the information being presented.
The worst presentations have animated things zooming in and out so that they distract from the presentation itself.
Once might be good for a laugh, but after that, simple and straightfoward always wins.
You don't want your presentation to look more important than the information it is designed to impart.
Sorry, but I think we'll just need to disagree on this topic. I'm not referring to making complicated uber-graphs, I'm referring to attractive looking graphs that most effectively deliver a message.
Microsoft is so focused on the look and feel of their next-gen OS, yet they don't seem to be giving any consideration to the look and feel of the output that Excel and Powerpoint generates.
I'm not saying that the standard templates are the nicest. But most are fairly simple, and the colors are designed not to distract from the information being presented.
For the worst keynote slides see Bill Gates. He uses that horrible olive green colour and his slides are more tacky than Intel's at WWDC!
Sorry, but I think we'll just need to disagree on this topic. I'm not referring to making complicated uber-graphs, I'm referring to attractive looking graphs that most effectively deliver a message.
Yes, definitely. Ever compare the DVD themes in Windows programs compared to iDVD? Sure, there are a few cutesy ones in iDVD, but overall they are much simpler and yet more sophisticated than anything you'll find in a Windows app.
Sonic even used to charge extra for "special" themes for MyDVD that were truly ugly and busy and were far worse than the free themes in iDVD.
Apple should buy Adobe. This is by no means my original idea but a bit of rehash of others ideas.
1. As insurance agains MS and the Office hegemony. If MS drops OS X development apple would have PS to hold over the head of MS.
2. As a subtle means of getting people to switch. Make new and great features Mac only at first.
3. Get the Creative Talent and Markets of Adobe and Macromedia.
4. Integrate features of PS into iphoto or Aperture
5. grow Apple.
I completely agree. And doesn't apple have billions of dollars banked up? Maybe that was one of their reasons for keeping so much cash on hand, preparing a buyout of somebody? Purchasing Adobe would be like buying insurance against flopped hardware. If for some awful reason the Intel mac's flopped, apple could back off the hardware (it would suck...but hey its a backup plan), and they could sell OS X x86 and the Adobe suite, Aperature, iLife suite, etc. And maybe even negotiate bundle agreements with PC manufacturers.
I completely agree. And doesn't apple have billions of dollars banked up? Maybe that was one of their reasons for keeping so much cash on hand, preparing a buyout of somebody? Purchasing Adobe would be like buying insurance against flopped hardware. If for some awful reason the Intel mac's flopped, apple could back off the hardware (it would suck...but hey its a backup plan), and they could sell OS X x86 and the Adobe suite, Aperature, iLife suite, etc. And maybe even negotiate bundle agreements with PC manufacturers.
If Apple were going to buy Adobe, wouldn't they have done it before spending all that time and energy creating Final Cut Pro, DVD Studio Pro, Motion, SoundTrack, etc.?
Apple has no interest in creating or updating Windows programs. They've bought a number of companies over the past few years, and immediately killed the Windows versions of each of those applications.
Adobe's apps are not optimized for OS X. They're cross platform and thus a huge compromise compared to OS X-optimized apps (e.g, CoreImage, CoreAudio, etc.). Adobe's publishing apps are also very, very old. Adobe keeps adding features and trying to improve the user experience, but it's getting harder and harder to do. They really need a complete rewrite ($$).
Apple's professional apps are all based on a common framework. If you own any of them, you'll notice that you occasionally get Software Updates for the Professionals Applications. This is a framework that's updated, and then all the pro apps gain the benefits. Aperture is clearly based on this framework (take a look at Aperture and then DVD Studio Pro--look familiar?). Apple will leverage this to create new apps that may compete with Adobe's publishing apps.
Rumor has it that iLife 06 will include iWeb, a simple web publishing (and PodCasting?) application. Just as there is Final Cut Pro for iMovie, and DVD Studio pro for iDVD, and now Aperture for iPhoto... don't you think Apple is working on a professional web design app that will be the pro version of iWeb? Of course they are.
For all these reasons, there is no justification for Apple even to consider buying Adobe. Just ain't gonna happen.
Let's just hope LightRoom isn't the dog that Adobe Bridge is. The idea of Bridge is wonderful, in my experience, however, the implementation is lackluster (blows). And as far as the age of Adobe's publishing software, InDesign is really not all that old, though the first version was released for OS 9, before X was mainstream. Also, Illustrator to my understanding has recently recieved a rewrite on the Mac platform using the new development platform.
Photoshop remains a dog in many respects, and GoLive the redheaded stepchild. I'm really interested to see what Adobe does about Flash/SVG, and whether or not they will push Google/Yahoo etc into being able to index vector content.
... And doesn't apple have billions of dollars banked up? Maybe that was one of their reasons for keeping so much cash on hand, preparing a buyout of somebody? Purchasing Adobe would be like buying insurance against flopped hardware...
Huh? If you want insurance against flopped hardware, how about CASH?!
Of you buy Adobe, all you're doing is putting yourself at risk of either flopped hardware OR software! Brilliant!
Positive first impression just from watching the video. I'm mostly curious about the UI. I'll let the "pros" with more direct interest and related experience be the beta testers and critics.
Notable segment near the beginning:
"Watch as I move through these 16Mp photos. I think you'll find that the performance is pretty fantastic. And, I'm recording this movie on a common laptop configuration ... so Lightroom will run beautifully on real world hardware."
And near the end:
"... I'm going to show you some of our outrageous performance advantages over the so-called competition."
It's a pretty safe bet George is targeting Aperture when you hear the tone and emphasis in those remarks.
Positive first impression just from watching the video. I'm mostly curious about the UI. I'll let the "pros" with more direct interest and related experience be the beta testers and critics.
Notable segment near the beginning:
"Watch as I move through these 16Mp photos. I think you'll find that the performance is pretty fantastic. And, I'm recording this movie on a common laptop configuration ... so Lightroom will run beautifully on real world hardware."
And near the end:
"... I'm going to show you some of our outrageous performance advantages over the so-called competition."
It's a pretty safe bet George is targeting Aperture when you hear the tone and emphasis in those remarks.
It's all sleight of hand. It's using cached proxies for printing multiple images on a sheet, and for the small previews. He states that in the video. It's 100% pure marketing hype when he makes the statement about "printing 16MB photos" when, seconds earlier, he said that it *doesn't* print 16MB files but rather the proxies.
Don't get me wrong. That's a great performance enhancement (after all, you don't need all 16 megapixels to print a thumbnail of 8 images per page). But don't claims that you're printing a full resolution image when you're not.
Other than that little bit of marketing hype (Apple is just as guilty of that sort of thing ), Lightroom appears very impressive. I'm no Adobe basher; it's just that their apps "for photographers" have been terrible up to this point.
Lightroom is very, very different. Very impressive, Adobe!
But, you've pretty much made my case for me. You agree that it has a VERY small audience, because it does so little.
What's particularly funny in retrospect (with melgross insisting that Aperture/Lightroom would not be suitable for photojournalists and many other photographers) is this from the Lightroom FAQ:
Quote:
Who will use Lightroom Beta?
First and foremost, Lightroom is the product professional photographers have been demanding, especially those who deal with large volumes of digital images. These include fashion and portrait photographers, photojournalists, wedding, landscape and commercial photographers. To these add the seasoned personal photographers who aspire to achieving the same results as the pros, and who demand the same level of quality in their tools.
Lightroom is intended to be very focused on the specialized workflows of digital photographers. Bridge serves a much wider variety of customers and workflows, and by so by necessity, has more generalized features. During the development of Lightroom, we heard from a lot of photographers, that, yes.... they want to work with one program. But we also heard that you want a very focused application that is easy to learn, very lightweight, and elegant. One that is super-efficient, but at the same time, is a pleasure to work in.... and does not require taking a workshop just to get up and running with. Lightroom serves just one master, and that is the higher-volume, serious photographer. Whether pro, or advanced amateur.
The thing I'd like to emphasize is that Lightroom should ultimately become the 95% workflow solution for the daily work you do to import, manage, process and output your photos. If you want to do compositing, or deep pixel editing, that's great.... that's what Photoshop CS2 is for.
What's particularly funny in retrospect (with melgross insisting that Aperture/Lightroom would not be suitable for photojournalists and many other photographers) is this from the Lightroom FAQ:
Lightroom is somewhat different from Aperture, as it is designed to work much more closely with PS.
Aperture aims to be self-contained. It will export to PS an import flattened images, but that's it.
Lightbox will be more integrated.
But, time will tell with both of these. I've got Aperture, and have been using it. I haven't had the time in the couple of days it's been here to try Lightbox, but I'll do that tomorrow.
I like the fact that the beta is available. It would have been good if Apple had done that. The release might not have been so buggy.
Lightroom is somewhat different from Aperture, as it is designed to work much more closely with PS.
Aperture aims to be self-contained. It will export to PS an import flattened images, but that's it.
Lightbox will be more integrated.
It's funny that you say that, since as you say you haven't even tried Lightroom.
Try this:
1. Import an image into Lightroom. It can be a raw file or a layered PSD.
2. Right click the image.
3. Select "Edit in Photoshop" from the menu.
What do you get in Photoshop?
A flattened TIFF! Ha ha! The exact same thing you get with Aperture!
Nice integration. Not.
Oh, I know what you'll say. "It's just a beta." Therefore it can't be criticized because it will/might be different in the final version. In which case Lightroom is beyond reproach. Nice marketing strategy from Adobe.
It's funny that you say that, since as you say you haven't even tried Lightroom.
Try this:
1. Import an image into Lightroom. It can be a raw file or a layered PSD.
2. Right click the image.
3. Select "Edit in Photoshop" from the menu.
What do you get in Photoshop?
A flattened TIFF! Ha ha! The exact same thing you get with Aperture!
Nice integration. Not.
Oh, I know what you'll say. "It's just a beta." Therefore it can't be criticized because it will/might be different in the final version. In which case Lightroom is beyond reproach. Nice marketing strategy from Adobe.
I'm going to download it tomorrow. I remember you being pretty adamant about Aperture before you saw it.
We'll see about this. Adobe obviously felt that it would be good to release a beta while Aperture was so new and buggy. I hope that it will spur Apple on to fix it, pronto.
By the way, I don't own Adobe stock, while I do own Apple. So, I have no reason to push Adobe over Apple for financial gain.
LightRoom is one Adobe app that I will think about purchasing. At least, some night, I will download it. It is nice to see them come out with it for the Mac first, even if it is a 'beta'. A clever way to keep the fishes on the line.
I too hope it spurs Apple to work on developing Aperture in to a top working programme. The Woz was right back some months ago when he said(in that interview, if one reads the whole) that Apple too much is for going on to the next thing, that they need to work on maturing software.
I became frustrated with Adobe, after they ditched FrameMaker(thankfully, Mellel is aimed to pick up on book making). They should sell FrameMaker(the Mac version), or give it away. And, with the costly updates to Photoshop. I realised, why do I, a mere amateur, need Photoshop, if Elements or other programmes are around. As the pro David Brooks pointed out, most people only really need Elements, and so Adobe came out with it. Good move.
But, LightRoom, hmm. I really don't need two such programmes, and I prefer to support Apple.
Adobe caused much chafement and resistance in me when they would develop more for the windos versions. Why are fonts a problem in programmes in OS X? Adobe is using its font handling, which seems geared more toward the windos version, but has been 'ported' to the Mac. It does not use OS X's own, from what I understand from some pros, simple fellow that I am. Perhaps someone here(who has hung around Adobe) can better inform me.
But I am going to give LightRoom a good look. If only it didn't take so long on a dial up to download 111MB. I am not any pro, just an amateur. But it would be helpful to have a simple worthwhile tool for organisation.
Comments
Originally posted by melgross
Well, I can say to read the many books on the subject. Better looking doesn't mean "sexy". It can mean, clean, straightfoward, easy to interpret, uncluttered, etc.
One of the biggest propbems it that many people think that by getting more information on one "slide" they can have a more efficient presentation. In order to do that they need some complex - i.e. "sexy" chart.
That's wrong. Presenting LESS information per chart, and doing it well, with more charts presented as you explain the numbers, leads to more understanding.
I'm not saying that the standard templates are the nicest. But most are fairly simple, and the colors are designed not to distract from the information being presented.
The worst presentations have animated things zooming in and out so that they distract from the presentation itself.
Once might be good for a laugh, but after that, simple and straightfoward always wins.
You don't want your presentation to look more important than the information it is designed to impart.
Sorry, but I think we'll just need to disagree on this topic. I'm not referring to making complicated uber-graphs, I'm referring to attractive looking graphs that most effectively deliver a message.
Microsoft is so focused on the look and feel of their next-gen OS, yet they don't seem to be giving any consideration to the look and feel of the output that Excel and Powerpoint generates.
Originally posted by melgross
I'm not saying that the standard templates are the nicest. But most are fairly simple, and the colors are designed not to distract from the information being presented.
For the worst keynote slides see Bill Gates. He uses that horrible olive green colour and his slides are more tacky than Intel's at WWDC!
Originally posted by melgross
You do twist things around. I never mentioned LightRoom, did I?
But, you've pretty much made my case for me. You agree that it has a VERY small audience, because it does so little.
Yeah, Adobe's coming out with LightRoom to grab all of 3 customers from the total of 5 photographers worldwide who need a program like Aperture.
Yeah, there must not be a market there. Adobe's shareholders are thrilled that Adobe's competing in this "non-market".
Originally posted by MacCrazy
For the worst keynote slides see Bill Gates. He uses that horrible olive green colour and his slides are more tacky than Intel's at WWDC!
Yeah, they match the pukey green and blue color scheme of XP--and it looks pretty similar in Vista. Yuk.
Originally posted by Chagi
Sorry, but I think we'll just need to disagree on this topic. I'm not referring to making complicated uber-graphs, I'm referring to attractive looking graphs that most effectively deliver a message.
Yes, definitely. Ever compare the DVD themes in Windows programs compared to iDVD? Sure, there are a few cutesy ones in iDVD, but overall they are much simpler and yet more sophisticated than anything you'll find in a Windows app.
Sonic even used to charge extra for "special" themes for MyDVD that were truly ugly and busy and were far worse than the free themes in iDVD.
Apple is definitely a class act.
Originally posted by TednDi
Apple should buy Adobe. This is by no means my original idea but a bit of rehash of others ideas.
1. As insurance agains MS and the Office hegemony. If MS drops OS X development apple would have PS to hold over the head of MS.
2. As a subtle means of getting people to switch. Make new and great features Mac only at first.
3. Get the Creative Talent and Markets of Adobe and Macromedia.
4. Integrate features of PS into iphoto or Aperture
5. grow Apple.
I completely agree. And doesn't apple have billions of dollars banked up? Maybe that was one of their reasons for keeping so much cash on hand, preparing a buyout of somebody? Purchasing Adobe would be like buying insurance against flopped hardware. If for some awful reason the Intel mac's flopped, apple could back off the hardware (it would suck...but hey its a backup plan), and they could sell OS X x86 and the Adobe suite, Aperature, iLife suite, etc. And maybe even negotiate bundle agreements with PC manufacturers.
Originally posted by ThinkExpensive
I completely agree. And doesn't apple have billions of dollars banked up? Maybe that was one of their reasons for keeping so much cash on hand, preparing a buyout of somebody? Purchasing Adobe would be like buying insurance against flopped hardware. If for some awful reason the Intel mac's flopped, apple could back off the hardware (it would suck...but hey its a backup plan), and they could sell OS X x86 and the Adobe suite, Aperature, iLife suite, etc. And maybe even negotiate bundle agreements with PC manufacturers.
If Apple were going to buy Adobe, wouldn't they have done it before spending all that time and energy creating Final Cut Pro, DVD Studio Pro, Motion, SoundTrack, etc.?
Apple has no interest in creating or updating Windows programs. They've bought a number of companies over the past few years, and immediately killed the Windows versions of each of those applications.
Adobe's apps are not optimized for OS X. They're cross platform and thus a huge compromise compared to OS X-optimized apps (e.g, CoreImage, CoreAudio, etc.). Adobe's publishing apps are also very, very old. Adobe keeps adding features and trying to improve the user experience, but it's getting harder and harder to do. They really need a complete rewrite ($$).
Apple's professional apps are all based on a common framework. If you own any of them, you'll notice that you occasionally get Software Updates for the Professionals Applications. This is a framework that's updated, and then all the pro apps gain the benefits. Aperture is clearly based on this framework (take a look at Aperture and then DVD Studio Pro--look familiar?). Apple will leverage this to create new apps that may compete with Adobe's publishing apps.
Rumor has it that iLife 06 will include iWeb, a simple web publishing (and PodCasting?) application. Just as there is Final Cut Pro for iMovie, and DVD Studio pro for iDVD, and now Aperture for iPhoto... don't you think Apple is working on a professional web design app that will be the pro version of iWeb? Of course they are.
For all these reasons, there is no justification for Apple even to consider buying Adobe. Just ain't gonna happen.
Photoshop remains a dog in many respects, and GoLive the redheaded stepchild. I'm really interested to see what Adobe does about Flash/SVG, and whether or not they will push Google/Yahoo etc into being able to index vector content.
Originally posted by ThinkExpensive
... And doesn't apple have billions of dollars banked up? Maybe that was one of their reasons for keeping so much cash on hand, preparing a buyout of somebody? Purchasing Adobe would be like buying insurance against flopped hardware...
Huh? If you want insurance against flopped hardware, how about CASH?!
Of you buy Adobe, all you're doing is putting yourself at risk of either flopped hardware OR software! Brilliant!
http://labs.macromedia.com/technologies/lightroom/
Originally posted by adam1185
Public Beta now available.
Positive first impression just from watching the video. I'm mostly curious about the UI. I'll let the "pros" with more direct interest and related experience be the beta testers and critics.
Notable segment near the beginning:
"Watch as I move through these 16Mp photos. I think you'll find that the performance is pretty fantastic. And, I'm recording this movie on a common laptop configuration ... so Lightroom will run beautifully on real world hardware."
And near the end:
"... I'm going to show you some of our outrageous performance advantages over the so-called competition."
It's a pretty safe bet George is targeting Aperture when you hear the tone and emphasis in those remarks.
Originally posted by sjk
Positive first impression just from watching the video. I'm mostly curious about the UI. I'll let the "pros" with more direct interest and related experience be the beta testers and critics.
Notable segment near the beginning:
"Watch as I move through these 16Mp photos. I think you'll find that the performance is pretty fantastic. And, I'm recording this movie on a common laptop configuration ... so Lightroom will run beautifully on real world hardware."
And near the end:
"... I'm going to show you some of our outrageous performance advantages over the so-called competition."
It's a pretty safe bet George is targeting Aperture when you hear the tone and emphasis in those remarks.
It's all sleight of hand. It's using cached proxies for printing multiple images on a sheet, and for the small previews. He states that in the video. It's 100% pure marketing hype when he makes the statement about "printing 16MB photos" when, seconds earlier, he said that it *doesn't* print 16MB files but rather the proxies.
Don't get me wrong. That's a great performance enhancement (after all, you don't need all 16 megapixels to print a thumbnail of 8 images per page). But don't claims that you're printing a full resolution image when you're not.
Other than that little bit of marketing hype (Apple is just as guilty of that sort of thing
Lightroom is very, very different. Very impressive, Adobe!
Originally posted by melgross
But, you've pretty much made my case for me. You agree that it has a VERY small audience, because it does so little.
What's particularly funny in retrospect (with melgross insisting that Aperture/Lightroom would not be suitable for photojournalists and many other photographers) is this from the Lightroom FAQ:
Who will use Lightroom Beta?
First and foremost, Lightroom is the product professional photographers have been demanding, especially those who deal with large volumes of digital images. These include fashion and portrait photographers, photojournalists, wedding, landscape and commercial photographers. To these add the seasoned personal photographers who aspire to achieving the same results as the pros, and who demand the same level of quality in their tools.
http://labs.macromedia.com/technologies/lightroom/
Enjoy...
Ops, seems I was late. Should have read all the posts before. Sorry.
Lightroom is intended to be very focused on the specialized workflows of digital photographers. Bridge serves a much wider variety of customers and workflows, and by so by necessity, has more generalized features. During the development of Lightroom, we heard from a lot of photographers, that, yes.... they want to work with one program. But we also heard that you want a very focused application that is easy to learn, very lightweight, and elegant. One that is super-efficient, but at the same time, is a pleasure to work in.... and does not require taking a workshop just to get up and running with. Lightroom serves just one master, and that is the higher-volume, serious photographer. Whether pro, or advanced amateur.
The thing I'd like to emphasize is that Lightroom should ultimately become the 95% workflow solution for the daily work you do to import, manage, process and output your photos. If you want to do compositing, or deep pixel editing, that's great.... that's what Photoshop CS2 is for.
George Jardine
Pro Photography Evangelist
Adobe Systems, Inc.
Originally posted by bikertwin
What's particularly funny in retrospect (with melgross insisting that Aperture/Lightroom would not be suitable for photojournalists and many other photographers) is this from the Lightroom FAQ:
Lightroom is somewhat different from Aperture, as it is designed to work much more closely with PS.
Aperture aims to be self-contained. It will export to PS an import flattened images, but that's it.
Lightbox will be more integrated.
But, time will tell with both of these. I've got Aperture, and have been using it. I haven't had the time in the couple of days it's been here to try Lightbox, but I'll do that tomorrow.
I like the fact that the beta is available. It would have been good if Apple had done that. The release might not have been so buggy.
Originally posted by melgross
Lightroom is somewhat different from Aperture, as it is designed to work much more closely with PS.
Aperture aims to be self-contained. It will export to PS an import flattened images, but that's it.
Lightbox will be more integrated.
It's funny that you say that, since as you say you haven't even tried Lightroom.
Try this:
1. Import an image into Lightroom. It can be a raw file or a layered PSD.
2. Right click the image.
3. Select "Edit in Photoshop" from the menu.
What do you get in Photoshop?
A flattened TIFF! Ha ha! The exact same thing you get with Aperture!
Nice integration. Not.
Oh, I know what you'll say. "It's just a beta." Therefore it can't be criticized because it will/might be different in the final version. In which case Lightroom is beyond reproach. Nice marketing strategy from Adobe.
Originally posted by bikertwin
It's funny that you say that, since as you say you haven't even tried Lightroom.
Try this:
1. Import an image into Lightroom. It can be a raw file or a layered PSD.
2. Right click the image.
3. Select "Edit in Photoshop" from the menu.
What do you get in Photoshop?
A flattened TIFF! Ha ha! The exact same thing you get with Aperture!
Nice integration. Not.
Oh, I know what you'll say. "It's just a beta." Therefore it can't be criticized because it will/might be different in the final version. In which case Lightroom is beyond reproach. Nice marketing strategy from Adobe.
I'm going to download it tomorrow. I remember you being pretty adamant about Aperture before you saw it.
We'll see about this. Adobe obviously felt that it would be good to release a beta while Aperture was so new and buggy. I hope that it will spur Apple on to fix it, pronto.
By the way, I don't own Adobe stock, while I do own Apple. So, I have no reason to push Adobe over Apple for financial gain.
I too hope it spurs Apple to work on developing Aperture in to a top working programme. The Woz was right back some months ago when he said(in that interview, if one reads the whole) that Apple too much is for going on to the next thing, that they need to work on maturing software.
I became frustrated with Adobe, after they ditched FrameMaker(thankfully, Mellel is aimed to pick up on book making). They should sell FrameMaker(the Mac version), or give it away. And, with the costly updates to Photoshop. I realised, why do I, a mere amateur, need Photoshop, if Elements or other programmes are around. As the pro David Brooks pointed out, most people only really need Elements, and so Adobe came out with it. Good move.
But, LightRoom, hmm. I really don't need two such programmes, and I prefer to support Apple.
Adobe caused much chafement and resistance in me when they would develop more for the windos versions. Why are fonts a problem in programmes in OS X? Adobe is using its font handling, which seems geared more toward the windos version, but has been 'ported' to the Mac. It does not use OS X's own, from what I understand from some pros, simple fellow that I am. Perhaps someone here(who has hung around Adobe) can better inform me.
But I am going to give LightRoom a good look. If only it didn't take so long on a dial up to download 111MB. I am not any pro, just an amateur. But it would be helpful to have a simple worthwhile tool for organisation.