Is Photoshop Elements "cannibalizing" Photoshop? In any sort of real, significant way?
I seriously, seriously doubt it: two different programs for two very different types of users.
can you use elements to do any kind of real work beyond touch ups and minor color corrections? nope. my guess is it's almost worthless in an offset print environment. besides, you can't seriously hope to compare digital imaging to desktop publishing. different needs, different types of solutions. what market segmentation might be feasible in the digital imaging world, may not fly in the other.
One of the compromises that Photoshop Elements makes is that it isn't able to work in CMYK, making it useless for anyone working in print.
A lower-cost DTP app would be great...but the problem is, which features do you disable to make it low cost, and still usable for semi-pro work? Most of the features that people want to have (typography, reliable PS/PDF output, ability to import graphics, etc.) is what distinguishes a high-end DTP app from a word processor.
From what I remember about other apps that tried to fill the gap (MS Publisher), they blew. From a user's standpoint, they weren't much better than what a word processor could do; from a printer's standpoint, the PS code they generated was horrible.
Fine, fine. That's it then...$600 InDesign and $900 shitty QuarkXPress for anyone wanting to do page layout in OS X.
Sounds good...
I wish some of you would/could think forward just a bit...all this "was/is/used to/can't/wasn't" talk...you act like a) it can't be done, b) the current idiot version of PageMaker would simply be covered in Aqua and otherwise untouched and c) there isn't a legit need/market for such a product.
I don't know how it could be done...I'm not a software guy or programmer. And yes, Elements if for RGB/inkjet type of work. Don't be so literal, people. When I mention Elements, I mean in the overall sense of "taking a high-end, everything-but-the-kitchen-sink" app and paring it down to consumer level needs/usage.
Do I even have to explain every little thing like this?
Okay, someone above asks "what would be removed to pare it down to a consumer level product": I'd start with the transparency stuff. I'd leave off any HTML/web-based tools or conversion stuff. I'd leave off long document/multiple master page support. Remove the drawing (pen) tool and other Illustrator-esque features. Leave off anything having to do with XML, SVG, etc. I don't know...go look at all the features listed for InDesign at Adobe's site and, to me, it's pretty clear that quite a few could be scrapped to make a pared-down, consumer-level DTP app that can STILL do separations. How hard could that be?
Make it, functionally, pretty much the equivalent of PageMaker 7: layers, type, mulitple pages, master pages, columns, colors, spell-checking and style sheets. Just tighter, not so clunky and "old school". Enough for the people used to using it, as is, to continue so, more or less. Only in an OS X-native environment. These people will never, ever migrate to X otherwise. They can't, if their "bread and butter" app stays behind.
And even if you remove the "separations support" (forcing true, serious people to buy InDesign) that's fine. There are still a lot of newsletters and one-off, small-run projects printed on laser printers and inkjets every single day of the week. Even if it only - like Photoshop Elements - supported that type of environement/output...at least people doing that type of work would have an option or something to turn to. Elements and InDesign Lite (aka PageMaker X) could probably be used in tandem to churn out perfectly acceptable output in small business/church/school settings.
In any case...when such an app is released in 2004 I want you all to remember where you read it first. I'll except snail-mail or e-mail apologies.
Fine, fine. That's it then...$600 InDesign and $900 shitty QuarkXPress for anyone wanting to do page layout in OS X.
Sounds good...
or $400 for freehand.
Quote:
I wish some of you would/could think forward just a bit...all this "was/is/used to/can't/wasn't" talk...you act like a) it can't be done, b) the current idiot version of PageMaker would simply be covered in Aqua and otherwise untouched and c) there isn't a legit need/market for such a product.
your right i don't believe there is a legit market for it. i also don't think it has anything to do with being forward thinking or not, it has more to do with being realistic. can what your asking be done? sure. is it going to happen? no, at least not from adobe. why? try to looking at it from their perspective.
you have one application (indesign or quark for that matter) that services a fairly significant portion of a given marketplace - specificaly the pro design and publishing arena. you want to have them offer an application that would be deemed attractive to another marketplace of would-be designers and such on the low end. now the pro market is pretty damn big in terms of dollars. by introducing a low cost solution that can do many of the basic things that their higher priced brothers can do, you are potentialy robbing yourself of sales. you'd have to sell almost 3 cheaper apps to equal the loss of one higherend app. there is not, nor will their be enough demand to offset those kind of losses. sure, they would gain some new users that would never have bought the pro app, but how many existing users might consider going the cheaper route because they don't use the pro app to the fullest of its potential.
My mentioning of the limitations of elements was to bring up a specific feature of photoshop that was disabled in order to create a "scaled down" product for lower-end users. The point was that, in the case of Photoshop, creating a "low-end" product like Photoshop Elements meant limiting its usability.
Similarly, if a scaled-down version of InDesign/Quark/whatever were developed, it would also need to have several key features disabled, which may ultimately result in a similar app to PS Elements--good for screen, useless for anything else, and unsatisfactory for people wanting a "gap" DTP app.
If all you want is something that's "good for screen/inkjets," MS Word will do fine. Or Appleworks. Or Ragtime Solo. Or Quark CopyDesk.
What I'm mostly seeing from people calling for a budget DTP app is the desire for all the functionality of the key features of Quark/InDesign, at less than half the cost--in other words, give us your flagship product for dirt cheap. And for those that say, "OK, disable some features, but still give me something that will handle imported graphics properly and output reliable files to send to my newsletter printer," well, the ability for the big boys to do what you want a budget DTP app to do is what makes them so expensive.
Yes, I completely agree that paying $600 for something to create a decent looking resume with blows. And yes, I would love to have a "dirt cheap" version of InDesign or Quark. And no, I never said it can't or won't be done, or that there isn't a market for it. But the feature/price/usability equation will need to be solved, and this isn't exactly a Math 101 problem. Previous "gap" DTP products met the price people were willing to pay, but were lacking in either features or usability. From their track record (and presumably sales, as most of those gap products have been discontinued), whoever tries to delvelop this will have some serious hurdles to address.
Have you ignored my mentioning of microsoft word? It costs $400 in the pack, but a lot of people have Word all ready. And in the non-checking S&T edition, it costs $100-149.
Okay, how about this: since we all pretty much agree PageMaker sucks or whatever, how about instead of making an "OS X native PageMaker", perhaps the smarter solution is to, instead, release an "InDesign Elements"?
This is something that wouldn't surprise me. I think Adobe would do well to "Elements" a lot of their programs for home users and small businesses. Photoshop Elements would pair well with a simple, PageMill-type GoLive Elements. Add an InDesign Elements and some CMYK support to PSE for small business desktop publishing.
I'd also like to see Adobe market Mac and Windows versions of Acrobat Elements as a retail product. I love PDFs, prefer them over Word docs any day, but can't send them out to my friends for editing of my manuscripts, because they can't put comments into PDFs like they can Word docs. Sad. A simple Acrobat Elements that lets you, say, add comments, rip a page out of a PDF or combine multiple PDFs into one document -- basic authoring stuff, but without Distiller, that runs $75 to $100 would be perfect. And popular.
Then bundle them together as Adobe Elements Suite or something for $200. Keep the feature sets usable but uninspiring to avoid too badly infringing on the CS market (that's also why you don't see me listing an Illustrator Elements here). It would sell very well, I think.
Comments
Originally posted by pscates
Is Photoshop Elements "cannibalizing" Photoshop? In any sort of real, significant way?
I seriously, seriously doubt it: two different programs for two very different types of users.
can you use elements to do any kind of real work beyond touch ups and minor color corrections? nope. my guess is it's almost worthless in an offset print environment. besides, you can't seriously hope to compare digital imaging to desktop publishing. different needs, different types of solutions. what market segmentation might be feasible in the digital imaging world, may not fly in the other.
A lower-cost DTP app would be great...but the problem is, which features do you disable to make it low cost, and still usable for semi-pro work? Most of the features that people want to have (typography, reliable PS/PDF output, ability to import graphics, etc.) is what distinguishes a high-end DTP app from a word processor.
From what I remember about other apps that tried to fill the gap (MS Publisher), they blew. From a user's standpoint, they weren't much better than what a word processor could do; from a printer's standpoint, the PS code they generated was horrible.
Sounds good...
I wish some of you would/could think forward just a bit...all this "was/is/used to/can't/wasn't" talk...you act like a) it can't be done, b) the current idiot version of PageMaker would simply be covered in Aqua and otherwise untouched and c) there isn't a legit need/market for such a product.
I don't know how it could be done...I'm not a software guy or programmer. And yes, Elements if for RGB/inkjet type of work. Don't be so literal, people. When I mention Elements, I mean in the overall sense of "taking a high-end, everything-but-the-kitchen-sink" app and paring it down to consumer level needs/usage.
Do I even have to explain every little thing like this?
Okay, someone above asks "what would be removed to pare it down to a consumer level product": I'd start with the transparency stuff. I'd leave off any HTML/web-based tools or conversion stuff. I'd leave off long document/multiple master page support. Remove the drawing (pen) tool and other Illustrator-esque features. Leave off anything having to do with XML, SVG, etc. I don't know...go look at all the features listed for InDesign at Adobe's site and, to me, it's pretty clear that quite a few could be scrapped to make a pared-down, consumer-level DTP app that can STILL do separations. How hard could that be?
Make it, functionally, pretty much the equivalent of PageMaker 7: layers, type, mulitple pages, master pages, columns, colors, spell-checking and style sheets. Just tighter, not so clunky and "old school". Enough for the people used to using it, as is, to continue so, more or less. Only in an OS X-native environment. These people will never, ever migrate to X otherwise. They can't, if their "bread and butter" app stays behind.
And even if you remove the "separations support" (forcing true, serious people to buy InDesign) that's fine. There are still a lot of newsletters and one-off, small-run projects printed on laser printers and inkjets every single day of the week. Even if it only - like Photoshop Elements - supported that type of environement/output...at least people doing that type of work would have an option or something to turn to. Elements and InDesign Lite (aka PageMaker X) could probably be used in tandem to churn out perfectly acceptable output in small business/church/school settings.
In any case...when such an app is released in 2004 I want you all to remember where you read it first. I'll except snail-mail or e-mail apologies.
j/k...
Oh well...sigh.
Originally posted by pscates
Fine, fine. That's it then...$600 InDesign and $900 shitty QuarkXPress for anyone wanting to do page layout in OS X.
Sounds good...
or $400 for freehand.
I wish some of you would/could think forward just a bit...all this "was/is/used to/can't/wasn't" talk...you act like a) it can't be done, b) the current idiot version of PageMaker would simply be covered in Aqua and otherwise untouched and c) there isn't a legit need/market for such a product.
your right i don't believe there is a legit market for it. i also don't think it has anything to do with being forward thinking or not, it has more to do with being realistic. can what your asking be done? sure. is it going to happen? no, at least not from adobe. why? try to looking at it from their perspective.
you have one application (indesign or quark for that matter) that services a fairly significant portion of a given marketplace - specificaly the pro design and publishing arena. you want to have them offer an application that would be deemed attractive to another marketplace of would-be designers and such on the low end. now the pro market is pretty damn big in terms of dollars. by introducing a low cost solution that can do many of the basic things that their higher priced brothers can do, you are potentialy robbing yourself of sales. you'd have to sell almost 3 cheaper apps to equal the loss of one higherend app. there is not, nor will their be enough demand to offset those kind of losses. sure, they would gain some new users that would never have bought the pro app, but how many existing users might consider going the cheaper route because they don't use the pro app to the fullest of its potential.
Similarly, if a scaled-down version of InDesign/Quark/whatever were developed, it would also need to have several key features disabled, which may ultimately result in a similar app to PS Elements--good for screen, useless for anything else, and unsatisfactory for people wanting a "gap" DTP app.
If all you want is something that's "good for screen/inkjets," MS Word will do fine. Or Appleworks. Or Ragtime Solo. Or Quark CopyDesk.
What I'm mostly seeing from people calling for a budget DTP app is the desire for all the functionality of the key features of Quark/InDesign, at less than half the cost--in other words, give us your flagship product for dirt cheap. And for those that say, "OK, disable some features, but still give me something that will handle imported graphics properly and output reliable files to send to my newsletter printer," well, the ability for the big boys to do what you want a budget DTP app to do is what makes them so expensive.
Yes, I completely agree that paying $600 for something to create a decent looking resume with blows. And yes, I would love to have a "dirt cheap" version of InDesign or Quark. And no, I never said it can't or won't be done, or that there isn't a market for it. But the feature/price/usability equation will need to be solved, and this isn't exactly a Math 101 problem. Previous "gap" DTP products met the price people were willing to pay, but were lacking in either features or usability. From their track record (and presumably sales, as most of those gap products have been discontinued), whoever tries to delvelop this will have some serious hurdles to address.
Originally posted by pscates
Okay, how about this: since we all pretty much agree PageMaker sucks or whatever, how about instead of making an "OS X native PageMaker", perhaps the smarter solution is to, instead, release an "InDesign Elements"?
This is something that wouldn't surprise me. I think Adobe would do well to "Elements" a lot of their programs for home users and small businesses. Photoshop Elements would pair well with a simple, PageMill-type GoLive Elements. Add an InDesign Elements and some CMYK support to PSE for small business desktop publishing.
I'd also like to see Adobe market Mac and Windows versions of Acrobat Elements as a retail product. I love PDFs, prefer them over Word docs any day, but can't send them out to my friends for editing of my manuscripts, because they can't put comments into PDFs like they can Word docs. Sad. A simple Acrobat Elements that lets you, say, add comments, rip a page out of a PDF or combine multiple PDFs into one document -- basic authoring stuff, but without Distiller, that runs $75 to $100 would be perfect. And popular.
Then bundle them together as Adobe Elements Suite or something for $200. Keep the feature sets usable but uninspiring to avoid too badly infringing on the CS market (that's also why you don't see me listing an Illustrator Elements here). It would sell very well, I think.
Kirk