Adobe at it again

[digitaldog]

Your hope is for Adobe to spend more time on slideshow modules...my hope is they sound more resources on the mobile integration.

Better yet, both!

Slideshows I can do with many 3rd party solutions...mobile integration not so much.

The LR slideshow module is weak enough that I'm forced to do that. Why should I have to?

The future of this product or in fact the entire industry is not slideshows...but possibly mobile as everything has headed that way.

Oh, so your take is, speaking for the entire industry as well, one shouldn't produce a quality slideshow intended for mobile devices? Odd.

I'd be just as happy if they killed of their book and slideshow modules as I can do both of these without the need of LR.

Which would upset a boatload of customers who DO use them. What's the point of removing modules other's use?

[ButchM]

Which would upset a boatload of customers who DO use them. What's the point of removing modules other's use?

Indeed ... some folks think that if improvements made in areas they don't find popular must come at the expense of areas they do appreciate.

Product development does not have to be a zero sum game.

[ButchM]

Slideshows I can do with many 3rd party solutions...mobile integration not so much.

I can say the same for solutions that have existed for mobile. There are MANY third party options that I can use to 'integrate' my photos to my mobile devices ... and a few of them I have been using for years with great performance and I didn't have to bounce my images off a distant Adobe server just to get them on my tablet or phone. Not to mention the price was a once-only, extremely inconsequential expenditure.

[chez]

I didn't have to bounce my images off a distant Adobe server just to get them on my tablet or phone.

Exactly my point Butch...Adobe still has a ways to go with their mobile platform so they should be spending more resources in it. Thanks for reinforcing it.

From a business perspective, where do you feel Adobe will get more revenue...from adding a few features to their slideshow module or coming out with a truly mobile integrated platform? I'll give you a hint...when has the last time the investment community ever mentioned slideshow? 

[ButchM]

Exactly my point Butch...Adobe still has a ways to go with their mobile platform so they should be spending more resources in it. Thanks for reinforcing it.

If total rank amateurs have been kicking Adobe's butt and taking their lunch money, by comparison i the mobile market ... for years ... why is it taking a $4B ,multi-national developer so long to get up to speed?

I'll give you a hint...when has the last time the investment community ever mentioned slideshow? 

When was the last time anyone in the investment community mentioned ANY feature in ANY Adobe app ... they don't care about feature development ... they only care about dividends.

[TomFrerichs]

What I find frustrating with LR are the "features" that are half-baked.  I like the "leave the marathon at mile 25" analogy that was offered earlier; it makes perfect sense.

LR has a slideshow.  However, it is very feature poor.  I know others have said to use PremierPro or other programs, but I don't own those other programs.  Considering that I don't have a constant need for slideshows, it's foolish to get a subscription for YAAP (Yet Another Adobe Program).  I'd be wasting my money much of the time. 

Actually, I didn't tell the truth; I have been using a cheap Corel program. However, it's still a hassle to export images from LR, then import them into Corel.  If the LR version offered even a part of what I can do elsewhere...and I think we can agree that LR does not offer much...then I'd use it instead because it would be far more convenient.

Books?  Pretty much the same.  I own a license to InDesign CS6, and use it regularly. Although it's still a kludge to export/import, the creative freedom is far better than what is offered by LR's book module. Indeed, it probably is more versatile than what my needs require. And if I didn't own the license, I would be hard pressed to justify the subscription cost of InDesign CC. 

Those two modules seem to me to be like getting a wonderfully wrapped package for Christmas, only to find that the box is empty. I'd rather that they hadn't offered them in the first place; at least I wouldn't have been disappointed in how poorly they function.

Oh, and as far as "mobile" goes?  I don't use it; I don't want it; but I won't begrudge the addition of those things to LR because I know others do want that functionality.  I would hope that others would honor my desires to have a fully functioning book and slideshow module.

At least I didn't mention the web module. 

Tom

[Rhossydd]

.. why is it taking a $4B ,multi-national developer so long to get up to speed?

Probably because they've done enough research to know that many of us aren't at all interested in using LR on mobile devices.

[stingray]

Lightroom needs a champion within the Adobe organisation.  If such a role exists that person needs to shout louder (a lot louder) and find a way to get feedback from experienced real world users.

If no such role exists then Adobe needs to fill that slot urgently.

Lightroom is a gateway product which should lead new Adobe customers into the world of more specialized products such as Photoshop, CS / CC Suite, etc.. Investing in Lightroom will lead to other downstream revenues.

[Paulo Bizarro]

"Still cannot upgrade to LR 6.5 on my machine, 6.1 is a joke as is CC
Sill happy with LR 5 thank goodness"

I find the above really strange. I have been using LR on a Sony Vaio laptop from 2009. I am now on Windows 7. I have regularly upgraded my LR version (that came free with the laptop) through time, am now on 6.5. No problem.

[stingray]

To Rhossydd (And anyone else interested in Custom Photoshop Panels).

I tried Configurator4 for Photoshop.  No problem getting the Workbench to create and save a custom panel, but could not Export for use in Photoshop CC.

I raised a support ticket with Adobe to discover .....

Configurator4 is supported for Photoshop CC but ..... here is an official Adobe support response ......." Yes, It is with CC version but not with CC 2014 and CC 2015".

So ... great....wasted another 2 days. Adobe should have had the professionalism to post the info on the Configurator4 product page that it would NOT work for CC 2014 andCC 2015.  I asked the support engineer if there were plans to support this feature in the future. His reply "As of now I ma not sure if there are any plans in future. "

Posting just fyi so people do not waste as much time as I have on this tool.

[chez]

Probably because they've done enough research to know that many of us aren't at all interested in using LR on mobile devices.

Actually if you read through their investor reports you'll see that many new Adobe customers joined because of their mobile applications, and a lot of future Adobe focus will be in this direction.

So maybe your statement should read:

Probably because they've done enough research to know that many users are interested in using LR on mobile devices and they are focussing their future efforts in this direction. And their research shows the majority of us users have no interest in LR slideshow and boom modules so Adobe has not focussed in those directions.

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Posting just fyi so people do not waste as much time as I have on this tool.

Appreciated. Better info than from Adobe, even if disappointing (and very odd).

Cheers,
Bart

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Actually if you read through their investor reports you'll see that many new Adobe customers joined because of their mobile applications, and a lot of future Adobe focus will be in this direction.

So you are saying that investors were not spoon-fed that future outlook by Adobe, but they conducted their own market research on a market segment (Adobe offer many more products and services than just for photographers) of all potential Adobe product users?

Cheers,
Bart

[chez]

So you are saying that investors were not spoon-fed that future outlook by Adobe, but they conducted their own market research on a market segment (Adobe offer many more products and services than just for photographers) of all potential Adobe product users?

Cheers,
Bart

Bart...new technology and what it can do is always lead by the corporations and not by the general public. Who in the public asked for the iPhone with all it's abilities. Who in the public asked for the iPad? Who in the public asked for digital cameras...or in fact digital image processing.

The public is always spoon fed new technology.

[kirkt]

To Rhossydd (And anyone else interested in Custom Photoshop Panels).

I tried Configurator4 for Photoshop.  No problem getting the Workbench to create and save a custom panel, but could not Export for use in Photoshop CC.

I raised a support ticket with Adobe to discover .....

Configurator4 is supported for Photoshop CC but ..... here is an official Adobe support response ......." Yes, It is with CC version but not with CC 2014 and CC 2015".

So ... great....wasted another 2 days. Adobe should have had the professionalism to post the info on the Configurator4 product page that it would NOT work for CC 2014 andCC 2015.  I asked the support engineer if there were plans to support this feature in the future. His reply "As of now I ma not sure if there are any plans in future. "

Posting just fyi so people do not waste as much time as I have on this tool.

FYI - I mentioned that earlier in this thread and you even quoted it in a reply to me - CC is the last version of Photoshop that will work with Flash panels (Configurator)!  The Configurator 4 page has not been updated since 2013.  I am guessing that Adobe is moving away from Flash because, among other things like the rest of the internet moving to HTML5 and whatever, Flash is full of holes to exploit, for example this post from yesterday:

https://blogs.adobe.com/psirt/?p=1334

Security Updates Available for Adobe Flash Player (APSB16-10)

A Security Bulletin (APSB16-10) has been published regarding security updates for Adobe Flash Player. These updates address critical vulnerabilities, and Adobe recommends users update their product installations to the latest versions using the instructions referenced in the security bulletin.

Adobe is aware of reports that CVE-2016-1019 is being actively exploited on systems running Windows 10 and earlier with Flash Player version 20.0.0.306 and earlier.  Please refer to APSA16-01 for additional details.

This posting is provided “AS IS” with no warranties and confers no rights.

etc.

Again, if you are interested in developing panels and extensions for your Creative Cloud apps, take a look at Davide Barranca's new book - it will save you many many hours of searching for scattered, incomplete information.

best of luck,

kirk

[ButchM]

Actually if you read through their investor reports you'll see that many new Adobe customers joined because of their mobile applications, and a lot of future Adobe focus will be in this direction.

So maybe your statement should read:

Probably because they've done enough research to know that many users are interested in using LR on mobile devices and they are focussing their future efforts in this direction. And their research shows the majority of us users have no interest in LR slideshow and boom modules so Adobe has not focussed in those directions.

Only one major flaw in your theory ... there has been recent positive proof that Adobe can't rely upon their 'research' as it has been established that their user metrics (or their interpretation of same) have been severely flawed.

Don't you recall at the introduction of Lr v6.2/2015.2, when Sharad Mangalick stated on the Lightroom Journal Blog:

I think it’s important to provide some context to why we made changes to Import.  Over the years we’ve done extensive studies of customers interested in Lightroom.  The studies have been comprised of people passionate about photography and who use their cameras as a creative outlet.  In short, their motivations share the same motivations as people who already love Lightroom.

Then the following unprecedented uproar that ensued proving they got it wrong ... in a VERY major way and had to backtrack and offer up this apology from the same blog by Tom Hogarty::

Lightroom was created in 2006 via a 14 month public beta in a dialog with the photography community.  In making these changes without a broader dialog I’ve failed the original core values of the product and the team.

The team will continue to work hard to earn your trust back in subsequent releases and I look forward to reigniting the type of dialog we started in 2006.

In that context ... don't be surprised if more than a few users of Adobe products have a lack of trust in their user research data.

[stingray]

To kirkt

Again, if you are interested in developing panels and extensions for your Creative Cloud apps,

Thank you for the book reference. Unfortunately, I am not keen right now to get into coding a solution, but will note for future possible use.  Also, I misunderstood the reference to Configurator4 and CC, assuming it would work with all versions of Photoshop CC.

I have used :
a. Javascript plus ListView to automate the integration of images, titles, captions, locations, date capture from  Lightroom to InDesign for high quality, professional standard, automated titled A3 and A2 prints.
b. Visual Basic / Listview / Lightroom to automate integration to Microsoft Word for Mailmerge (images, titles, captions, locations, outputting to a PDF......my quick automated electronic book solution)
c. Visual Basic / Listview / Lightroom to automate production of Powerpoint slideshows using titles, captions, images on multiple platforms and mail to people.

Individually, all these mini projects have been super useful to streamline my workflow but they come at a cost of time. Plus, the effort of maintaining these solutions is a concern.

Inability to be able to create a custom panel, without the need to write code, is a basic tool needed to streamline the Photoshop legacy interface and dependency on remembering millions of keybord short cut combinations.  I know this  is a Lightroom forum, but I am just using this as an example of a major Photoshop gap and failing by Adobe on so many levels.

I wish to give a plug to John Beardsworth and his super Listview plug-in, which allows me integrate my images and metadata from Lightroom  to other solutions when Adobe fail to look after basic workflow needs.

[Rhossydd]

To Rhossydd
I raised a support ticket with Adobe to discover .....
Configurator4 is supported for Photoshop CC but ..... here is an official Adobe support response ......." Yes, It is with CC version but not with CC 2014 and CC 2015".

Why the surprise ? that's exactly what it says on the web site I linked to.

[stingray]

Why the surprise ? that's exactly what it says on the web site I linked to.

As I admitted above ....

Also, I misunderstood the reference to Configurator4 and CC, assuming it would work with all versions of Photoshop CC.

[David Mantripp]

Actually if you read through their investor reports you'll see that many new Adobe customers joined because of their mobile applications, and a lot of future Adobe focus will be in this direction.

So maybe your statement should read:

Probably because they've done enough research to know that many users are interested in using LR on mobile devices and they are focussing their future efforts in this direction. And their research shows the majority of us users have no interest in LR slideshow and boom modules so Adobe has not focussed in those directions.

"that many users are interested in using LR on mobile devices" -- personally I'd be very interested in using it, only my view is that the most interesting Use Case is to be able to use Library functionality on the mobile device, as in Photosmith (or Pixelsync). NOT to process iPad-sourced photos in LR, which seems to be Adobe's thinking. In other words, Adobe positions Lr Mobile as a competitor for high-cool factor apps such as Snapped or Instagram.  Good luck with that.  Current industry thinking seems to be that photography as understood by most of the denizens of this site is for greybeards only and is not a growth market or likely to produce attractive quantities of $$$$$.

"And their research shows the majority of us users have no interest in LR slideshow and boom modules" -- Well, that's quite possibly because they're absolute crap, not because we don't want the features.  Personally, I'm another who has been forced into the InDesign route.  I was, however, quite satisfied with Aperture's book module (and its Lightbox, and its modeless workflow, and its DAM, etc etc.  But yeah, noise reduction at ISO stupid was a bit weak, especially if you missed the RFT NR slider)

It does seem that having succeeded with the marketing steamroller mode of market domination, Adobe now sees zero reason to do more than minimal tinkering with Lr.