Photoshop Online Within Six Months

scobrown writes "Adobe is going to create a software-as-a-service version of photoshop that it will initially be offering for free. It should be available within 6 months. It is supposed to be ad supported... but we'll see how long that lasts"

Platform-independent, I hope

So long as it's not written in ActiveX or anything dumb like that, this could be good news for Linux on the desktop. Can't install the latest version of Photoshop? Who cares, just use it online!

Re:Platform-independent, I hope

I believe the correct phrase would have been

"Can't bittorrent the latest version of Photoshop......"

 

Re:Platform-independent, I hope

Rather use GIMP to be honest. Anyway, performance will be way too slow for any image of a reasonable size over the web. Why bother? Or am I missing something here?

Re:Platform-independent, I hope

I'm guessing that while performance might suck for large images, anyone doing real graphic design and photography will have a real version of Photoshop. This is probably intended for people who want to be able to quickly design some small graphics for use on their website.

Re:Platform-independent, I hope

I'm guessing that while performance might suck for large images, anyone doing real graphic design and photography will have a real version of Photoshop. This is probably intended for people who want to be able to quickly design some small graphics for use on their website.

To illustrate that you are most likely correct consider that the lead artist that works on professional photo restoration at YellowCatDesign typically works with files many gigabytes in size. A simple 8x11 inch at 600dpi and 8bit per color clocks in at 100MB. Most images are scanned at higher resolutions at higher bitdepth (and I think in CMYK rather then RGB). Also I've seen our professionals use tons of layers (10-100) which can add significantly to the filesize. I just don't see that amount of data beeing transferred between a web-based client and a remote server in real time.

Still, for smaller images having photoshop available online would be great.

Re:Platform-independent, I hope

Photoshop Elements!

I tried, but I can't find the periodic table pulldown. Hell, I can't even specify "Cobalt Blue" in the colour picker...

Re:Platform-independent, I hope

Yup...that feels just like Photoshop!

Re:Platform-independent, I hope

What technology do you expect it to be written in then? I see ActiveX, Flash as being the only *real* options for pulling this off. Maybe a Java Applet.

ActiveX and Flash are far from the same thing. The main problems with ActiveX is its windows only and its insecure. You also forget to mention java.

As far as being windows only, Flash and Java have the problem of requiring closed source bytecode interpreters, but run on other platforms. They are both relatively secure as well. Both have interpreters available for linux so you will be able to run this on linux.

I really hope this gets implemented as a J2EE delivered webapp with a flash frontend. Flash has the potential to be a platform of choice for rich web apps, and I think whatever R&D comes out of delivering photoshop as a flash app will translate into newer flash developer tools. I see this as the Flash equivilant of putting a man on the moon in terms of positive side effects.

GIMP online 7 years ago

This is nothing new. There was an online version of GIMP [slashdot.org] available 7 years ago. It wasn't a commercial success, but with today's hardware and bandwidth prices, and with a modern AJAX interface, would it stand a chance now? Adobe obviously seem to think so.

Re:GIMP online 7 years ago (who cares?)

Whenever people Photoshop comes up at Slashdot, people mention Gimp. But Gimp is not a substitute for Photoshop as far as professional users are concerned. Gimp is like so many OSS projects, a rat's nest of messed up code, no real road map, and half-assed implementations "features".

Re:GIMP online 7 years ago (who cares?)

There's a lot more than a "CMYK implementation" needed to replace Photoshop. You need suppport for ICC color correction, a lossless "base" color space (e.g. L*a*b), high-bit-depth support, monitor/scanner/device calibration support, 6+ color separation support, PANTONE color library support, and a hundred other professional-level features.

GIMP is good for making JPEGs that target the web, where color fidelity is (lamentably) disregarded. And of course personal photo editing. GIMP's true competition at this point is Photoshop Elements, Paint.NET, Paint Shop Pro, and other "prosumer" tools.

Enjoy Cocaine in a can

Since when does cocaine come in aluminium?

Since 2006 [wikipedia.org].

Next business opp.

Once it is offered, someone from the Third World would offer services to touch up the photos, clearing the background and adjust the color balance etc on the web using the free adobe photoshop. Already I have seen ads from people willing solve CAPTCHAs for less than a dollar an hour. Homework service for school children is also popping up. If only someone would invent a lawnmower that could be driven remotely via the net ...

I can't wait

This means that Microsoft will follow by putting their much loved 'MS Paint' online.

MS Paint online

This means that Microsoft will follow by putting their much loved 'MS Paint' online.

"Funny", huh? It's already been done [canvaspaint.org], albeit not by MS themselves.

Anyone remember Photo Deluxe?

Didn't take reading the article to figure out that any version of Photoshop that was both online and ad-supported was more likely to be a very cut-down service and greatly different/simplified from the boxed versions.

I used to use an app from Adobe called "Photo Deluxe". It was based on the Photoshop engine, but with the interface totally changed and cut down (more so than Elements). I wouldn't have considered that Photoshop, and I suspect that this online service will be even more simplified. Calling it Photoshop is likely just a branding exercise.

I don't get it...

Seems like it will be an interesting experiment in software as a service, but media editing seems to be a bad fit for the "software as an online service" model due to the high bandwidth & processing demands. The math has to be done either on the user's end (which would be bad for folks with low spec systems, who i see as the primary target for this business model) or on Adobe's systems (which will cost them money, decreasing their bottom line). Anyone with experience in the field have any compelling reasons why one would chose to use adobe's online photoshop rather than just using picasa [google.com] or gimp [gimp.org]?

Where is the CPU?

OK, so I upload my 20MB PSD file and run a gaussian blur on it. Who's CPU is doing that? Unless it is ActiveX (Win32 only) or a Java plug-in (most likely not super efficient on raw CPU features), is it going to be hosted on their servers? Javascript won't handle it very well, I'd have to think.

Probably not going to be a huge deal, but those real-time previews of CPU intensive filters are nice on the machine local installation; only hope those make it to the online as well.

Re:Where is the CPU?

This is Adobe. They'll write it in Flash. Expect an application that'll run locally in the Flash runtime (which will happily have optimised image composition routines to do stuff like a Gaussian blur), but with the web used to deliver the application inside a browser, and possibly with online storage and/or public sharing of your work tied in.

Re:Where is the CPU?

Oh yes that's logical. They'll entirely rewrite one of the most complex C/C++ apps ever written - in Actionscript.

Feh, just reduce the price

I'd buy it. I use OS X, and Photoshop would make a nice addition.

For OS X is good, for Linux even better. But either way, just reduce the price and I'm sure they'd get more users.

In the browser?

Is this going to be a standalone application or is it going to compete with the hundreds of other online image editing applications?

I say hundreds and I do not lie. There are hundreds of online java and javascript image editors. Some of them are quite fancy. I have usde one or two of them in the past when visiting family locations where they have no suitable software available.

We do not need another online editor. I would be interested in downloading a small 50mb file to do basic functions though. Adverts or no adverts, I wouldn't care.

Ownership of work?

I somehow don't doubt that Adobe may try something sneaky along the lines of claiming ownership of any works created using Photoshop online.

Surely a bad idea?

I'm no image editing bod but surely this is a crap idea? Aren't most 'serious' photoshop images enormous and any stuff done to them requires big resources? This is not an ideal combination for a web app.

There's the casual use I suppose but if you're not doing something uber-serious then you don't need photoshop - the gimp or similar will do just fine.

Am I missing something?

Re:Surely a bad idea?

Photoshop has a solid identity in the market, even among casual photographers. Walk into a camera shop and mention GIMP to some random person looking at the point and shoots and you'll probably get punched in the eye. That same person almost certainly recognizes what Photoshop is and does.

I'm a professional photographer but I am far less Photoshop oriented than most of my peers. But it is an indespensible tool. I've tried dozens of other apps, online and off, and even for my relatively simple needs Photoshop has no replacement. Not even other less expensive Adobe products like Elements or Lightroom. From the way the article reads this online version won't actually have the same features as a local version of Photoshop. My guess would be that it would be better named after Elements or Lightroom but neither of those have the kind of ubiquitous name recognition that Photoshop does.

Great...

Now Firefox will use up even MORE memory.

How convenient!

The embedded ad images will provide the perfect raw material to deface when trying to come up with clever parody images to post on b3ta, Fark, Something Awful, and the like.

really?

I somehow doubt they will be able to pack the full goodness of photoshop into an online site. One of the best ones I have seen so far is lunapic.com [lunapic.com]. It's got all the basic edits, lots of effects, and it's pretty fast too.

File Size?

Sounds great for casual edits and what not, but serious users of Photoshop usually work with huge files, like 10, 20, 50, hell 100's of megabytes. Bandwidth, lag, connection reliability, etc. will be a serious issue for anyone doing serious Photoshop work.

What do you use Photoshop for?

Photoshop is great photo-editing software - the best.

For Web graphics, Fireworks is much better - more functional, more flexible, and with a much lighter footprint.

Fireworks is like a mix between Illustrator and Photoshop. You can use vector drawing tools and you can use bitmap drawing tools. You can do so without having to load behemoth programs that hog resources greedily.

If you're at all interested in efficiency, if you want to get the job done quickly, if flexibility sounds good to you...Fireworks ends up being a great option for web graphics.

Once again, for a print job, or for high resolution photo-editing, Illustrator and Photoshop are the best. They are capable of web graphics, however clumsily, but why not use the right tool?

A stripped-down, ad-strewn Photoshop? Why? For what reason? For the tasks that I'd want Photoshop, I want it to be fully powered. If there are lesser tasks, there are far and away more efficient tools.

If they follow this by pulling the plug on Fireworks, which I wouldn't put past them, then they will be doing themselves and us a great disservice.

Adobe Photoshop "Online Edition"

Cluephone ringing!

Of course online isn't the appropriate place to edit "professional" material, ie giant files, projects requiring esoteric plug-ins, local fonts, a multitude of resources embedded in the image, etc. The "professionals" will do what they always do: Purchase the right tools and get on with it.

However for non-"professionals" this is an interesting development. There are already other online photo-editing sites out there, using Java applications or clever Web 2.0 AJAX-ey stuff (and probably some older technology upload-and-refresh ones) but Adobe does have the brand name everyone knows and they do have a good concentration of code, coders, UI folks, etc. to pull it off with.

As others have pointed out it'll probably be in Adobe's Flash product, which already has a lot of basic image manipulation built into it. If it will be entirely client-based or if there will be backend processing will be interesting to find out.

From a business perspective how much Adobe will tie this to other services like photo storing & sharing, buy-a-tea-towel-with-the-picture-on-it, etc. is the big question. Will Adobe just have 3rd party banner advertising or will they build in hooks for 3rd party services, the tea-towel sellers & such? Will those services require licensing deals with Adobe or will Photoshop Online be a 'web service' open to other websites to integrate as part of their own offerings a la Google Maps.

I'm looking forward to Photoshop Online, if only as another tool in the progress towards increasingly sophisticated online client applications. They don't seem ready to entirely supplant desktop applications yet, but for occasional-use situations they're already viable, and this is just one more category soon to have multiple 'real' options.

Headlines to mask competition?

I wonder if headlines like this are contrived to (continue to) mask competitive products such as Pixel [kanzelsberger.com] and GIMPshop [gimpshop.net]?

This could be a handy tool

for estimating the market for alternative platforms like Linux. They look how many people use their online app from under Linux, and then decide if this is going to justify the investment associated with porting.

Faux To

They have this already http://www.fauxto.com/ [fauxto.com] Its under development, but it has potential

Yay - no more online updating

I use Photoshop Elements, the cheapo version of Photoshop you get when you buy some scanners or cameras (a scanner in my case). The first couple of times I tried to use it I would get the splash screen, and then it would go out to the Adobe site to look for "updates," suffer bandwidth latency issues, and crap out. A little Googling found a site that tells you how to disable that "feature," which I did immediately.

The only good thing I can think of with regard to an online Photoshop site is that the software will always be up to date, unless Adobe's products can't access their own update site from in house. The fact that Adobe products need their own update manager, which always seems to run poorly and slowly in my experience, worries me with regard to their software.

Upstream Bandwidth ??

Not sure what the percentages are, but I'd say there's a very large percentage of people out there (especially with cable ISPs) who have very throttled upstream bandwidth. I know, because I'm one of them. The average digital camera today puts out an image that is like 5MB, and that's jpg compressed!

Or are the actual controls just being downloaded to my computer, and running locally? That would seem to make more sense.

This makes sense

This makes a lot of sense.. No, it's not going to replace a real copy of Photoshop on a graphic designer's workstation, but it may be enough for Adobe to squeeze some ad revenue out of people who would normally just download it off BitTorrent. These are the casual users of Photoshop who use it maybe once every few weeks and for whom buying a $600 program doesn't make sense.

Basically, Adobe is getting no money from those people right now, so any additional revenue they can pull from them is free money. Of course, your graphics professionals will still have the legit, expensive copy of Photoshop because $600 really isn't that much if you're using it to make money.

I'm suprised they waited this long

Adobe Graphics Server has been around and hasn't done much. Other sites have had basic online image editing available for a while. I'm glad Adobe is finally getting in gear. I'm a serious Photoshop user, but this has some exciting implications in a lot of non-serious-user areas.

Four steps:

1) Create online photo-editing service.

2) Present a forty-page Terms and Conditions agreement in a 300-by-75 pixel window, with an all-your-images-are-belong-to-us clause three-fourths of the way down.

3) Wait for people to upload and edit you-know-what-kinds of images.

4) Profit!

Adobe has been doing good things with Flex 2

Flex 2 applications look great although for now I slightly prefer the approach of OpenLazlo because OpenLazlo supports both Flash and DHTML on the back end.

Check out gliffy.com for just how good OpenLazlo (with Flash backend) applications can look, with good functionality.

Adobe's upcoming Apollo will probably build on Flex 2 (not sure off hand) and promises the ability to have one code base for both web and desktop applications.

I'd Use It

I'd use it immediately. I'd beta test it if it were offered to me for that. If it turns out worse than other approaches I'd soon quit using it, but I'd sure give it a good try first. And I presently own PS CS2.

The one downside

It's okay so long as you don't mind having your images watermarked with a Head ON ad.

Oekaki

Oekaki Shi-Painter Pro, Not really PhotoShop but you get layers etc http://hp.vector.co.jp/authors/VA016309/spainter/i ndex_en.html/ [vector.co.jp]

Re:Video Editing

You can already do online video editing in java.
 
...depending on your life expectancy.