Adobe 'Aggressively' Working on Photoshop for iPad

Adobe 'Aggressively' Working on Photoshop for iPad

Photoshop for the iPad has been in the works for about a year now, and as it nears its release, there have been reports that it will be missing key features. Nonetheless, sources say that Adobe is "genuinely all-in" on the app and that it will quickly work to fill out the program.

John Gruber of Daring Fireball cites multiple sources saying that Adobe is on an "aggressive schedule" with Photoshop for iPad, and although they may not release it with a full feature set, that will be coming in short time in iterative updates. A recent report from Bloomberg noted that the upcoming version was missing essentials, including filters, the Pen Tool, raw editing, and more. Of course, these (particularly support for raw files) are absolutely essential if Adobe hopes to position Photoshop for iPad as a legitimate tool for photographers, and it seems they do intend to do just that, with the engineering team for the project having grown quite a bit in the last year. I must admit that when I saw a beta version of the application at last year's iPad Pro event, I was mightily impressed, as a file with 157 layers at 12,000 by 12,000 pixels and over 3 GB sped along without a hitch. Adobe hasn't given a release date yet, but hopefully, we'll hear something at the MAX conference in early November. 

Alex Cooke's picture

Alex Cooke is a Cleveland-based portrait, events, and landscape photographer. He holds an M.S. in Applied Mathematics and a doctorate in Music Composition. He is also an avid equestrian.

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22 Comments

In a time where a lot of people have dumped Adobe over their pricing and customer relations fiasco.

I was at MAX last year and they told the crowd that it would be out in spring 2019. So...... yeah.

"Adobe is on an "aggressive schedule" with Photoshop for iPad, and although they may not release it with a full feature set, that will be coming in short time in iterative updates."

Let me translate this: you'll be paying monthly fees while you wait for Adobe to get it right.

It would be nice if they got it right for desktops first. Lightroom should be written and coded from scratch to take advantage of the latest tech the same way computer games do. I am in the middle of my school season and I curse every day because it takes LR ages to accomplish simple tasks like zooming, moving from image to image etc. Not to mention that every now and then it crashes.
.

Absolutely! Since a recent update, LR takes about 3 minutes to start and be operational on my really fast desktop. It first opens, then if I click on anything I get "this program does not respond" for ages, and then finally I can start working. Also, exporting to JPEG a single 20 MP RAW file takes sometimes up to 1 minute and 20 seconds. Going to full screen crashes the entire program about 50% of the times that I try. Same happens on my somehow slower laptop, so it's not about the install, it's about the program itself.

I wish they would "aggressively" learn how to load Fujifilm .RAF files properly.

Adobe is full of it. They now have a huge cashflow with the subscription model and lost their drive to innovate at a reasonable pace. It will end up being OVER A YEAR between the time Adobe previewed Photoshop on the iPad and the time they ultimately release a LESSER version of the desktop software. Affinity Photo has had the iPad version of the their desktop program out for years now...and it is a full version of their desktop software. I fondly remember the 18 month product cycle for Photoshop, in which we eagerly awaited all the new features. What amazing Photoshop features did we get in the last 18 months? What about 18 months before that? How many people are leaving Lightroom Classic for Capture One? Only a reduction in their cashflow will get Adobe moving again.

I agree with most of this. But I do think PS has had a few good upgrades in the past 18 months.

I'm trying hard to like Capture One, but the learning curve is so hard and I'm constantly on deadlines, so I've been preferring to suffer all the lags and bugs in Lightroom Classic instead of really learning C1 :(

Adobe is about nine months late in creating a Lightroom color profile for the Canon RP camera. Still no sign of it, or even that they are working on it. And for this they charge $10 every month,

Shouldn’t have bought that camera in the first place...

Why? It's a great camera. I absolutely love it. It's so good. Except I wish Adobe gave it its own color profile, like every other camera that I use.

...because it's so cool to process your 50 meg files on a 10 inch screen...

12.9" and yes it is.

This is the same Adobe that promised to bring some really cool and /neat' features using MS Surface/Touch tech? Adobe never delivers on their promises, or if they do, it's a pale shadow of what was promised.

Cool cause that's important. Stockholders figure the more versions they have of this bugged filled shite, the more subscribers they get.

Way too late

And what about aggressively working on making Lightroom work flawlessly and without lags on top-tier computers?

If Lightroom for iPad is anything to go by, I'm not convinced they're "all-in" until I see it. I suspect many many features will be left out, like Lightroom CC. Hope they do it justice though, I really enjoy doing creative work on an iPad Pro, with the Pencil—Procreate is a shining example of a creative app done right.

Aaaaaaannnd... Affinity Photo!

It's amazing how the Adobe white noise machine can drown options that have been readily available and refined for some time now...