Claudia McCue

On Monday, May 6th, in the AdobeMAX keynote prefaced (somewhat ominously) by a driving instrumental snippet from the Allman Brothers’ “Whipping Post,” Adobe announced that the next versions of its creative tools will be designated “CC” — and will be available only via Creative Cloud subscriptions. This means the end of perpetual (conventional) licenses. Adobe will continue to sell perpetual licenses for CS6, but only by download — no boxed software. The new CC tools will become available on June 17th.

There are compelling new features in CC:

Photoshop

• Camera Shake Reduction
• Camera Raw as a filter
• Intelligent Upscale
• Smart Sharpening

Illustrator

• TouchType
• On-object transform controls
• Area Type to Point Type conversion (and vice versa)
• Images in Brushes
• Auto-generated corners for Pattern brushes

InDesign

• Greatly improved EPUB export
• 64-bit native (and this was a ton of work)
• De-Carbonized for future enhancements on Mac (another ton of work)
• QR Code generation

As for other applications, you’ll have to consult www.adobe.com: I’m a stodgy old print person, so I confess that I’m ignorant of what’s going on with the Web and video applications.

Pricing and Installing Nitty-Gritty

• You can now buy a year of Creative Cloud with one payment.
• If you own Creative Suite 3 or later, you can join the Cloud for $29.99/month for your first year. After that, the price goes up to $49.99/month.
• If you own a perpetual license for Creative Suite 6, you pay $19.99/month for your first year (and then $49.99/month in subsequent years).
• As with perpetual licensing, you can install on two computers (yours—not yours and your brother-in-law’s). And since the software is downloadable, one could be Mac, and one could be PC (no crossgrade charge). While the licensing implies that only one computer can be used at a time, I have CS6 running on my laptop and desktop at this very moment. InDesign and Photoshop are open on both, with no yellow terror alerts warning me that I’m going to Software Hell as a result. In my heart, I don’t think I’m violating the spirit of the license, since I’m one person. [suddenly, there’s a knock at the door...] Realistically, though, my arms aren’t long enough, nor am I sufficiently ambidextrous to truly be using both computers simultaneously.
• If you need Cloud applications on more than 2 computers, you’ll need another Cloud subscription, and another Adobe ID for additional subscriptions (no big deal; I have a bunch of Adobe IDs so I can test DPS stuff).
• As with the current version of the Cloud, you have to be online only to download and install the software. The software is installed on your computer, just like any other software. Once a month, it silently “calls home” to ensure that your credit card has been successfully charged; that’s the only time you have to be online. (There’s talk of more lenient arrangements, requiring the computer to check in over longer periods, and even more “conventional” arrangements possible for government agencies.)
• If you end your subscription, you’ll still have any files you’ve created, of course, but your software will stop working after a 30-day grace period.
• Don’t need all the programs? You can subscribe to individual products. But if, like most of us, you use more than one program, it makes more sense to just do the Cloud subscription. It gives you access to all the applications, plus numerous services, such as 20GB of Dropbox-like online file storage, free (basic) Business Catalyst hosting for a site created with Adobe Muse, and a free Behance ProSite account.

How do I feel about this change? I’m not utterly surprised — it does mean steady revenue for Adobe, and they swear that we will be given frequent new features to “sweeten the pot.” But I thought we’d be given a one-version warning before they pulled the trigger. I gather that Cloud adoption has been faster than Adobe anticipated—perhaps that hastened this move.

What should you do?

Well, it depends…
Stick with a perpetual/conventionally-licensed copy of CS6 if:

• You work alone, and submit finished files to print providers.
• You don’t anticipate creating EPUBs (or you’re happy tweaking the exported coded)
• You aren’t interested in Muse or the Edge family of products
• You plan to keep this computer and current operating system forever

What might force you into the Cloud:

• The need to collaborate with Cloud subscribers using newer versions
• The need to buy a new computer with newer operating system that doesn’t support your copy of, say, CS3.
• The need for Cloud-only applications such as Muse or the Edge products
• The need for features available only in Cloud versions of applications

I’m in an odd position: because I’m a trainer and writer, I have to keep current. But even when I was in prepress, I always upgraded my own software immediately, just because I loved playing with new stuff (and I had to stay ahead of the jobs coming in). So my natural bent would probably drive me into the Cloud. Mind you, I still have all my old versions, both for historical curiosity (“when did we get that feature?”) and to handle antique files in their native habitat (“It’s a PageMaker 6 file? How…quaint.”)

On top of that, I do freelance work for Adobe: I present at printer-sponsored co-hosts and at AIGA events. So I have no choice but to install the latest and greatest. So you might question my objectivity—fair enough. But I truly am trying to maintain my natural cynicism nonetheless. So, with that in mind:

Pros for Adobe:

• Steady revenue stream is good for bottom line (and that means that people I really like at Adobe get to keep their jobs)
• I’m trying to think of another, but that pretty much covers it. UPDATE: As someone remarked to me, maybe this means that the teams aren’t forced to exactly the same release schedule, since features can come “down the pipe” as they’re ready. That could benefit the development teams (and consumers).

Cons for Adobe:

• This could really piss off customers: the appeal of an optional Cloud may not carry over to the forced Cloud. If people don’t upgrade, revenue sags.
• Even if Adobe backs down from the forced Cloud, the bad taste will remain in the mouths of the disgruntled.

Pros For Users:

• Access to every application
• Cross-platform installation
• New features without additional upgrade costs

Cons For Users:

• You’re leasing software: stop paying, it stops working.
• Printers will either have to obtain multiple individual subscriptions, or use the (more expensive) Teams subscription.
• Government and other corporate agencies will have to make special arrangements for Cloud subscriptions, to accommodate firewall and other security concerns.

What About Compatibility?

The potentional for incompatibility with clients’ and collaborators’ versions isn’t new—I have numerous clients who are still using CS4 (especially on Windows). That’s why I keep all my old versions. Adobe has said that they will make every version from CS6 forward available, which implies that, even when “CC3” is released, subscribers would be able to download and install CS6 applications. So this sounds like we’ll have a continuum of versions available for those situations. How will any changes in file architecture affect us? Well, given that, for example, InDesign CC can export IDML that can be opened in CS4 or later, I don’t anticipate problems in the very near future.

I currently have CS4, CS5, CS5.5, CS6 Cloud installed on both my laptop and desktop computers. I used my AIGA 15% discount to purchase a PC version of CS6 Design Standard, and a Mac version of Design Premium, so I have “hard” versions of CS6 that I can install on both platforms if necessary. And if I wake up all my old laptops, I have everything back to the last century. Why, look—here’s my installer for InDesign 1.0.

Tell Us How You Really Feel

So, am I pro-Cloud or anti-Cloud? To quote an old coworker, “I feel strongly both ways.” Want to hedge your bets? If you’re not yet a Cloud subscriber, join AIGA at the Supporter level ($150/yr) or above, and take advantage of the software discount benefit to get a copy of CS6, and keep that on the back burner. Join the Cloud, see if you like it. If you don’t, you always have CS6 to fall back on when civilization collapses (which is imminent, given that elementary schools are not teaching cursive writing, basic grammar, or multiplication tables).

I’ll be frank— I don’t like the idea of leasing software. I know that software is licensed for use, not ownership, but it doesn’t evaporate when you have a conventional perpetual license. I don’t resent the fact that I “rent” my cellphone, cable, and internet services. But I wouldn’t want to lease a car, or rent my house. I can’t quite put my finger on what makes me uneasy about this, but I’m not fond of the idea. Despite the advantages (easy download, tons of features, the promise of constant improvements), the software now seems less real. Less mine.

Then again, it’s not exactly like leasing a car, since the software is not unchanging. If car leases were like Creative Cloud, I’d walk out to the garage one morning to find that I now had heated seats and a sunroof, without an increase in my monthly lease. I could get used to that.

I will soon have to present the new Creative Cloud model to groups, and I’ll be interested to see how they respond. Or maybe I should say “I’ll be steeled” for their reactions: maybe I’d better download “Whipping Post” to serve as the soundtrack.

It may be much like this:

http://bit.ly/11THKHL

What do you think?

CORRECTION:

I had tried a driver for the Intuos 4, which fixed the pressure issue, but lost the Touch capabilities of the tablet. I’m actually not crazy about that feature, and turn it off. But you might like it, and the 6.3.1w2 driver fixes both the pressure and touch features under Mountain Lion. I’ve corrected this post to include the later driver number, which is better for the Intuos 5 Touch.

Have I mentioned that I hate updating the OS? I used to be bleeding edge…

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I finally replaced (well, supplemented) my oldish Wacom Graphire tablet with a Wacom Intuos 5. It’s probably overkill for the amount of retouching I do these days (sadly), but I justified it by the fact that I need to show the spiffy Erodible Brushes when I demo Photoshop CS6.

I have not plumbed the tablet controls; I simply wanted pressure and tilt ability in Photoshop and Illustrator. This is not a tablet review; it’s more of a driver review, I suppose.

I recently bit the bullet and updated to Mac OS X 10.8.2, Mountain Lion. [This is why PC users laugh at Mac users—because our Unix-based operating system versions are named after kitties.] After dreading it for so long, I wiped my drives and did clean installs; there were a few little kinks, but not as dire as I’d feared.

That is, until I cranked up the Intuos tablet for a demo 2 nights ago, and had no pressure: the option was grayed out in Photoshop and Illustrator. I was not amused. So I dug through Google and the Wacom forums for solutions: I used the Wacom driver’s “wipe out the preferences” option—no help. I uninstalled and reinstalled. Nope. I repaired permissions—grrr.

Finally, in a thread about Cintiq tablets (now I was on a quest), I came across a suggestion to install an older version of the driver. Made no sense, but I was desperate. I downloaded several of the antique drivers (current one for Intuos is 6.3.5w3). I thought what the heck and went for WacomTablet_6.3.1w2.dmg. I figured I’d try it, it would fail, and I’d work my way forward.

To my delight/relief, it did the trick—I now have pressure options in both Photoshop and Illustrator, thanks to the antique driver.

I posted in the Adobe Illustrator forum in hopes of helping other users, and thought I’d go back to the Wacom forums to do the same. I signed up, and when the confirmation email came from Wacom, I tried to confirm…and their confirmation process is broken. Sheesh. The forums are peer-to-peer, with no Wacom oversight, but since they’re available only through a portal on the company website, you’d think you could at least get in. I can read, but I can’t post.

Wacom makes good products: when I think “tablet,” I automatically think “Wacom,” and never considered another vendor’s products. But clearly they need to respond to the countless angry posts on their own forums (and others), and fix their dadgum driver. The latest one is dated just 2 weeks ago, but it doesn’t fix the problem.

I came across a very old ink drawing I’d done, depicting my segue from science to print. I happily abandoned my old Pickett slide rule for what was then the pinnacle of drawing instruments, a technical drawing pen. I always gravitated to the finest points, enabling me to render tiny details accurately.

I fear that, after years using a mouse, my drawing skills have atrophied completely. Those cerebral circuits have long since been reworked, so that I wield virtual pens in Illustrator and Photoshop, rather than real-world drawing tools. But I think that those sensibilities were repurposed successfully to the digital world.

This much.

New bike tag:

NOTE: Please read the comments, as well as my “Later Notes” at the end of this post. While this post and the solutions offered by commenters all provide improved methods for cropping PDFs, there are still some catches.
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If you’ve ever used the Crop tool in Acrobat, you’ve probably discovered that it doesn’t really crop: it just masks out content. Other applications may ignore the mask and reveal the stuff you were trying to delete. And since content is not deleted, there’s no reduction in file size.

Here, I’ve added a big honking half-inch bleed in Illustrator to make it obvious. The red border is the bleed (natch).

Let’s say I want to delete the bleed, just leaving the trim area of the PDF. I could use the Crop tool, but that’s not exact. Instead, knowing that I have 0.5″ bleed, I launch the Set Page Boxes tool under the Print Production tools. I choose CropBox from the pulldown at the top of the dialog, and enter 0.5″ in all the Margin Control fields. When I click OK, it appears that I have cropped the PDF to the trim. Whee!

But heartbreak awaits me when I return to the Set Page Boxes dialog to check it…Doh! The rind isn’t gone! Like a persistent zombie in a bad horror flick, it’s still there.

Continue Reading »

Let’s get something straight: Photoshop is NOT a page layout program!

While it’s been true that we could create text and vector shapes for some time in Photoshop, the addition of Paragraph and Character styles in Photoshop CS6 made me cringe—it’s like an endorsement of bad behavior.

I understand that someone who knows only Photoshop might be tempted to create projects with text in Photoshop. I recently heard of a photographyer submitting his files for an 80-page coffee-table book…as 80 layered Photoshop files. As we say here in the South, “bless their little hearts, they just don’t know any better.” But that’s no reason to encourage it. So I see these new features in Photoshop CS6 as tantamount to handing a firecracker to a baby.

Printers, you can now look forward to proud clients bringing their sell sheets to you as ginormous Photoshop files, bragging that they’ve used styles. And then you can look forward to explaining to them why their text looks pixelated on the proof. That’s because, even though text is editable in Photoshop, it’s rendered as pixels, whether you output directly from Photoshop, or place the image into InDesign and image from there.

Without special handling, text and vector content in a Photoshop file is rendered in pixels during output. Not what you want on your business card!

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But wait—all is not lost!

While it’s better to handle text and vector content in Illustrator and InDesign, there IS a way to render vector content correctly from Photoshop.

The trick is to save the file as a Photoshop PDF.

• In the General options, check “Preserve Photoshop Editing Capabilities.”
• In the Compression options, choose “Do Not Resample,” and turn off compression.

The result is essentially your completely editable Photoshop file—layers, vectors, text and all—in a PDF wrapper. To other applications (such as Acrobat or InDesign), the file is a PDF. But if you reopen the PDF in Photoshop, nothing is lost—the original Photoshop file is there for you.

While vector and text edges are nice and crisp, effects such as bevel and emboss (or the ubiquitous drop shadow) can only be accomplished by pixels. Such content will take on the underlying resolution of the image.

Not-So-Smart Objects

When you place vector content from Illustrator into Photoshop, it’s automatically converted to a Smart Object, which allows you to perform endless transformations with a fresh start each time. So you’d think that Smart Objects would be rendered with vector edges, but they’re not: while the vector reference is stored within the Photoshop file, it only serves as a source for pixels. Even saving as a Photoshop PDF will not force Smart Object content to render as vectors. Counterintuitive, I know, but that’s the deal.

Here’s a comparison of the fate of vector content in PSDs and Photoshop PDFs (click to enlarge).

A comparison of the support for vector edges.

Now that you know how to maintain vector and text content in a Photoshop file, just promise me you’ll use it only for good, never for evil (by which I mean something like a 24-page catalog in 24 Photoshop files; that’s just wrong).

No, not me. The word “me.”

Apparently, it strikes fear in the hearts of many. For example: “Betsy called Bob and I.” Would you say “Betsy called I”? Of course not. It’s “Betsy called Bob and me.”

It’s helpful to put each action in its own sentence: “Betsy called Bob.” “Betsy called me.” Thus, “Betsy called Bob and me.”

And then there’s the irksome misuse of myself. “I was hoping you would collaborate with Mary and myself.”

“Myself” is only used when you do something to yourself: “I burned myself while frying bacon.” It would never be “Mary burned MYSELF with a branding iron,” for any number of reasons (grammar, as well as Mary’s psychotic behavior). So the correct construction would be “I was hoping you would collaborate with Mary and me.” Again, think of it in segments: “I was hoping you could collaborate with me.” It sounds wrong when you say “I was hoping you would collaborate with myself.” It sounds wrong because it is wrong.

And don’t get me started on whom…

My Lynda.com title “Acrobat X: Creating Forms” is now available on DVD. Now you can watch it anywhere — great fun at parties!

Here’s the product information.

It’s an extensive course on creating interactive forms in Acrobat, with information on designing form artwork in Word, Illustrator, and InDesign, all the way to performing calculations in forms (so your users don’t have to). And it’s even funny in spots.

Recently, I was out with a group of InDesign geek friends (yes, we travel in packs) having drinks after a day-long seminar. Mind you, this is a group of some of the brightest — and funniest — guys I know. We’d had a few rounds of debilitating laughter already, so we were primed to laugh easily. As we were sharing keyboard shortcuts (or something like that), a woman from a nearby table came over and struck up a conversation with one of the guys. Soon, she began handing out her business cards. In the dim light, we each looked down at the card she’d handed us, and apparently all had the same thought simultaneously, finally voiced by one of the guys: “Uh, I can’t pronounce your last name.” Loosened up by earlier laughing fits, we all started chuckling. Finally, someone said it aloud: “Well, I think she’s Polish. Or maybe Czech.” That was the last straw, and we dissolved in the final laughing fit of the evening (well, maybe you had to be there…) Let me explain. Here’s a recreation of the card, with the name and company changed to protect the kerning-impaired. Squint to replicate looking at it under subdued lighting.

The professional abbreviation, CITP.CPA, is so tightly set, and so close to the name, that a casual reader reads it all as one unit, seeing “CITPCPA” as the last name. Of course, a careful re-reading decodes it correctly. But after a couple of Bailey’s, it’s fairly hilarious.

Here, I’ve reworked the name and title to prevent such hilarity. The dual professional designations are separated by a slash, and generous kerning before and after the slash makes it unambiguous. See? Good kerning isn’t just a nicety—it’s a must.

Disclaimer: Any resemblance to the business card of a real person, living, dead, or undead, is purely coincidental. Professional driver on closed course. Your kerning values may vary. No offense is intended to Polish or Czech individuals, or any other vowel-limited group.

Remember when printing companies used to give out free tint sample books, showing combinations of cyan, magenta, and yellow so you could get an idea of what your CMYK combos might look? I haven’t seen one in a while, so I have created files so you can print your own. Of course, unless your printing device is carefully profiled, your output won’t necessarily match a commercial printer’s results. But if you print in-house, you may find them helpful. They show only combinations of C+M+Y —adding all the black combinations would result in over 400 pages, so I’m afraid you’ll have to imagine what adding 15%K might produce.

I’ve provided two versions:

Illustrator CS5 file: www.practicalia.net/tintblocks/ColorBlocksBy5.ai
Adobe PDF file: www.practicalia.net/tintblocks/ColorBlocksBy5.pdf

Hope you find them useful!