Adobe Removing Photoshop Sketch and Illustrator Draw From App Store in July

[thekev]

Autodesk is really generous with student licenses.

It's not really a matter of generosity. That is how they maintain control of their market. Without that, a lot of students would either pirate the software and/or work mainly with cheaper (or free) solutions instead.

It's true. If you can stand to "freeze" your system and stop updating the OS every year, there's actually software you can keep using more or less forever. When I was working more with printers and graphics service bureaus, they always had some old machines that ran working versions of stuff they just never updated because, well, it worked -- and by not changing stuff they didn't have to keep troubleshooting (and paying for) new combinations of software.

It only works well if you freeze every aspect of it and preferably don't expose it to external networks. You don't get security updates on such systems.

 

[duervo]

In fact, you can do even better: discontinue the old app people paid for and release a new one with subscription plan only. Just because you can and because it is trendy (or your shareholders suggested you make it so).

This is what Adobe did some years ago for their Raw processing software. On that day, they lost me as a customer. Forever.

That’s pretty much what they are doing here as well. Adobe’s recommended replacement, for these 2 discounted apps, is Adobe Freeco. It has a free tier, but above that it requires a subscription, which starts at just over $100 USD a year.

 

[dzankizakon]

Why people continue to pay Adobe money when Pixelmator exists I’ll never know.

Because everyone else in business is using it. It's called the "network effect".

 

[Rhartford]

Our company unfortunately uses Adobe Acrobat, its features are what we just happen to need, and others either can’t compete or do so poorly. We’ve started looking at BricsCAD to replace AutoCAD, and personally I’ve already been using Affinity Photo and Designer. Affinity is great; if they’d do a video editor and PDF editor I’d be a happy camper! Autodesk and Adobe used to be good; now they are fairly disgusting. And Autodesk just buys up the competition, hopefully Bricsys stays the course.

 

[Blue Nova]

Our company unfortunately uses Adobe Acrobat, its features are what we just happen to need, and others either can’t compete or do so poorly. We’ve started looking at BricsCAD to replace AutoCAD, and personally I’ve already been using Affinity Photo and Designer. Affinity is great; if they’d do a video editor and PDF editor I’d be a happy camper! Autodesk and Adobe used to be good; now they are fairly disgusting. And Autodesk just buys up the competition, hopefully Bricsys stays the course.

Regarding Acrobat, if you are a Mac user, Preview is like a Swiss Army knife, it will do everything Acrobat Professional does. I have switched to Affinity Photo and Affinity Designer, and use DaVinci Resolve for video. Don’t need Adobe anymore.
Many companies don’t know what’s out there, top executives sign on Adobe products simply because of Photoshop and Acrobat. They are not users so they don’t know about Affinity and DaVinci Resolve, both are very professional and robust, no subscription, just a one time charge.

 

[Rhartford]

Regarding Acrobat, if you are a Mac user, Preview is like a Swiss Army knife, it will do everything Acrobat Professional does. I have switched to Affinity Photo and Affinity Designer, and use DaVinci Resolve for video. Don’t need Adobe anymore.

I use Mac and windows both at home and agree about Preview, but we are windows only at work.

 

[Blue Nova]

I use Mac and windows both at home and agree about Preview, but we are windows only at work.

Yep, you are right about windows, someone has to create an Acrobat alternative for a PC.
Maybe Serif the company the owns Affinity products, has few other products not sure if the have an app similar to Acrobat Professional.
Even from Affinity Photo or Affinity Designer I can export a layered PSD file, which is an adobe proprietary file format.

 

[vladi]

Acrobat XI still has the good base of prepress plugins available.

 

[vladi]

When it comes to vectors Illustrator is really nothing special and it's easily replaceable. It's path tool is super ancient compared to Bezier tools found in rotoscoping and vfx apps. So unless you have some plugin like Xtream Path or that virus of a plugin Astute you will be doing a lot more labor than you should.

The only two Adobe apps I find irreplaceable are Photoshop and InDesign. Although Photoshop is getting crammed with so much crap features that are nested within palettes, tabs, toolbars, drop down menus etc. it's getting ridiculous. BMD Resolve is in the same situation, they are cramming new stuff whenever they find empty pixels and its all illogical placement.

 

[Blue Nova]

The only two Adobe apps I find irreplaceable are Photoshop and InDesign. Although Photoshop is getting crammed with so much crap features that are nested within palettes, tabs, toolbars, drop down menus etc. it's getting ridiculous. BMD Resolve is in the same situation, they are cramming new stuff whenever they find empty pixels and its all illogical placement.

Affinity Photo replaces Photoshop very easily and Affinity publisher replaces Indesign. Coming for a user of both, 30 years on adobe and 7 years on Affinity.
BMD Resolve is many applications they seamlessly interact with each other, video editing, or color correction, post audio and Fusion -for motion graphics, I have been using it for 5 years.
I have to admit Resolve has been in building stages, but now with its final release it ready for prime time.
at least you can edit with the free version and check it out.