why doesn't apple have a photoshop equivalent?

[bearbo]

apple has a (almost) complete set of creative application suite...

there's the final cut studio, for every movie editing need, is the Adobe Premiere equivalent

there's the logic pro, for every audio editing need, is the Adobe, well, whatever that is, equivalent

there's aperture, which is adobe photoshop lightroom equivalent

how come there's no adobe photoshop equivalent?
is it because photoshop is The Industrial Standard?

i just think if apple were to come up with a photoshop, then we don't have to depend on adobe so much...

 

[gauchogolfer]

I think for the same reason that Apple hasn't really tried to take on MS in the Office space (even though iWork is starting to), they don't want to challenge Adobe in the Photoshop/Illustrator space. The threat of Adobe cutting off support seems to much of a risk.

 

[bearbo]

I think for the same reason that Apple hasn't really tried to take on MS in the Office space (even though iWork is starting to), they don't want to challenge Adobe in the Photoshop/Illustrator space. The threat of Adobe cutting off support seems to much of a risk.

but would adobe really cut support? i mean, even if apple develop its equivalent, there will still be plenty of ppl use the adobe counterpart... just look at aperture, look at final cut studio

and in term of office, i think MS is already slowly pulling support, and apple knows it (or i hope), i sure hope to see a spreadsheet program as powerful as excel, only made by apple. and apple should strengthen the page to be a bit more powerful too... maybe this is just too hopeful thinking?

 

[Sun Baked]

Since they have been purchasing most of their Creative Suite apps, and Adobe Photoshop likely isn't for sale -- that leaves ...

 

[iMacZealot]

Yeah, it's amazing how Apple buys software and makes it their own...NeXTSTEP, SoundJam, KeyGrip, Emagic, etc.

 

[maximile]

There's always been this rumour that Apple has their own Photoshop-like application, which they keep in active development, but will only release if Adobe stops supporting the Mac.

 

[Blue Velvet]

how come there's no adobe photoshop equivalent?
is it because photoshop is The Industrial Standard?

Because Photoshop is an incredibly powerful and deep program, with most of its functionality for pro users not immediately obvious to the casual user. Replicating this and marketing it as a viable alternative is a fight that Apple will not take on.

However, there is room for an low-end Apple image editing solution, but perhaps it doesn't need to be able to work in Lab space or work with Pantone swatch libraries.

 

[elppa]

There's always been this rumour that Apple has their own Photoshop-like application, which they keep in active development, but will only release if Adobe stops supporting the Mac.

File with the one about cocoa frameworks being ported to windows and Apple having access to MS's APIs.

It would be an enormous drain on resources to develop a product like that and keep it up-to-date for a "just in case scenario".

I think Apple (mostly) respects it's 3rd party developers. It's good business sense as they are responsible for the Mac eco-system. One of the reasons FTP blows in the Finder is because they don't want to step on Panic's toes.

 

[Marble]

I wouldn't go that far. Apple may respect its developers, but not enough to let them get in its way. Apple has put many small developers out of business with their free, user friendly applications. iTunes is the best example, and Panic was the one that took the big hit on that one, remember?

 

[RacerX]

but would adobe really cut support? i mean, even if apple develop its equivalent, there will still be plenty of ppl use the adobe counterpart... just look at aperture, look at final cut studio

Lets look at Final Cut... when it proved to be better than Premiere, did Adobe step up to the plate to take it on?

No.

What Adobe did was pulled support for the Mac version and then started a campaign called PCs Preferred.

How about when Apple decided to use PDF rather than Postscript for Mac OS X's display rendering engine? Adobe had (in less than two weeks, with a single employee) ported Photoshop 5.0 to Carbon an demoed it at the WWDC 98 Keynote. Photoshop was the last major Adobe app to be ported to Mac OS X (Summer of 2002). It was released after Mac OS X native versions of Acrobat, Illustrator, InDesign, GoLive, LiveMotion, AfterEffects and Premiere.


The people running Adobe today aren't the people who ran Adobe in the 80's and 90's... Yes, they would have no problem (at all) pulling Photoshop support for Macs.

 

[MisterMe]

....

The people running Adobe today aren't the people who ran Adobe in the 80's and 90's... Yes, they would have no problem (at all) pulling Photoshop support for Macs.

Adobe in the 1980s was the PostScript company, but Adobe in the 1990s was every bit as quirky as it is today. Remember what happened when Apple asked Adobe to alter PostScript Type 1 hints to accomodate onscreen display. Siting its professional typesetting market focus, Adobe refused. This started the "Font Wars," which Adobe lost after Apple developed and Microsoft adopted TrueType.