no separate airbrush tool in photoshop CS. WHY!

[150mph@adobeforums.com]

Yeah I don't see why they changed it either - I really liked having a separate airbrush and brush - what were they thinking????

Then they put that dumb slice tool in there- something I NEVER need. And thank God Adobe made it easy for me to accidentally launch my browser with just a quick click top of the toolbox too!

Grumble, sniff , whine

[Mike_Ornellas@adobeforums.com]

Hey,

If Steve Jobs is anal enough to bounce video cards because the connectors aren't the right color, than do the math.

;o)

[progress@adobeforums.com]

so whats adobe's excuse...? ;)

[JasonSmith@adobeforums.com]

you.

[Tiffany_Sims@adobeforums.com]

I must chime in on behalf of progress' posts.... I too am completely dumbfounded at the HUGE change in the utility (or lack thereof) of the airbrush. I am a professional graphic designer working in Photoshop every day, 12 hours a day or more. I have been upgrading with every new release -- this airbrush debacle reared its ugly head in 7.0. I constantly need to switch between a small hard-edged brush and a large soft, semi-opaque airbrush. I'm freaked out!!! Does anybody know how/if Adobe has any avenues for customer input?

[Ed_Hannigan@adobeforums.com]

It may not be great comfort but if you use the same brushes often you can select them and their settings quickly from the Tool Presets palette and you can also make actions selecting the ones you use a lot.

[progress@adobeforums.com]

Thats a suggestion Ed, but it doesnt solve the ability to quickly jump between airbrush and brush states and different brush sizes quickly and freely, which is the whole point here. To cover all bases theres a hell of a lot of presets that would need to be built as well.

[Wade_Zimmerman@adobeforums.com]

Tell you the preset thing is pain.

I have feature request though I am not sure it would in fact work to the satisfaction of those unhappy about this change.

I wish I could save and create palettes of the various brushes I am using for any project and have those palettes saved to a library and since progress pointed out that he likes to have different settings available I would also like to be able to save those settings palettes such as in a drop down list.

[Ed_Hannigan@adobeforums.com]

Wade,

Seems to me you could do just that with either the Preset Manager or the Tool Presets palette.

[Wade_Zimmerman@adobeforums.com]

Seems!? I don't think you quite understand what mean.

What I want is select some brushes make a set or create some brushes and make a set. Save it as a set then make another one and so on and give them names just like you can do now but when I want to open them in a palette I want each set to have it own palette I want to be able to butt the palettes to one another or separate them
and open and close them with keyboard shortcut. I don't want all the crazy Photoshop brushes, does anyone use them? Oh, yeah digital artist like Capinigro, what the world needed.

This is Photoshop and we are or should be visual and work instinctively the preset manager and the Tools Preset is for some engineer of marketing guys who are going to give us yet another complexity that makes it computer like, I would rather see us do away with this computer like way and go to a more visual way.

In other words simpler.

[Chris_Cox@adobeforums.com]

wade - no, presets ARE the visual way...

[Ed_Hannigan@adobeforums.com]

You can't have them as separate palettes but you can make sets, save them and have the ones you want and only those together in the Tool Presets palette with nothing else there. You can do the same in the Brushes palette if you wish, or you can have one or the other set loaded if you wish. You don't need ot have the other vrushes loaded. Gets you most of what you want.

[Wade_Zimmerman@adobeforums.com]

I don't agree with you Chris! Presets are definitely a computer engineers way.

When I paint look through my brushes, now I don't use a lot of brushes but on occasion I will use eight or so brushes. For me that's a lot of brushes.

I will put the two that I will using to do the painting together I will put the three I might use for touch up off to the side but close by and I will put the other three that I will use for edge work off to the side but ready if I find that I have a change in the
flow of things. I don't have many more brushes but that is all I need and all I want.

I have recently started working in acrylic and that means I want to work more spontaneously and sometimes a little quicker as I don't sometimes want the paint to dry.

No in Photoshop I find I have a similar situation since you have to do things in steps.
You sometimes want to sort of work wet.

I think you get the point.

Now I don't expect anyone to rewrite Photoshop for me and unless this became a common complaint or request I am just stating my wishes.

Ed yes thanks for pointing this out I am sort of aware of this but as it doesn't really
fulfill my wishes and needs I sort of by instinct do it in a less structured way.

But thank you both for your opinions.

[progress@adobeforums.com]

have to chime in here...chris, im sorry...your just plain wrong (in nice terms i severely disagree)

whilst its uesful to have presets for commonly used items, setups, whatever, presets are no substitute in any shape or form for being able to quickly and easily tweak a tool...being able to bounce and change around PS at speed is what the user needs, creativity should not be hampered by UI design, it should be allowed to flow as fast as possible, if not enhanced by the UI (especially tools like the airbrush and paintbrush which are by their nature intuitive and analogue)

the airbrush being a setting of the airbrush may make life simple in engineering terms, but be under no illusion, its a gross step backwards, and nothing comes close to solving the arising issues in terms of flexability

[Scott_Weichert@adobeforums.com]

hmm.. I've never used the airbrush... what's the differnece between the airbrush and a regulat brush with a stylus with pressure set to opacity? They always seemed the same to me.

[Chris_Cox@adobeforums.com]

Fow is what made the airbrush differ, and the fact that it keeps applying even while you're not moving the cursor (which is now available on the paintbrush).

[jigsaw_merge@adobeforums.com]

I am with progress - this is not progress! The new brushes are a fiasco. I can't get anything done as it stands at this point. Granted, I am used to the way things worked in Ps 6 - but with the push of a letter and the holding down of the control key to pick a new brush (maybe even hitting a number key for opacity) and, voila! Efficiency! Now every time I select another brush, hiccup, crash, burn, I have to do things all over again. I am not sure I want to learn a less efficient way of working, with or without deadlines. Adobe needs to get better beta testers instead of using us, their customers!

[Venicia_L_2@adobeforums.com]

Jigsaw,

Assuming your reference to PS 6 is correct, and not a typo, there was a very protracted objection here to the change in brush behavior from v6 to v7. The drop in productivity was huge and the steps backward have continued with PS 8.

I hated the change, and still do. Adobe absolutely refused to listen to the complaints and insisted that the change was a better way to work. It was not and still is not.

Most artists characterized the changes as something an engineer liked, but that artists disliked. We artists accused Adobe of shoving the change down our throats. The chief proponent here of the brush selection/palette change was Chris Cox who insisted he was not only an Adobe software engineer, but also a user of the program, therefore well qualified to know what was best. He insisted that his way was better and that if we would only use the program the way he insisted we should, we would see the light.

In a program as all-encompassing as Photoshop, as ubiquitous an image editing program as it is, with all the programming talent there is at Adobe, he insisted there was no way that the option could be provided to the artist to select the brush behavior that best suited his or her work.

The rest is history.

VL

[Ann_Shelbourne@adobeforums.com]

I don't understand why you find the brushes so unsettling.

If the new options are too hard to handle, why don't you just go to Edit menu/Presets Manager/Brushes; Cmd. A and Delete.

Now make a new set of brushes (perhaps just one hard and one soft one with all options off and just use the keyboard shortcuts to change size mode and opacity?
Save your own brushes to a new name and load only those.

Using the angle-brackets, < and > , after selecting a Preset will cycle you through the Presets and the square brackets will change the size.
Shift Option P cycles the Airbrush on and off and the numeral keys (and Shift Option numeral) change flow or opacity.

Scott Weichert "Working with Brushes in Photoshop 7" 6/28/02 7:26pm </cgi-bin/webx?14@@.ef8e0c6/0>

[Venicia_L_2@adobeforums.com]

Ann,

I've learned to live with the way the program works. I know how to accomplish the things you describe. I get my work done. But I don't like the way it works. Learning to do something a particular way is not the equivalent of being comfortable with it.

There was a time when Adobe Systems said, in effect, to the graphic arts professional, "show us how you do your work, and we will do the best we can to provide a computer analogue in which you will feel at home."

Adobe solicited the work habits, the tools of the trade and other nuances of the work flow and really did a good job in making good. There is no denying that Photoshop is the best program (for now) for doing the kinds of jobs we all do with it. But something has definitely changed in the perception of Adobe's relationship with its professional customer. Their attitude has become "take it or leave it, we know best, and we'll provide the controls we deem best."

To some, I probably sound like I'm whining. The program is so good otherwise, why should one object to such an annoyance as changing a previous (excellent) work flow? Somehow, the Windows-like philosophy that the universe needs to conform to the computer's way and the programer's view of things, rather than the opposite, healthier and more helpful approach seems to be more and more Adobe's style now. In their current orientation, the engineer and the program is much, much more important than the customer.

Just my opinion.

VL