Microsoft are going after Photoshop

[Timon]

Originally posted by Hell Puppy@Jun 12 2005, 05:43 PM
They can have some success with this regardless of quality a couple of ways. One is by simply undercutting photoshop. Photoshop is a very expensive tool, and there is a market there in the consumer segment for people who have digital cameras and want to play a little bit just cant justify the cost for a pro-level product.

Microsoft could also "cheat" by putting a "lite" version in windows for free and having an upsell.

However, with all of that said, Photoshop has remained the king despite things like Fireworks taking strong runs at it. It is a powerful tool that has a legion of designers who are very familiar with it. The ONLY way you culd get many of them to move over would be to provide a skin for the interface that provided all of the same tools and operate in the exact same manner as Photoshop, plus adding some features and speed. I'm not sure it's possible to do it by adding features alone and forcing designers to otherwise learn a new tool from the ground up.

Also consider that a large percentage of designers are Mac users. Adobe started as a Mac development company and their Mac expertise is strong. Microsoft ports to the Mac, even when they attempt it, are usually poor. They also have resistence from the user community as Bill is considered "the enemy".

The best graphics tool is the one you are familiar with.

All they have to do is make it easier to use, shorten the learning curve and make it cheaper and newcomers will learn and use the MS product instead of Adobe. As the years pass Adobe users will grow old and die, and Photoshop and Illustrator will die with them ;-)

Also in a lot of cases large companies decide what software their employees use, MS has the sales networks in place to make sure many choose the MS product.