zahnster

Adobe CS3 has been out for a little while now, and thanks to my new job, I’ve been able to get my hands dirty with it for the first time.

But, for the first time ever, I’m not thrilled with it. In fact, I’m quite mad about it.

The problem arises with the fact that Adobe took out the ImageReady program. Now, ImageReady was kind of a ‘niche market’ tool, but as a CSS-based web designer, it had become somewhat of a staple program to me because of it’s ability to allow you to ’slice’ a web photoshop comp. You could slice, name, and optimize layers right there on the screen, and most importantly - you could toggle these slices on and off, allowing you to make overlapping slices with no problems.

It’s come in very handy for me, because it allows me to keep every slice I ever create - so if needed at any point in time, I can go back, adjust an image (maybe add a new title graphic), and save it out - without having to guess the pixel-perfect dimensions of my slices before.

Well, apparently Adobe didn’t feel like the usage market was big enough to keep the program around - after all, image slicing and optimization IS available in Photoshop (as a much much toned down version).

So they took the program out, and you know what, that’s fine Adobe. Maybe it doesn’t need to be it’s own program. However, what Adobe failed to do is vamp up Photoshop’s slicing abilities. There’s not even a toolbar in Photoshop to name / toggle slices, which is the core of the reason behind this rant. There was a great toolbar in ImageReady for this - so come on, Adobe. Add it for CS4? Please?