P: New user interface lacks contrast and many usability cues, lots of other problems

Report · Dec 01, 2015

I just updated to Photoshop CC(2015) version 2015.1. Adobe changed the UI to the flat look you see on phones and tablets. I do not see any way to select the classic interface, which I'm sure many desktop users of PS prefer.

This feels yet another attempt by Adobe to be trendy without caring about what users want or need. Didn't they learn anything from the dumbed-down Lightroom import fiasco?

Report · Feb 15, 2016

Truly awful, not dissimilar to the mentality behind windows 10 flat lifeless UI being forced onto users, I uninstalled and returned to 7, I'm uninstalling this and returning to CC 2104.

"1) These changes were tested with many customers in our prerelease program. They were also used at Adobe MAX 2015. I was a teaching assistant for about 10 classes that used Photoshop and received many specific comments about how the UI was cleaner, easier to use and made using the product feel more "relaxing". These comments were from long time Photoshop customers as well as new customers. We made improvements even after Adobe MAX and will continue to make additional updates in future releases."

I doubt this ever happened, your getting true feedback here and choosing to ignore it, I'll be using CC 2014 for the foreseeable future until Adobe come to their senses or alternatives arrive.

Report · Feb 15, 2016

Yes Richard...I too have found CC 2014 so much easier (and thus faster) to use that CC 2015 is now a distant, and horrible, memory. And that is just pathetic Adobe. Your software is awesome but please wrap it in a usable interface like your clever designers used to.

Report · Feb 15, 2016

I also doubt that the "testing" ever occurred. Or if it did, that feedback was carefully considered. It is absolutely inconceivable that ten classes and "many customers" would overwhelmingly favor a UI that is hated by 99.9% of the users on this forum.

Report · Feb 15, 2016

It is absolutely inconceivable that ten classes and "many customers" would overwhelmingly favor a UI that is hated by 99.9% of the users on this forum.

In a nutshell, Adobe chose to overlook it's database of 1000's of users in favour of a classroom full of fanboys ?

...I seriously think not.

Report · Feb 15, 2016

Ann, that nngroup article series is excellent. Thanks for posting. Right on the mark.

Report · Feb 15, 2016

Fascinating. Lightroom initiated a new import dialog in Oct. of 2015. People hated it. But no where near as many people were as vocal about that one aspect of Lightroom than have been clamoring at full volume about the ENTIRE new interface of Photoshop. And yet, within weeks, a rollback to the previous Lightroom import dialog was implemented, WITH a profuse apology.

Dear Lightroom team,

Please take the Photoshop team out for drinks some night. Explain to them, nicely, why the customer is always right. Why focus groups of fanboys getting a free lunch or tote bags are no replacement for hard feedback from pro users. Why time is of the essence. Why it's better to admit defeat and roll back than to try to force feed mistakes. Why just because everyone in the design lab thought something was a good idea doesn't mean the end users will. Why it's ok to let it go and give the people what they want. Why every mistake is an opportunity to learn.

Report · Feb 17, 2016

Please bring back the previous GUI! Nothing more to add.
I will go back to the old version now.

Report · Feb 19, 2016

The response so far has been shocking; we are witnessing not only a disastrous implementation, but inability to recognise the seriousness of the mistake. Adobe would get an awful lot more people on side if it recognised rapidly that it had mis-stepped with this design, even if it then tells everyone that it will take a bit of time to rectify. But to suggest that all is ok, while it clearly isn't, will only infuriate more people - and increase the clamour for action. This is basic customer management.

Report · Feb 19, 2016

It looks as if a young, inexperienced (but exceedingly arrogant?!) Design Team is being allowed to run wild; and do exactly what they please; with total disregard for the requirements of Adobe's customers.
Perhaps it will take either some firm re-education or, ultimately, some Rolling Heads to fix this major UI and UX blunder?

Report · Feb 19, 2016

Jeff Sass is joking. Must be. The conclusion is simple: he knows nothing about UI, his testers were biased or paid to be happy about the darn thing, or high on Québec Gold.

Adobe should be on its collective knees and abjectly asking for forgiveness. This guy is not interested in what we're telling him, he doesn't hear us at all, he doesn't know what we're talking about.

Adobe just broke this delicate thing called customer loyalty. Forget about loyalty. I'm now ready to jump ship at first chance.

Remember what happened to other companies that ignored their users! Remember Quark! What you did to Quark (they asked for it), somebody will do it to you (you're asking for it)!

Report · Feb 20, 2016

I too was disappointed by Jeff Sass's comments, especially: "I was a teaching assistant for about 10 classes that used Photoshop and received many specific comments about how the UI was cleaner, easier to use and made using the product feel more 'relaxing'"

I find it extraordinary that these changes were based on a sample of 10 sessions. What level were the classes? How many participants were in each class? What was the duration? You'd think Adobe would do more in depth research before making such bold changes.

Report · Feb 20, 2016

Ann, if I remember correctly, you can find towards the beginning of this long thread that there were some guys from New York (don't remember who they are, but a big retouching outfit) that were called in to test the thing. None of them were amused by the new UI. They were very much against it in fact. So Adobe has known for a long time that the working guys did not, would not like it at all. But this doesn't matter at all to them.

I'm thinking about this mobile thing... whaaaaaatttttt? Hey guys, I'm not alone with a loaded Mac Pro (the flower pot...), or the equivalent in the Windows world, and two 30 in graphic monitors! Mobile? Am I to rent to truck to go mobile or what?

Photoshop is an expensive piece of software, for people working with expensive equipment, people that don't have much time to lose. We are the ones bringing in the money to Adobe. Leave us alone with your mobile thing. Or your touch thing. And I just learned that they are going to massacre Adobe RAW that they had kind of overlooked.

I've been protesting for two months now, and had quit because I was in a fury. Hence my new name "gone". Well, I'm going back into hibernation. Have fun, guys.

P.S.: BTW, ask the guys why, instead of messing with the UI, they don't fix the Refine Radius Tool in Refine Edge. No contextual menu. Nothing with a right-click or a control-click. Worse than that: you have to make the control bar appear in the Options bar. And then, you cannot even type it the number you want. What a shame.

Report · Feb 20, 2016

These changes were tested with many customers in our prerelease program. They were also used at Adobe MAX 2015. I was a teaching assistant for about 10 classes that used Photoshop and received many specific comments about how the UI was cleaner, easier to use and made using the product feel more "relaxing". These comments were from long time Photoshop customers as well as new customers. We made improvements even after Adobe MAX and will continue to make additional updates in future releases.

You made a classic mistake in usability testing: instead of relying on actual quantitative testing, and observation of actual user behaviour and measuring performance, you seem to have relied only on what users subjectively TELL you.

Without knowing the circumstances and your comments made prior to showing the new GUI to these users, you may well have coloured and influenced their opinions. For all you know, those users may have felt intimidated by your presence (being an official Adobe Photoshop team member), and Groupthink may have occured.

What a user (group) tells you, and their actual USE of the GUI are often two entirely different things.

Anecdotal "evidence", such as those user comments you mention, has some use, but should be backed up by quantitative UX research of the product in question.

I installed the latest version two weeks ago, and from my personal experience with the GUI so far, I have concluded that many PS GUI design decisions which your team made fly in the face of established usability heuristics. That much should be entirely obvious.

And based on your comments it seems rather obvious to me that your team has not done much or any quantitative user testing at all. Please prove me wrong in this.

Report · Feb 20, 2016

Well said.

Report · Feb 20, 2016

I agree. His observations are entirely anecdotal, and Jeff's comments only weaken his case.

Report · Feb 20, 2016

Dead on, Ann. Dead on. Now Adobe will never be able to take the phone and call the Big Brothers. Give a call to the guys at Apple. Or if you hate them too much, give a call to the guys at Microsoft. True, Windows 10 isn't my favorite, but Windows 7 is pretty decent and I can work with it without any problem.

Report · Feb 24, 2016

You know what I miss in this new version? The move tool icon. The new one just DOES NOT cover the functionality of the move tool, and is visually utterly inconsistent with the mouse cursor that is used for this function.

Interestingly enough, the idea for the four arrows icons is not new: in Photoshop 3 (not CS3) the traditional move tool icon was switched to the current version.

Bad ideas remain bad ideas, and it was changed to the one which we all know (and love?). One has to wonder why this new move tool icon was considered a better one than the old one. Especially seeing the mouse cursor still acts just like before.

Looking at the graphic below, it is also interesting to note that the latest dark versions are arguably the worst from the viewpoint of perceivability. The older light versions just work better in terms of usability. They might look somewhat clunkier - but the icons are easier to identify, as are the icon groupings.

The Photoshop GUI team ought to read up on some of Nielssen's Flat Design reports and conclusions:
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/flat-design/
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/flat-design-long-exposure/

Especially the second article is of interest here: many users so far have complained about the lack of visual signifiers in the new GUI, and, consequently, it takes them longer to find what they are looking for.

In short, the new PS GUI decreases user efficiency, and with longer-term exposure this will only worsen.

Also interesting: Photoshop started out with "flat icons", and the latest versions re-introduce flat versions. Albeit within a less usable lightgray-on-dark visual context.

Report · Feb 25, 2016

Dear Adobe team,

I am also a daily, professional user of CC. The new UI is EXTREMELY difficult to read, especially the character palette. There is no hierarchy; very little differentiation between the palette copy and the user variables makes at-a-glance understanding all but impossible . For users of the entire suite, the new look is especially jarring. UI should be function over form...photoshop is a tool. Please fix this.

Report · Feb 25, 2016

Well said angkmaurer.

Report · Feb 25, 2016

I'm now seriously concerned that this ridiculous interface design may infiltrate all other CC apps as well – which really would be enough to make me look for alternatives.

I have had my share of strange user experience decisions being a lifelong Apple fanboy, but they (almost) always came around and listened to us, their paying customers.

I find it hard to believe that Adobe senior management can argue a business case from this interface mess. Design decisions are always subjective, no question, but a user interface is a very different project that a pretty poster, an ad or an edgy TV spot.

I have seen people leave car dealerships because they did not like the dash design. And rightfully so, after all, design decisions are subjective.

It's absolutely beyond me how such a radical push of the PS UI to the worse was not user acceptance validated and accessibility tested. In my book this new UI fails in both categories.

Report · Feb 25, 2016

this ridiculous interface design may infiltrate all other CC apps as well

This is the worst nightmare!

Report · Feb 25, 2016

I am quite certain that the Adobe folks are carefully monitoring our conversations. And after one or two attempts to join our conversation they may have realized that this won't help them sway us.

But sitting it out might.

And honestly, we are not enough here to really make a huge impact. I don't know how many subscribers Adobe has in the CC community, I'm guessing it's in the Millions, so even a few hundred here are a mere fraction against the silent majority out there.

The only way I see to make Adobe reconsider is to amplify our volume. Here, and otherwise.

Does anyone know of other similar discussions around the Interwebs? They should be linked here. Any PS UI reviews out there? They should be linked here too. We all should tweet about this forum here, post it on Facebook and Google+, or anywhere else you see appropriate.

It's time to amplify the volume if we really want change!

Report · Mar 01, 2016

User interface controls are sloppy and full of regressions. It feels like each update to Photoshop via Creative Cloud is a step backwards. I launch Creative Cloud to look for an update and Photoshop locks up — restarting doesn't restore the active files.

The UI is not polished or is being over managed by a 20-year old web guy who doesn't understand desktop software:

• Capsule buttons have text that aren't vertically centered.
• Dropdown combobox arrows have padding on the right that's too tight.
• Chevron arrows should not be used for hierarchical menus
• Active items in the layers menu is now gray (which used to indicate an non-RGB channel selection

This list goes on and on. You're shipping products too fast and your quality control is terrible.

Report · Mar 02, 2016

The flat design of the interface in Photoshop 15.1 is very difficult to use. I much preferred the older UI and am greatly hoping that an option will be added to revert to the "boxed/shadowed" version. I use Photoshop 10-12 hours a day and this is very difficult to look at and use. I need differentiation in the fields.

Report · Mar 02, 2016

They basically don't care what you think and what you need.

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P: New user interface lacks contrast and many usability cues, lots of other problems

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