Gradients in 24.5

[MRobertson_NC]

Why? Why am I wasting A SECOND, much less the last hour, trying to figure why gradients, a function that wasn't broken, have been "fixed" to behave a way that refuses to do what it has for the last 30 years?

Please, please, PLEASE ... someone come along and Quark this company out of existence.

[Jeff Arola]

If you want the old Gradient Tool, enable Classic Gradient in the tool options bar before drawing out your gradient.

[MRobertson_NC]

Tried it. Every gradient I draw in Classic mode is black, regardless of my foreground color. Color mode has no effect.

[Jeff Arola]

Can you post some screenshots to illustrate the issue?

[MRobertson_NC]

Classic, foreground set to red when drawing gradient

New Gradient, foreground set to purple when drawing gradient, method Perceptual 

New Gradient, foreground set to purple when drawing gradient, method Classic

After bringing my workflow to a complete halt this morning I found that I can change the start color of a New Gradient by double-clicking the circle at the starting end of the gradient line (or whatever we're calling it), but I still can find no way in either method to draw a gradient based on foreground color.

NOTES: have quit & resarted Photoshop, have restarted my Mac (16" M1 MBP running OS 13.4), have tried in RGB and CMYK

[Semaphoric]

This could be confusing. We have [the new] this:

But we also have this, at the other end of the Option bar:

The Method thing caught me hard when it was introduced a while back. The online help tells you all about how to use these wonderful new features(and they are), but glosses over how to disable them when you need to.

[MRobertson_NC]

I've tried changing the mode (left) and method (right) dropdown menus to Classic in both configurations and it has had no effect on the color of the initial gradient I draw.

[Jeff Arola]

For the Classic Gradient go to the Gradient Preset Picker under Basic and select Foreground to Transparent, then the Gradient Tool when in Classic Gradient should follow the Foreground color you have set.

For some reason that doesn't seem to work with the "New" Gradient Tool even though one would think it should.

[MRobertson_NC]

THANK YOU! Changing this once now allows Classic mode to use the foreground color on subsequent gradients.

And yes, I'm sure this new feature is wonderful. It is not, however, "get a deadline extension because I suddenly and without warning can't do a Photoshop 101 thing" wonderful. Features which are markedly different from years of precedent need to be opt-ins, not opt-outs. 

[ClaudiaR99]

I'd like to share a video recording done by Adobe's Evangelist Julieanne Kost on the gradient tool improvements. I hope this is useful.

https://youtu.be/get7XConbwc