Scaling Images with shift no longer works after update (20.0)

[Kbirch]

After updating to CC 2019, I am not longer able to scale images evenly simply by holding shift.

I went to keyboard shortcuts and found a "scale" shortcut that was unassigned, so i assigned it to "S" as it simply wouldn't let me assign shift:

Now it seems to only want to scale evenly and won't let me scale however I want simply by dragging the corner of the image. Sometimes it doesn't go evenly when I transform with Ctrl+T and scales evenly after I press S, but wont let me go back to scaling unevenly.

Any Ideas?

[designu46483552]

Why is the new discussion branch shunted to a locked forum on this?

(too many disgruntled users?)

[satisfied_Hero154A]

What new discussion? Who would need a new one?

I wake up every day hoping for a new "me too" comment in thread to give my life meaning.

[carlseibert]

I just did the PSUserConfig.txt fix and it worked smoothly, at least as far as the proportions constraint in Transform is concerned. It now matches the behavior of the crop tool and every other tool that toggles proportional constraint in every other program on the planet.

A couple notes:

Quit Photoshop, pop the file in, and restart Photoshop for the config file to load.

If the folder is hidden, Shift+Command+. (That's shift-command-period.) will toggle folder visibility on a Mac. On a PC, it's a tickbox in Folder Options, which should be at the top of any folder window.

The folder really is 'Adobe Photoshop CC 2019 Settings', not Adobe/Photoshop/2019/settings. Spaces in a folder name. Yeah. That's another good idea.

If you've already got a PSUserConfig.txt, the normal thing to do would be to back it up, then just add the new line to the existing file. I didn't have to do this but it's pretty standard procedure. Passed on for what it might be worth.

If Adobe is wondering why there's explosive growth in the market of applications that are alternatives to Photoshop, Lightroom, Illustrator, and InDesign, they need look no further than this sort of arrogance. Charging a lot of money in rent, thoughtlessly breaking things, and lying to the customers about what you've done, or why, does not sound like a great business plan to me.

Adobe has developed some very fine programs that have become industry standards and as such many of us are more or less trapped into using them. The temptation to abuse that position must be intense. But abuse will be punished in the marketplace.

As for me, I'm pretty much stuck with paying Adobe 600 bucks a year for Creative Cloud, more or less forever. But I've always used a third party alternative to Bridge and lately have been using an alternative to Lightroom. Just because those apps do the job better. Add in cheaper and resentment to motivate the customer to shop for alternates and you've pretty much handed the other guys a business plan.

[satisfied_Hero154A]

Thanks. I'd never heard of the Shift-Command-Period option before. Typical of Apple to hide this from users and not even expose it in Preferences. Unbelievable.

You should try Affinity Photo.  Since Adobe abandoned Illustrator years ago (without fixing profound defects that I can't work with), I switched to Affinity Designer.  I'll probably move to Photo too.

[carlseibert]

A few of my readers have mentioned Affinity Photo. I took a quick look and I was impressed. It might have a shot.

You can't argue with the price. The challenge with these new apps is subsetting the features so that you satisfy certain segments of the market. If a given user can get all he or she needs from your new app, given the amount of disaffection with Adobe right now, you've earned a customer. Then, you can expand your feature set and expand your potential user base.

Many/most of the upstart programs are developed by people who don't have clue and they don't offer real value to anybody in particular. But still, it would be foolhardy of Adobe to underestimate the threat.

I've been using ON1 Photo RAW, which is a LIghtroom replacement. It will certainly mature as time goes on, but I think the design is more on-target than Lightroom and, frankly, since I've been using it, I haven't been using Photoshop anywhere near as much as before. I think it might obviate the need for Photoshop for many photographers. Might Affinity play a part in that? If their feature set and functionality are just right - quite possibly.  This from somebody who does and will continue to pay for the CC suite regardless.

All that said, I write about metadata and Affinity Photo doesn't support standards-compliant metadata yet. So there's that.

[satisfied_Hero154A]

carlseibert  wrote

Many/most of the upstart programs are developed by people who don't have clue and they don't offer real value to anybody in particular.

What an odd assertion.  Even if you can find a single example of this, I doubt you're going to be able to show that it's generally true.  Why would they start such an enterprise then?  In Affinity's case, I think they do have some passion for the work but they lack some UI design acumen.  Their products are competent and hold a lot of promise, but unfortunately they are reluctant to address some baffling UI design gaffes.  Then again, so is Adobe... at much, much higher prices and a rental model that's pissing people off while not delivering the fixes that were used to excuse it.

What is the "standards-compliant metadata" problem you're referring to?  I haven't tried Photo yet, so I'm intrigued by your comment.

[carlseibert]

I don't think that assertion was particularly odd. It's totally subjective. Just my opinion.

I'm not in the software review and criticism business, but I did do evaluations of software for potential corporate adoption for a number of years and I think I have a somewhat decent eye for feature sets and interfaces that promise to be useful in various use cases. (My subjective faith in my own ability to have well-founded subjective opinions. Could be a raging case of Dunning-Kruger Effect, but what the heck.)

I've looked at a whole herd of would-be Lightroom replacements and a few Photoshop replacements. Most of them - almost all of them - have just not made a positive impression. They seem to me like toys rather than tools. Maybe there's too small a subset of features or strange functionality, or the thing is just clunky. Certainly, there must be somebody whose use case is a perfect match for each one. But in my opinion, true rivals for the Adobe products are not thick on the ground. On the other hand, it only takes one Photoshop killer to... well you get the picture.

The two that I mentioned, Affinity Photo and ON1 RAW impressed me as having real potential. ON1 enough so that I'm actually using it instead of the Adobe product I'm already paying for. They strike me as having been developed by people who actually use this stuff. (There are other worthy contenders, of course. Capture One is enjoying a lot of traction now, for instance. But it's hardly a newcomer. It's been around for, what, fifteen years?)

I'm not qualified to render useful opinions on would-be Illustrator or InDesign replacements. Maybe I cast too sweeping an impression when I wrote that sentence.

'bout that metadata.

In Photoshop, actually most of the Adobe programs, you can go to File > File Info and add IPTC metadata to your file. That would be descriptive metadata like a caption, your name, copyright notice and contact information. (Important on photos. Not so much on design documents that don't end up on Google images.) Or you can read that stuff. Which is, I guess, more to the point in Photoshop, since very few people actually use Photoshop to write that kind of information. (Bridge, or Lightroom if you use it, would be more likely places. People who do it every day might use something more powerful, like Photo Mechanic.)

When I looked at Affinity Photo a month or so ago, there was the barest stub of metadata functionality. You could read some Exif data (logging information from your camera) and you could sort of write to the Caption/Description field. (As in - you could write stuff in a non-standard way, so only a few programs might be able to read it.)

Given that most people, photographers at least, would use something else other than Photoshop/Affinity Photo for the task, it might not be the biggest deal in the world. But I think that a photo editing or management program with professional aspirations should have the functionality, just on general principles. My view is, as I mentioned, I tad biased. But still.

I'm hopeful that Affinity eventually gets onboard.

Is metadata functionality in a Photoshop replacement a big deal for designers? Good question. I know lots of designers whose workflow includes taking a peek at caption and copyright info when they open a photo, which would be in Photoshop. I know very few designers (like one or two) who have something else at hand to use for that. So, maybe metadata functionality in a Photoshop-like program might be more of a thing for designers than it would be for photographers. Hmmm.

The moderators would probably have apoplexy if I put a link to my blog here, but if you want to learn more about metadata you can Google my name and "metadata". Or Google David Reicks' name and "metadata".

[bt61084250]

7 pages... not too shabby.

Same "general" ridiculousness happening on the Premiere front, luckily there is Davinci Resolve (and not a moment to soon!)... but admittedly with Photoshop I feel pretty stuck. Let's hope mother of invention and all that jazz comes into play.

The overwhelming reaction I always have when this always happens is a silently screaming voice in my head that just keeps repeating "Who asked for this?".

Adobe has proven time and time again they are definitely one of those companies that should stay the course, never knee jerk and listen very very closely to their power users or at least those who prefer to edit photos on something other than a phone... as opposed to a company that should be steering anything or having "how would the influencers prefer to scale things?" meetings.

This reminds me of the gory events that played out at Levis and Gibson actually.

Oh well in the meantime I will just code a config file for my windows directory because that's normal - *Falls On Floor*

[carlseibert]

Seriously.

They seem intent on making all their apps feel like you're using them on a phone. I submit as evidence the current Acrobat Pro, or M or X, or whatever. Good lord. It's not that complex a program. But they made the interface tablet-like and it's inscrutable. Didn't learn from Microsoft's mistake with Windows 8, I guess.

Photoshop and Premiere are inherently complex. They just aren't candidates for big ol' my-first-tablet sized touch targets.

[John Waller]

See what you think of full Photoshop on iPad Pro sneak peek.

Photoshop for iPad hands-on: an exclusive look - YouTube

[satisfied_Hero154A]

Anything on the iPad (or any iOS device) is hideously crippled by Apple's fear of (and lack of) proper I/O for their mobile devices. "Just upload everything to the cloud" sucks. My computer is RIGHT THERE. I should not have to round-trip giant files through a third-party Internet server. Can we at least do AirDrop (which sometimes works)? Not to mention the utter lameness of the use case shown here: Whoop dee doo, you can download pictures from three places. But not the Web in general. Not shared drives on the LAN.

I'm also curious as to how well Photoshop will reject spurious touches from your palm as you're drawing.

And finally... this only works on the iPad Pro; which Apple has made even more nearly useless than it already was, by removing the headphone jack. Want to watch a movie on the plane with your companion?  NOPE, says Apple.  That's one more of the very few uses of a tablet eliminated, for no reason.

Meanwhile, Apple put a giant trackpad on their laptops but the Pencil doesn't work on them.  That's just stupid.

Adobe needs to face the fact that it's time to rewrite its bug-ridden core applications from the ground up, instead of screwing around with mobile toys on a gimped platform. The excuse for the rental model was that we're supposed to get more timely bug fixes and a better product.

Still waiting...

[John Waller]

Thanks for your thoughts, Mobius.

I'm a lot more optimistic about the potential for this. It's obviously a version 1.0 app at this stage.

I think it's got an exciting future.

[satisfied_Hero154A]

You're welcome!  We'll see. Maybe it'll be good. Two simple but huge things Adobe could do to mitigate the storage problem:

1. Integrate a Web browser that allows users to download images (like a normal desktop browser does).

2. Let users connect to shared drives over the local network.

I suspect they won't, of course, because they're pushing CC.

[carlseibert]

Good point, Mobius. We have walled gardens within walled gardens here.

Adobe wants to push their own cloud storage service by making products incompatible with all the others. Good idea? No. Adobe knows perfectly well the value of open standards. They have created and promulgated lots of them, from PDF to XMP.

If I wanted to spend 13 hours uploading a raw shoot to the cloud before editing it down to half a gig's worth, for what I'm paying Adobe, I would expect support for whatever cloud service I happen to use. So, Adobe makes themselves vulnerable and hands the competitors an easy win. Competitors can simply build integrations with as many cloud services as they choose for a tiny fraction of the overhead of running their own service.

Then Adobe builds what appears to be a toy-like application for one specific expensive, not terribly versatile tablet. That may be folly, but nobody would mind except they damaged the "real" desktop version of the app in the process. (Thus this thread.) That would be the version used by real workers who don't have electric skateboards leaning in the corners of their video set offices. (And, might I add, the app that built the house of Adobe. )

Never mind all the other tablets in the world and never mind that competitors to that one tablet can and do sell tablets that can run normal desktop operating systems and normal, already developed, desktop apps. Handing yet another easy win to both Adobe's and Apple's competitors.

They're acting like they panicked and dropped the rope. Let's hope they calm themselves and pick it back up again.

(And, by the way - about that video - who uses the eraser tool instead of the pen tool to sillo a sword?! Just sayin'.)

[JJMack]

Adobe may learn something about building a better touch UI for a Photoshop like  application and  port that UI to Desktop Photoshop. Make Desktop Photoshop more usable on devices like Wacom Mobile Studio or  and an all in one PC like Microsoft Surface Studio 2 that my son uses. Depend less on a keyboard.  For on screen keyboards are disruptive and real keyboards are awkward to access.

[carlseibert]

I disagree.

While I agree that some ideas from mobile translate into common sense improvements in desktop interfaces, to me, the two are just fundamentally different.

I'm personally not that thrilled about the idea of shortcut keys and, especially, modifier keys, but they evolved into being on the desktop to solve valid issues.

It's incumbent on developers who try to port complex programs to mobile to come up with some sort of natively mobile answers to the issues that those keystrokes solved on the desktop, rather than just pave over the problem by reducing functionality.

I do have to wonder if there's really a use case for mobile complex apps at all. Do you like to work in Photoshop or Premiere on the couch on a laptop balanced on your knees? I don't. For the things where mobile is great - showing work to customers, presentations, gathering feedback - do we really need full versions of heavy apps?

Maybe for hybrid devices that can run complex apps, like the Surface, we need switchable interface elements that can be called into play when the device is used in a keyboard-less fashion. That way, we could have big touch targets for the specific jobs we for-real might do standing in the middle of the studio floor, without having to develop a completely separate version of the app. And without degrading the desktop version where productivity is critical.

[JJMack]

Desktop configurations like the Surface Studio and Dell studio are configured for the professional artiest to work with pen touch and  dial  The on screen keyboard may be more convenient to get then the real keyboard and the on screen modifier touch palette lack all other keyboard shortcuts.  There should be a better Touch and Pen interface for Photoshop. Like target layer with a touch in the layers palette and making other UI features easier to touched.    Photoshop UI was designed before desktop had these interfaces.  There is room for improvement using new technology. Photoshop is an image editor not a text editor after all. Maybe a shaper tool like AI could also be added to Photoshop.

[satisfied_Hero154A]

The Wacom tablet came out 35 years ago.

"Maybe a shaper tool like AI could also be added to Photoshop."

Amen. The shape tools in Photoshop are abominable, and inexcusable considering Adobe's ownership of Illustrator. Then again, Illustrator has been abandoned for years. And consider that Premiere can't import AI files. In fact, as far as I know, Premiere doesn't support any vector format... so if you want to zoom into a logo or other artwork, you can't without hideous aliasing.

[dv8kiwi]

Just trying to bring this back on topic - ADOBE PLEASE release an update that has the legacy transform behavior available as a preference. Users should not be having to hack this illogical inconsistent sudden behavior change!

[designu46483552]

Back on topic is right! I find that "Branhed to a new discussion" a bit confusing, especially when I get alerts in my inbox to a conversation about PS on the iPad, etc!

This thread is the place for discussion about the insane decisions regarding Transform due to poor leadership at Adobe.

[JJMack]

IMO Adobe Management should be better but that  a different topic for it effect way more than Photoshop transform scaling.

Adobe need to develop software better the it does. There are too many issues with the software they distribute and now they want to automatically install the new bugs on users machine.  At least you can turn that off and also keep old working release of application installed.

Adobe development was better than it is now.  Adobe has so much software  they just cant seem to handle it all these days. Adobe need to address this issue. Adobe needs the develop its software better and be more respectful of their users.

Nothing new has been added to the Transform scale thread is a long time.

[jerryw48492253]

Although I see (and have implemented) the text hack, I wanted to add my name to the growing group of incredibly frustrated users. The first rule of UI is you don't randomly change a behavior that has been the de facto standard for 20 years. Shift-constrain is the way virtually ALL programs work.

I'm assuming the next time I upgrade PS my "PSUserConfig.txt" will not automatically migrate to the new install. So six months from now, I'll update Photoshop and be surprised that my system has reverted back to the "new" scale system. Then I'll be to busy and limp around with it for a few weeks, re-igniting my disappointment in Adobe for making this change. Finally, I'll take the time to manually go in and turn off this misguided "feature" again.

*sigh* . Ahhh, progress.

[designu46483552]

Not 6 months- more like once every 2

[dv8kiwi]

Photoshop 20.0.4 has just been released and Adobe is NOT listening to its users! What a surprise. They have not made any changes to deal with this issue. There needs to be a toggle for this behaviour in preferences at the very least.

[Black_Snowflake]

Agreed, a toggle seems like the simplest and best solution. Sure it's not a "bug", but you'd think Adobe could sneak this fix in pretty easily given that it seems more annoying for some than the many of the stated "bugs" out there.