On Tue, 26 Aug 2003, Joao S. O. Bueno wrote: > > So, did you guys know that Disney considered using the GIMP and/or > > Cinepaint, but instead paid some coders to make sure PS runs in > > WINE? > > > > <http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,3959,1210083,00.asp> > Yup. When this was on Slashdot I did mention at least in a PS at the end of one of my mails. /me thinks of searching the archive but is the archive working again? will the alternative link suggested be up to date (last time I looked it was lagging by a few days) ... but anyway I am logged in on a console, so I'll skip finding a link this time. > I saw this over on slashdot. And when I commented there something > about preferring to see th GIMP, if not for anything else, for the > free-software question, I got some 15 replies flaming me all over. 1) You will probably get flamed no matter what you say on Slashdot, although I am would be interested to read exactly what you wrote. 2) Gimp and CinePaint were incidental to the article, the big deal was that Disney *EVIL* actually spent some money and helped improve WINE *GOOD* (although some looonatics object to WINE on a twisted notion that compatability with legacy applications is a bad idea). 3) They probably only evaluated GIMP 1.2, and even though GIMP 1.3 is a lot better I dont think any of you will deny there is 'room for improvement' 4) Although there are some tradeoffs CinePaint better fills the niche for a movie studio, higher colour depth and support for file formats such as OpenEXR are important. 5) Adobe Photoshop users, particularly proffesional artists love Adobe Photoshop. Price is not really an issue when the company is paying (up to a point, companies will eventually draw the line (no pun intended)) GIMP/CinePaint needs to be more than just as good, it needs to be significantly better for that kind of specialist user to make the effort to change. The killer feature(s) in the GIMP is freedom, and so cheap it is free. Proffessionals who depend on Adobe Photoshop are probably the last people that will convert to the GIMP. The value they place on Photoshop is not just the box price, it is the years of time and effort invested into learning it inside out and more. However after saying all that a whole lot could have been done to improve the GIMP or (and you are not going to like me for saying this) more likely CinePaint, with the hefty amount of money that Disney was willing to spend on this project. Perhaps if Adobe Photoshop 8 fails to maintain WINE compatibility they will look this way again. Has anyone mailed the man at Disney yet? I probably will, and encourage him to provide feedback, hopefully with a little more detail than just make it more like Photoshop. He seems to be in some way affiliated with CinePaint already (I forget his name but I looked it up when the article was first mentioned). - Alan
