Adobe today announced that all of its Creative Cloud desktop apps, including Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Dreamweaver, Lightroom, Premiere Pro, and more, will receive updates that improve the efficiency of work flows and boost performance.
Photoshop CC, for example, will gain new Blur Gallery motion effects for creating a sense of motion, a Focus Mask for selecting focus areas and highlighting portrait shots with a shallow depth of field, new Content Aware capabilities, and a new Perspective Warp for adjusting the perspective of a specific part of an image.
The update also includes enhanced Mercury Graphics Engine performance, the ability to link Smart Objects to be shared across multiple documents, and improved Layer Comps.
Illustrator CC gains Live Shapes to transform rectangles into complex shapes and back, while in InDesign CC it's now possible to select table rows and columns and use the EPUB fixed layout to create digital books.
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Adobe's video apps now include Live Text Templates and Masking and Tracking, with Premiere Pro CC gaining enhanced graphics performance. After Effects now includes new keying effects, while SpeedGrade CC has a more flexible Direct Link color pipeline and Audition has enhanced multi-track tools.
Along with updates to all of its Creative Cloud apps, Adobe is expanding Creative Cloud profiles to improve the connectivity between mobile and desktop apps. Profiles will include stored files, photos, fonts, and preferences, which can be accessed on both desktop and mobile apps, allowing files to be seamlessly shared between apps.
The new CC desktop apps, mobile apps, and hardware are tightly integrated through Creative Cloud services. This integration helps liberate the creative process by enabling users to access and manage everything that makes up their creative profile -- their files, photos, fonts, colors, community and more -- from wherever they work.
Adobe today also introduced both a new suite of mobile apps designed with its new SDK and two new tools, the Adobe Ink and the Adobe Slide, detailed in a separate post.
Adobe's new Creative Cloud updates are available to Creative Cloud subscribers for free. Adobe offers individual Creative Cloud memberships starting at $49.99 per month for new customers, $29.99 per month for existing CS customers, and $19.99 for students. Adobe has also announced plans to make its $9.99/month Photography bundle, with access to Photoshop CC and Lightroom 5, permanent and available to all users, and the company is debuting expanded offerings for education and enterprise.
Top Rated Comments
Endless slow feature creep is not the solution to make me happy I can't own my own creative works: if I stop paying every month, I can't even VIEW all of my files, much less edit them.
I wouldn't like the subscription model even if the products were as well-made as they once were... but they're not. And we pay month after month, whether any improvements happen that actually matter to us or not. Updates used to be optional: is this version worth my money or not? But now... updates are pretty much optional for Adobe! They need not bother with improving much, as long as they remain an expected industry "standard."
I pay $50 a month and I ask myself, what am I getting that my old fully-owned copy of CS3 wouldn't do for me? 99% of the answer is: I'm getting file compatibility with other people who subscribe to CC. That's about it.
Artists want to feel they are paying for terrific, empowering tools, not "cost of doing business." The latter IS worth it for pros... but worth it in the wrong way.
Oh, well, no escape for now. But one day....
Adobe and their software had become a part of me for years until they started the CC nonsense. I can see renting an apartment or a car--maybe even bowling shoes...but software? No.
I run CS6 and it's as far as I go with Adobe. They lost me for good when they did a recent Lightroom upgrade for version 5.4, not even a part of CS6. I own LR 5.4 outright. It was identical to LR CC 5.4. Adobe chose to give only the CC renters that upgrade, even though I outright purchased my copy of the program. They won't even upgrade Camera Raw for CS6 owners so both versions are the same.
Fine. I switched. I replaced LR with Capture One Pro 7 by Phase One. I'll use CS6 for other digital chores.
Scott Kelby will lose me for similar reasons when my subscription runs out. I joined a professional fraternity called NAPP. For some ill-conceived reason, Scott destroyed NAPP and created something called KelbyOne. The entire focus of the business is now trying to become a third-rate lynda.com instead of being an organization focused on professionals.
In both cases it's, "Let's take a good thing and ruin it."
P.S. On second thought, I don't think I'd rent the aforementioned bowling shoes.
Exactly why I'm sticking with CS6 as long as possible. There are a few features that are nice to have over CS3, but I could still run my business with CS3 a piece of software that was released 7 years ago. I figure I can use CS6 another 5-6 years as a full-time graphic designer. It's just a tool. If it works for you, it works. No need to pay $50/month just for the feeling of being up to date.
Maybe in the short term, but long term they've locked you into a system you can't back out of - whatever the future costs.
How about in a few years time you don't like the 'new' subscription charges? If you opt out you don't get to play with all the new toys. Fair enough. What isn't so good is that you don't get to play with the old tools either, or access any of your old work. (Unless it's possible to open, say, native InDesign CC files in CS6? - It isn't possible to open CS6 ID files in CS5)
To be honest I don't think the current subscription is too bad but I'm not prepared to sign my future self up to whatever they choose to do. This is like going back to the old days with Quark - the reason InDesign got traction in the first place.