Adobe’s Creative Cloud Turning Into Hotel California

Adobe has tightened its vice-like grip on the global creative community with the release today of the latest iteration of its Creative Cloud offering, which sports an integrated photo library leaving creative users very little reason to ever leave the ecosystem.

Speaking with B&T ahead of the release, Adobe’s Asia Pacific CEO Paul Robson said that he was most excited by the integration of the Fotolia photo library, which Adobe acquired in January of this year, into the Creative Cloud.

“If you go outside the workflow of creating a page in InDesign it affects your workflow and efficiency . . . anything you can do to reduce time is dollars for that company,” he said.

Apart from the usual enhancements across the board such as the automatic removal of fog and haze from images in PhotoShop through to Illustrator performing at up to ten times faster than the previous version, it’s the concentration on workflow and efficiency that most excited Robson.

Another development within the Creative Cloud is the new use Adobe has brought to Behance, a portfolio sharing platform it bought in 2012 for US$150 million.

Behance functionality coupled with Adobe Stock will allow Adobe’s enormous global community of creative to search and share images within the Creative Cloud. Although Robson did not go as far as to admit it, the implication is that Creative Cloud will be essentially able to crowd source images which it them sells within its licensing agreement. A 750 images a month licence is priced at $240 a month.

Here’s the full release:

Adobe Unveils Milestone 2015 Creative Cloud Release

Unprecedented Innovation Across Creative Cloud Desktop and Mobile Apps for iOS and Android; New Adobe Stock Service Debuts

SYDNEY, Australia. — June 16 2015 — Adobe (Nasdaq:ADBE) today launched a milestone release of its flagship Adobe Creative Cloud tools and services. The 2015 release of Creative Cloud includes major updates to Adobe’s industry-defining desktop tools, including Photoshop CC, Illustrator CC, Premiere Pro CC and InDesign CC; as well as new connected mobile apps for iOS and Android. The company also shipped Adobe Stock, the industry’s first stock content service to be integrated directly into the creative process and the tools creatives use every day (see separate press release). In addition, Adobe announced an expanded Creative Cloud enterprise offering that includes enterprise-grade administration, security, collaboration and publishing services.

“The 2015 release of Creative Cloud is packed with innovation. Adobe Stock, our brand new stock service, makes 40 million photos, vector graphics and illustrations accessible directly within your favorite CC desktop apps. Our CreativeSync technology deepens the connections between desktop apps and mobile apps on iOS and Android; and major updates to Creative Cloud’s infrastructure and administrative capabilities makes this an essential upgrade for enterprise customers,” said David Wadhwani, senior vice president, Digital Media at Adobe. “Creative Cloud 2015 is our most powerful and comprehensive release to date.”

“We know that companies that foster creativity are 3.5 times more likely to outperform their peers in terms of revenue growth, based on Forrester’s Creative Dividends research released late last year,” said Paul Robson, president, Adobe Asia Pacific. “The research also revealed that more creative companies enjoy greater market share and competitive leadership than their counterparts. Among the leaders in market share, creative companies tend to outperform their less creative counterparts by a factor of 1.5. Adobe continues to develop technology and services to help companies, educational institutions, governments and creative professionals realise their creative vision.”

At the heart of Creative Cloud is Adobe CreativeSync, a signature technology that intelligently syncs creative assets: files, photos, fonts, vector graphics, brushes, colours, settings, metadata and more. With CreativeSync, assets are instantly available, in the right format, wherever designers need them — across desktop, web and mobile apps. Available exclusively in Creative Cloud, CreativeSync means work can be kicked-off in any connected Creative Cloud mobile app or CC desktop tool; picked up again later in another; and finished in the designer’s favourite CC desktop software.

Desktop Tools Take Giant Leap Forward

With the 2015 release of Creative Cloud, Adobe magic and Mercury performance provide speed and technology breakthroughs across 15 CC desktop applications, including:

Celebrating its 25^th anniversary this year, Photoshop CC introduces Artboards, the best way to design cross-device user experiences in a single Photoshop document and quickly preview them on a device; and a preview release of Photoshop Design Space, a sleek new work environment focused on the needs of mobile app and web site designers.

• Lightroom CC and Photoshop CC both gain the new Dehaze feature, which appeared first as a MAX sneak peak in October 2014.  Dehaze eliminates fog and haze from photos, including underwater shots, for startlingly clear images.  Haze can also be added to a photo for artistic effect.
• Premiere Pro CC furthers its lead in the market with the addition of the Lumetri Colour panel for powerful colour corrections using intuitive sliders and other simple controls; and Morph Cut, which makes it easier to deliver polished interview content by smoothing out jump cuts in talking-head shots to create a cohesive, polished sequence.
• After Effects CC now has Uninterrupted Preview to allow artists to adjust a composition’s properties and even resize panels without impacting playback. Also, the groundbreaking Adobe Character Animator brings 2D figures to life using a webcam to track facial movements, record dialog and apply movements in real time onto a pre-configured character.
• Illustrator CC is now 10 times faster and 10 times more precise than CS6. Powered by dramatic boosts to its Mercury Performance Engine, users can now pan and zoom smoothly without delays. With the new Chart tool (preview), designers can also create beautiful custom charts and share them with others via CC Libraries.
• InDesign CC gets its own Mercury performance surge with zooming, scrolling, and paging through complex documents now twice as fast.  InDesign now also allows users to publish and distribute documents with a single click.
• Dreamweaver CC has new responsive web design capabilities that let designers quickly lay out and build production-ready sites that adapt to any screen size.
• Adobe Muse now includes instant access to premium fonts from Typekit.

Mobile to Desktop Workflows Enhanced with Android Support, New Mobile Apps

Since Creative Cloud was introduced in 2012, Adobe has championed the idea that mobile devices should be integral to the creative process, with free companion mobile apps working seamlessly with CC desktop tools. Adobe today released Brush CC, Shape CC, Colour CC and Photoshop Mix on Android for the first time, bringing connected mobile workflows to millions of creatives worldwide. Adobe has also updated many of its popular Creative Cloud mobile apps for iPhone and iPad, including Adobe Comp CC, Photoshop Mix, Photoshop Sketch, Illustrator Draw, Brush CC, Shape CC and Colour CC.

In addition to these updates Adobe debuted Adobe Hue CC today. Hue CC provides an easy way to capture and share production-quality lighting and colour schemes — for video, film and broadcast — by using an iPhone camera and then applying these light and colour moods into a Premiere Pro CC or After Effects CC project.

Adobe Stock Content Service Launched, With Deep Creative Cloud Integration

Adobe Creative Cloud is evolving into a vibrant global marketplace. Adobe Talent, introduced in 2014, connects the world’s best creatives with work opportunities from major brands and agencies; and today the company launched Adobe Stock, the first stock content service to be integrated directly into the creative process and the tools that creatives use every day (see separate press release). Now creatives can jump-start projects, with access to 40 million images, right within tools such as Photoshop CC, InDesign CC and Illustrator CC. Adobe also announced it will offer industry-leading rates to photographers and designers contributing content to Adobe Stock.

Creative Cloud Enabling the Digital Transformation of Enterprises

Major enhancements to Creative Cloud for enterprise were also announced today: a solution for large commercial, education and government customers who must radically speed up the development and publishing of customer experiences, as part of their digital transformation strategies. This edition includes all the product features from today’s Creative Cloud 2015 release, plus expanded security options and deep connections with Adobe Digital Publishing Solution (DPS) and Adobe Marketing Cloud. Two new security capabilities ensure protection of corporate assets, including customer-managed encryption keys and a new managed service hosting option, which offers dedicated storage behind a customer’s firewall. Creative Cloud for enterprise also supports an upcoming release of DPS, empowering existing teams in organisations to rapidly design and publish mobile apps without writing code. A public beta of this major update to DPS is available this week, with more information available at http://adobe.ly/dpsnextgen. Content from Creative Cloud for enterprise also syncs with Adobe Experience Manager (AEM), a key component of Adobe Marketing Cloud, to accelerate marketing campaigns by streamlining creative-to-marketing workflows.

Pricing and Availability

Today’s updates to CC desktop tools are immediately available for download by Creative Cloud members as part of their membership at no additional cost. The new mobile apps are free to everyone. Adobe Stock pricing for Creative Cloud individual and team customers is AU$11.99 for a single image; AU$35.99 per month for 10 images monthly (with rollover of up to 120 images); and AU$239.99 per month for 750 images monthly for CC members on an annual plan. Separate pricing is available for Adobe Stock customers who are not Creative Cloud members.