Abode has released a new suite of mobile apps and hardware that connects to the Adobe Creative Cloud to iOS devices. The hardware includes a stylus, optimized for the iPad, called Adobe Ink. It also offered a companion digital ruler called Adobe Slide. The goal is to create better, more precise drawing on iPads. Since it connects to Creative Cloud, users will have access to their creative assets, such as drawings, photos and Adobe Kuler color themes. There are now 2.3 million paid Creative Cloud subscriptions. The company also announced the following mobile applications:
Adobe Sketch is a social sketching iPad app for free-form drawing.
Adobe Line is an iPad app for precision drawing and drafting. Line can be used in conjunction with Slide and reimagines traditional drawing tools like rulers, T-squares and shape templates for the mobile world, as well as giving creatives access to assets, Kuler color themes, and the ability to share work.
Photoshop Mix is an iPad app that brings Adobe image mixing to mobile users with access to creative imaging tools such as Upright, Content Aware Fill, and Camera Shake Reduction. It also offers non-destructive photo enhancements, selections, the ability to cut-out and mix images, and more.
Lightroom mobile for iPhone extends recently shipped Lightroom capabilities to the iPhone. It provides the most efficient way to manage and edit images across desktops, mobile devices and the Web. Additionally, Adobe Voice, a free animated video app for iPad that’s had 50,000 videos shared since its debut in May, has also been updated to sync with Lightroom.
Creative Cloud for iPad and iPhone, a new app that allows Creative Cloud members to access and manage their files, assets, and more from their mobile device.
In addition to the mobile apps, Adobe announced 14 new versions of Creative Cloud desktop applications.
Why mobile and new hardware? The company surveyed 1,000 creative professionals and 500 creative students in the U.S. to assess trends in the creative marketplace. The survey revealed that:
80 percent believe they must learn new tools and techniques and three quarters say that creatives must now work across multiple mediums and disciplines.
74 percent of creatives view mobile technology as transforming the face of creativity and design and 7 in 10 creatives are developing content for mobile apps; 87 percent believe creating mobile content has had a positive impact on them.
While creatives still rely on pen and paper for ideation (28%) and brainstorming (36%), nearly half (45%) use their mobile devices to capture inspiration on the go.
42 percent of creatives say they use mobile to create content anywhere. In addition 30 percent of respondents would like to create more content on tablets, surpassing desktop computers.
What’s important about the Adobe announcement? One of the things that I find interesting is the notion of near seamless integration between desktop, mobile and cloud. In the past, these were very separate offerings. The cloud may or may not of connected with any desktop applications. In today’s hyper connected world, it is become it is an imperative to be able to access your content wherever you are on whatever device you’re using.
This worked well for “new world” software that was designed after the introduction of cloud computing and mobile apps. However, it was difficult for existing software providers to offer the same types of functionality across the domains of PC, mobile and cloud. Adobe is bridging this gap with its Creative Cloud services and hardware. The idea of creating something on your tablet while you are on the go, sending it to the cloud and also having a compatible with desktop app will be very beneficial for designers.
This requires a new way of thinking about applications and services. In the past, I described this as the concept of services portability. Effectively we’re moving away from an environment where your applications and services are locked to a physical location or to a single piece of hardware.
Today, I’d say that Adobe’s Creative Cloud is creating what I call a right-time experience, which is access to the right application or parts of an application, on the right device at the right time. This is a pressing change for application designers. You need to understand what parts of the application should be available on which devices. You also need to understand what makes sense to put into the cloud and how to deal with off-line access. It means certain things will continually be updated into the cloud. It’s a challenge for software companies that develop apps and services but it’s also a challenge that every business will need to address. This isn’t just a shift for the design industry. Each company, creative or not, has applications and processes that it needs to share across a wide range of devices. Businesses that can transition a company’s processes to work seamlessly across devices and locations will be more agile and more likely to succeed.
For the past several years, we’ve always considered tablets as a content consumption device. This is severely limited its utility in the minds of business users. Our notion of content creation has been one where we basically fill out forms and submit paperwork. In this announcement, Adobe has shifted the discussion to tablets where tablets, like the iPad, are rich content creation devices. We can create rich graphics and other media intensive services on tablets. These announcements highlight the beginning of the shift to mobile devices as first class computing systems that will achieve the same productivity levels as PCs. The lines between desktops and mobile devices will blur. The software market will evolve to a world where you expect to be use an application on multiple platforms and to be able to create and consume the right functions on your device of choice.
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