Get your mobile creative groove on with Adobe's latest apps
Adobe has recently updated its family of iOS software, consolidating multiple apps into new, feature-packed programs and adding some crucial features to a few of the most popular offerings. With the latest changes to Adobe’s mobile apps, we also see some of the family members retiring, their features being included in other software.
The newest members of the family: Adobe Capture CC and Photoshop Fix
A new, consolidated app, Adobe Capture CC brings together the features that were once provided by several different programs. Adobe Brush CC, Color CC, Hue CC, and Shape CC have been retired and rolled into the new app. Adobe Capture CC allows you to pull color themes out of photographs, convert images and drawings into vector graphics, and create new brushes from pictures. Whatever design asset you want to capture for use in other Adobe apps, Capture CC will let you accomplish that goal.
With Adobe Photoshop Fix, you can easily retouch and restore images on your iOS device. The app features tools that desktop Photoshop users will be familiar with like liquify, heal and patch, smooth, and lighten and darken.
A new version of Adobe Photoshop Sketch
Adobe Illustrator Line has been retired, and the third version of Adobe Photoshop Sketch adopts its features of supporting perspective and graph grids, as well as allowing users to draw French curves, polygons, and other shapes that were not previously available. On newer iPads, Photoshop Sketch now supports watercolor paintbrushes. Finally, the app supports the addition of images directly from Adobe Stock.
Tweaks to other Adobe apps and free Lightroom
Adobe Premiere Clip has received a big new feature, automatic video creation. With this capability, you can input a soundtrack and images, and Premiere Clip will create an arrangement that you can share or edit further.
With Adobe Photoshop Mix, you are now able to combine more than two layers, so you have the capability of creating more complex images. New controls allow you to set the opacity for each layer, giving a depth to your canvases that was not possible previously. Adobe has also redesigned the user interface in Photoshop Express, while also turning on support for CreativeSync to move photos from the mobile app to Adobe’s other software.
Adobe Comp CC has arrived on the iPhone, and the app has been given a more streamlined workflow that includes new gestures. Comp CC is also now compatible with importing resources from other Adobe mobile apps.
Finally, Adobe Photoshop Lightroom has been made free, as long as you do not need to synchronize with Adobe’s Creative Cloud. With the latest update, Lightroom has better color control and the ability to manipulate the amount of atmospheric haze in your images.
A bounty of updates and great new features, but something is missing
Adobe has been maintaining its position on the forefront of iOS development in recent years, so the most notable exclusion from the latest updates is surprising. There is no support indicated for the 3D Touch capability within the iPhone 6s. I am disappointed, because incorporating 3D Touch would have made switching tools and menus quite a bit simpler in several of the more complex apps.
