Today Adobe announced the free public beta of Photoshop Lightroom 4, the digital photography workflow solution for both professional and amateur photographers. Available for Windows and Mac as a free download from Adobe Labs, the Lightroom 4 beta previews new workflow efficiencies, and features for image processing and management.

New features in Lightroom 4 beta include:

• Refined technology for shadow and highlight processing
• Native support for videos shot on DSLRs, point-and-shoot cameras and smartphones
• The ability to create beautiful photo books from within Lightroom
• An intuitive Map module with tagging controls for assigning locations
• Soft proofing in the Develop module
• Direct emailing of images from Lightroom

We encourage photographers to try the beta release and share feedback; there are a few avenues to do this:

• Submit comments at the community-powered feedback site: http://feedback.photoshop.com
• Connect with the Lightroom team directly: Facebook (www.facebook.com/lightroom); Twitter (www.twitter.com/lightroom); The Adobe Lightroom blog (http://blogs.adobe.com/lightroomjournal)

We’re really pleased with the new capabilities and expect that you will be, too. We look forward to your thoughts and comments!

At our recent MAX conference, we announced the Adobe Creative Cloud – a groundbreaking initative that we believe will radically redefine the creative process. We’re excited about this new offering – it brings immense value to our customers allowing them to continue creating amazing things in whatever environment they choose.

The Adobe Creative Cloud consists of:

• Desktop Applications — Every tool that is currently in Adobe Creative Suite Master Collection, such as Photoshop®, InDesign®, Illustrator®, Dreamweaver®, Premiere® Pro, After Effects®, as well as innovative new tools that are currently in beta, such as Adobe Edge and Muse.
• Touch Apps – Starting with the six Adobe Touch Apps announced at MAX , 2011 – Adobe Collage, Adobe Kuler, Photoshop Touch, Adobe Debut, Adobe Proto and Adobe Ideas.
• Services – A version of Adobe’s Digital Publishing Suite for delivering interactive publications on tablets, a tier of Adobe Business Catalyst for building and managing websites, and access to cloud-based fonts for website design from our acquisition of Typekit.
• Community –Collaboration features that allow members to share their creative work with other Creative Cloud members and forums to discuss and inspire new ideas.

We are excited to announce that membership to the Adobe Creative Cloud will be available in the first half of 2012 at a price of $49.99 per month for individuals and $69.99 per month per seat for workgroups, both for an annual plan.

Our move to this membership model allows us to keep our customers up to date with the latest Adobe innovations in our tools and related services. Creative Cloud will provide maximum flexibility, offer lower cost of entry, and add cutting-edge innovation on an on-going basis to keep our customers ahead of the changing technology and device landscape.

For customers who prefer to remain on the current licensing model, we will continue to offer our individual point products and Adobe Creative Suite editions as perpetual licenses. With regards to upgrades, we are changing our policy for perpetual license customers. In order to qualify for upgrade pricing when CS6 releases, customers will need to be on the latest version of our software (either CS5 or CS5.5 editions). If our customers are not yet on those versions, we’re offering a 20% discount through December 31, 2011 which will qualify them for upgrade pricing when we release CS6.

There is a tremendous shift happening around content creation, distribution and monetization. The Adobe Creative Cloud initiative has the potential to transform creativity as designers and developers look to create the best experiences across devices and platforms, while integrating tablet devices and cloud-based services into their workflows. I’m very excited about what this means for Adobe and our customers and look forward to providing the latest tools and services that enable them to express their creativity in new ways.

David

Check out this outstanding example of what can be achieved with our just-launched Photoshop Touch SDK, from our friends over at DI Magazine.   What a fantastic idea — using a digital magazine on iPad to drive a Photoshop tutorial on your Mac (or PC). They also developed their digital magazine using Adobe Digital Publishing Suite, in a perfect storm of Adobe digital technology customer ingenuity.

For those of us who have trouble telling their Gaussian Blur from their Clone Stamp, this is revolutionary stuff that will bring the amazing creative power of Photoshop into many more hands.  Woof!

Adobe has announced a significant update to Creative Suite, with the unveiling of our first mid-cycle release: Creative Suite 5.5.  This is part of a new release strategy, where we’re moving out our milestone releases (such as CS3, CS4, CS5) to a two-year cycle. Mid-cycle releases will keep designers and developers ahead of technology changes, such as the mobile communications revolution (tablets!) that is radically altering how content is consumed and created.

Some highlights from CS5.5….

• For Web folks: huge updates to HTML5 and Adobe Flash authoring tools, enabling designers and developers to deliver mobile applications on Android, BlackBerry Tablet OS, iOS and other platforms — and create rich browser-based content across screens. All the big HTML5 checkboxes are ticked in Dreamweaver CS5.5: jQuery mobile framework integration for browser-based content, PhoneGap’s in, as well as WebKit engine updates.  We’ve also launched Adobe Flash Builder 4.5 Premium and the Flex 4.5 framework now includes mobile support.   Now hundreds of millions of mobile devices can be targeted with content and apps, created through our web tools.  Remember, Adobe tools support the development of both HTML and Flash content, don’t let crazy headlines make you think otherwise.

• For Design and Publishing jocks: Creative Suite 5.5 Design Premium suite builds upon Adobe’s recent product innovations in digital publishing. Using InDesign CS5.5 designers can add new levels of interactivity to their page layouts targeted to tablet devices.  Documents can include video, audio, panoramic views, 360-degree object rotation, pan and zoom of images, integration of HTML and HTML5 content and other interactive overlays.  Creative Suite 5.5 is tightly integrated with Adobe Digital Publishing Suite to support publication, sale and analysis of content on iPad, Android tablets and the upcoming BlackBerry PlayBook.

• For video and audio peeps: Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 Production Premium suite delivers awesome performance, workflow improvements, creative innovations, and powerful new audio editing capabilities that build upon the huge customer momentum Production Premium is experiencing with broadcasters, filmmakers and video professionals. The powerful Adobe Mercury Playback Engine, introduced in Adobe Premiere Pro CS5, broadens its graphics processing unit (GPU) hardware support to include laptops and more supported cards, allowing users to open projects faster, get real-time feedback and work more smoothly at higher resolutions.  If you’re at NAB this week in Las Vegas, come check out the buzz at the Adobe booth, where our evangelical video wolverine Jason Levine and others will be demoing to packed audiences.   Also at NAB, we’re hosting a panel with some great young filmmakers, including Gareth Edwards (Monsters) and Tyler Nelsen (The Social Network) on Tuesday.  I’ll be at the booth as well, so stop by, say hi and we’ll hit the tables later.

• Holy tablet-revolution Batman!  Today also sees Adobe extend the creative process beyond the desktop by helping integrate tablet devices into creative workflows.  The new Adobe Photoshop Touch Software Development Kit (SDK) enables developers to build tablet applications that interact with Photoshop from Android, BlackBerry PlayBook and iOS devices.  Adobe also announced three new iPad applications that demonstrate the creative possibilities of using tablets to drive common Photoshop workflows – Adobe Color Lava for Photoshop, Adobe Eazel for Photoshop and Adobe Nav for Photoshop. Letting a hundred flowers blossom and a hundred schools of thought contend is our policy to turbo-charge Photoshop’s integration into the tablet revolution, comrades.  Unlike some companies we think tablets are here to stay and creatives want to use them for their work.

And one more thing. Today also sees Adobe debut an affordable and flexible subscription-based pricing plan, attractive to customers that want to get current and stay current on Creative Suite products, have project–based needs, or try the software for the first time. New Subscription Editions ensure customers are always working with the most up-to-date versions of the software, without the upfront cost of full pricing. With subscription pricing customers can use flagship products, such as Adobe Photoshop for as little as US$29 per month, Adobe Design Premium CS5.5 for US$89 per month, Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 Master Collection for US$129 per month.   Yup, for less than your monthly Starbucks bill (or at least mine) you can have all of Adobe’s creative tools at your fingertips.  I’m a tall-non-fat-wet-cap kinda guy, if you have to know.

Check out Adobe TV for video tours of our new CS5.5 family.  And if you still don’t believe us, one of our execs, Johnny Loiacano has summarized all this news in his own video.

All this software goodness will ship in early May but you can pre-order today.

Holy Digital Publishing Platform Wars Batman, Adobe has launched a cool new application for iPad!!! Yes it’s true, a brand new piece of software — Adobe Ideas — is now available on the Apple iTunes App store:

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/adobe-ideas-1-0-for-ipad/id364617858?mt=8

Adobe Ideas is a digital sketchbook, letting you capture and explore ideas anywhere you go — an ideal companion for the professional design applications from Adobe, such as Illustrator or Photoshop. You know, you’re down at Starbucks gulping a Plenta, see a lady in a red pashmina* shawl, blue dress and sporting an afro……and decide that she is your creative muse. Happens all the time. See below for details:

The redoubtable John Nack is taking your feedback, from the open-minded and the zealot alike, over on his blog: http://blogs.adobe.com/jnack/

* I only know about pashmina because my wife is in the fashion biz.

A special Adobe TV broadcast airs today, in honor of the 20th anniversary of Photoshop. We got “the band” (the original four on the Photoshop team) back together again for the first time in 18 years to, to discuss their early work on the software and demonstrate Photoshop 1.0 on a rebuilt Macintosh computer. Check it out below!

You can’t escape Photoshop…it’s everywhere you go – billboard signs, magazine covers, major motion pictures, even the logo on the coffee cup you drink out of every morning have all likely been touched by Photoshop. The software that redefined creativity in the digital age, turns 20 on February 19. Celebrations are happening all around the world.

Tonight, the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP) will be hosting a special Photoshop 20th Anniversary celebration for over a thousand attendees in San Francisco at the Palace of the Fine Arts Theater. The event will feature vice president of Photoshop Product Management, Kevin Connor, Photoshop co-creator Thomas Knoll and famed Adobe creative director and Photoshop evangelist, Russell Brown. To be a part of this celebration and view the live Webcast, visit: http://www.photoshopuser.com/photoshop20th. The festivities continue overseas in Japan, Southeast Asia and throughout Europe. In honor of the 20th anniversary, Adobe Germany will host a special 20-hour online marathon, featuring over 15 local Photoshop “gurus” demonstrating their favorite tips and tricks live for Photoshop fans. In India and France, digital imaging contests will be held to showcase the work of Photoshop users.

The Photoshop community is also sharing their favorite stories online, with the product and its over 400,000 fan-strong Facebook page, the hub for a worldwide look at the product’s impact. A new “Celebrate” tab directs users to a 20th anniversary logo, which many have already personalized with Photoshop and used as a replacement for their profile image. Connect with the Photoshop team at www.facebook.com/Photoshop or http://twitter.com/photoshop, and add the tag #PS20 to tweets about the anniversary.

Avatar, have you watched the movie yet? The film has already topped $1 billion at the box office and it’s only been out for three weeks.

I had the privilege of meeting the film’s producer, Jon Landau
at Adobe’s annual user conference MAX.
Landau talked about how the film was created– and their use of Adobe software. His speech was really interesting so we pulled together a video interview about how the film was created. The Avatar crew used Photoshop, Lightroom, After Effects, Premiere Pro, Acrobat Connect, and the Flash Platform played a major role in marketing the film.

I thought the visual effects were stunning. What did you think?

It’s that time of year again. Add a touch of Adobe Photoshop to your Halloween this year – watch our very own Photoshop master, Russell Brown turn ordinary photos into scary monsters. You won’t be disappointed!

Yes, there are certain windows of time in which photographers actually get to step into the shoes of the product development team at Adobe and contribute to a final release. Today, marks the highly anticipated public preview of Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3 beta for Mac and Windows – a sneak peek of what’s to come. Lightroom has historically been an application formed from the direct feedback of photographers to address specific workflow needs. During the beta period photographers can actually moonlight as product developers, contributing their reactions, requests and responses to what currently exists in the application.

Lightroom is the essential digital photography workflow solution, helping serious amateur and professional photographers quickly import, manage, enhance and showcase all their images from one application. Available as a free download on Adobe Labs, Lightroom 3 beta delivers an early look at new tools that will be in Lightroom 3, including more intuitive importing, unparalleled noise reduction and sharpening tools, enhanced slideshow capabilities and direct publishing to online photo sharing sites like Flickr®. Visit http://labs.adobe.com/downloads to learn more and download the beta. Feedback can be submitted on the Lightroom forums: http://forums.adobe.com/community/lightroom. Users also can connect with Adobe at www.facebook.com/lightroom or www.twitter.com/AdobeLR, and can add the tag #AdobeLR3beta to tweets about the Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3 beta.