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Adobe announces new features and updates to its Creative Cloud apps at Adobe MAX

Adobe MAX 2022 starts today where Adobe has announced updates to its line of Creative Cloud applications. Below are just a few of the biggest highlights and new features.

Photoshop CC

The Object Selection Tool was introduced in 2020 and automatically detects objects in an image, allowing users to select it with a single click. This tool has been improved and can now detect more objects with better precision:

Now, the Object Selection tool recognizes complex objects and regions such as the sky, buildings, water, plants, different types of flooring and ground (e.g., mountains, sidewalks, streets). With these improvements, you can save time and get more precise and high-quality selections, all the while preserving hair details and edges.

One-Click Delete and Fill is a new feature that combines the Object Selection Tool, Content-Aware Fill, and the Shift-Delete fill command into a single tool that makes removing an object from an image easier than ever before:

With one-click Delete and Fill, customers can easily remove an object from an image entirely by clicking on it to select and then pressing Shift+Delete. The removed area is automatically filled using content-aware fill… all in a single action.

Old photograph of a girl riding a horse on a carousel

A new Photo Restoration filter has been added to Photoshop’s Neural Filters:

The Photo Restoration Neural Filter helps you bring an old or damaged photo back to life. The filter uses machine learning to detect and eliminate scratches and other minor imperfections on old photographs.

Photoshop Guides layout panel

Guides also see a bit of an overhaul in the latest update to Photoshop:

Guides Enhancements provide additional guide functionality at the document level to customize and streamline day-to-day work in Photoshop. Guides enhancements include adding the ability to customize and colorize guides, edit guide properties, access guides via new keyboard shortcuts, and use accessible guide options with a new right-click context menu. You can now also delete guides with the delete key, as well as multi-select to edit and move guides.

Photoshop for iPad

Making selections “on the go” gets easier with the addition of One-tap Remove Background and improvements to the Select Subject for Portraits tool:

Remove Background saves time by using Select Subject technology to quickly isolate the main subject from the background and automatically apply a layer mask. This allows you to take the subject and place it within other images, replace backgrounds with other scenes, and more. Using only a single tap, select the most prominent subject in an image — people, animals, vehicles, toys, and more — and remove the background.

The Select Subject tool has been improved to take better advantage of Adobe’s AI technology to identify people, animals, and additional objects with one tap:

When Select Subject is used on a portrait photo, it will automatically complete all the hair and edge refinements. Once selected, it’s easy to use masks and adjustment layers to quickly transform simple portraits into even more stunning images!

You can read the full list of changes and features coming to Photoshop right here.

Lightroom

Photo of a wedding couple on a bridge with the groom selected with the new Select People tool in Adobe Lightroom

Much like Photoshop, new updates to Lightroom focus on making selections easier with the inclusion of Select People, Select Objects, and background removal.

Select People can detect and create masks for specific parts of a portrait.

Powered by Adobe Sensei, Select People can detect and generate high-quality masks for individuals or groups in any portrait. Specific body parts like face skin, body skin, eyes, teeth, lips, hair, and more can also be selected. Our expanded interface for Select People allows you to quickly create all the necessary selections with fewer clicks and brush strokes.

Brush Select tool in Adobe Lightroom

Select Objects is now the quickest and most flexible way to mask objects in Lightroom that will help you make targeted edits seamlessly. Simply paint over the desired object with Brush Select or draw a rectangle around it with Rectangle Select, and our AI will automatically refine the edges to create a precise mask.

Remove the background of a photo in Adobe Lightroom with a single click

Previously you could select the background by inverting a mask of the subject. Now our AI can directly generate a mask for the background with a single click.

You can read the full list of changes and features coming to Lightroom right here.

Fresco

Adobe Fresco turns three and receives a new Motion tool, multicolor swatches, and the addition of a Free Transform & Liquify Tool:

Fresco’s motion tools make it simple to add animation to your artwork. Innovative motion paths in Fresco make it easy to create multiple moving variations of anything you can draw! New capabilities include grow/shrink and sway.

New multi-color brush strokes in Adobe Fresco

Multi-color Swatches give the artist a unique ability to pull from a variety of colors and create one-of-a-kind brush strokes. This magical feature now has updated swatches which allow you to paint 3D strokes and lettering.

You can read the full list of changes and features coming to Fresco right here.

After Effects

Adobe After Effects screenshot

Here is what Adobe has to say about the new release of After Effects:

The latest release of Adobe After Effects is now shipping with new features to address the needs of modern motion designers. Highlights include Selectable Track Mattes, which make working with mattes dramatically easier while also keeping compositions smaller. Native H.264 encoding gives users the option to export files directly from After Effects. We’re also including over 50 new presets created by professional designers to accelerate common creative tasks.

Frame.io integrations with RED and Fujifilm

Adobe has expanded its Camera to Cloud integration with improvements to Frame.io:

Updates to the Creative Cloud applications should be rolling out starting today. Check out Adobe’s website for all the details regarding the new updates and features.

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