Adobe has announced the latest version of its Elements software, the consumer-grade alternatives to its perennially popular Photoshop and Premiere applications.
Adobe Photoshop Elements 12 and Adobe Premiere Elements 12 should be going live any moment now, each costing $99.99, or $79.99 when upgrading from an earlier incarnation. The software is also being offered as a bundle, so those buying both will pay $149.99, or $119.99 on an upgrade.
The Next Web was given a demo of the updates by Bob Gager, Group Product Manager for Elements at Adobe. And here’s a quick snapshot of what’s new in the latest version.
Under the hood: Photoshop Elements 12
Perhaps one of the most notable additions to Photoshop Elements 12 is mobile connectivity, letting users view and share photos across their devices using Adobe Revel, creating synchronized Web albums that are accessible from anywhere.
Revel is Adobe’s photo-syncing and storing service, similar to the likes of Apple’s iCloud/Photo Stream. Adobe went freemium with Revel last year, offering a basic version of the service for free, though with significant restrictions.
It’s also worth adding that while there is a limited Revel Importer available for Android, the fully-featured mobile Revel app is only available for iOS devices and Windows 8 tablets for the time-being.
So Adobe may be best known for its suite of creative tools for the desktop, it’s clearly aware of the massive mobile photography market. This should prove popular with those already using Elements.
Other notable updates with Photoshop Elements 12 include the content-aware move tool – this has been in the full-fat version of Photoshop for a while already, letting users move or remove an object from within an image, automagically filling the empty void.
For example, if your daughter didn’t cooperate during a family photo, you can now easily fix this without having extensive photo-editing knowledge.
In the resulting updated image, things should look like everything was swell to begin with.
Similarly, the new straighten tool taps Adobe’s content-aware tech to let you complete the missing edges when you’re looking to realign a photo.
Elsewhere, there are new one-click photo frames, effects and textures which have been inspired by some of the more popular looks other people have been creating in Expert mode. And new guided edits offer step-by-step instructions to create Zoom Burst and other Photo Puzzle effects, in addition to restoring older photos to their former glory.
It’s also worth mentioning Auto Smart Tone, which is a new feature that learns a user’s preferences over time. In theory, this should lead to simpler, one-click adjustments based on historical editing decisions.
Believe it or not, it seems that ‘red eye’ in pet photos is a big problem, one that can’t be remedied by traditional red-eye removing technology. As such, Adobe has introduced a very specific feature to address this, called Pet Eye correction.
Finally, with Photoshop Elements 12, Adobe has introduced 64-bit support Macs, to allow better use of the system’s built-in memory, and should enable faster editing with larger file-sizes.
Under the hood: Premiere Elements 12
As with Photoshop Elements 12, Premiere Elements 12 now comes with mobile connectivity via Adobe Revel too for creating and sharing video albums, and Auto Smart Tone arrives on the scene too. It also features guided edits, providing step-by-step tuition on how to trim frames, add music, transitions and more.
Specific to Premiere Elements 12, a slew of new soundtracks have been added too, each of which regenerate to fit the duration of a video. This means that a 5-minute score can be made to fit a 2-minute video, and the user doesn’t have to worry about editing the intros, outros or any other facet of the matching.
More than 250 sound effects have been added too, so you can include comical audio noises, while four new filters bring a stylistic Hollywood look into the mix.
You can grab yourself the updated Photoshop and Premiere Elements now.
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