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Adobe Announces Photography Updates at MAX
18 October 2022
Adobe has announced updates to Photoshop and Lightroom while added a new camera-to-cloud option from Frame.io for one still camera that, the company says, previews the future.
The announcements were made at Adobe MAX, the three-day creativity conference that opened in Los Angeles today. At the same time, the company released details of updates in several blogs:
- Photoshop: Photoshop releases major update to Selections, Hole-filling, adds Share for Review Collaboration and much more by Pam Clark
- Lightroom: New features for Adobe Lightroom and more by Lisa Ngo
- Frame.io: New In-Camera Integrations with RED and Fujifilm by Michael Cioni
We had the benefit of a briefing on the updates earlier this month but haven't had a chance to try out the new features before release. So our report relies on Adobe's descriptions and demos during the briefing.
PHOTOSHOP
In her blog post, Clark notes all three versions of Photoshop were updated today, including the desktop versions, iPad version and Web version in select markets.
"We also released transformative new features in the Adobe Camera Raw plug-in and updates to the Content Authenticity Initiative and Adobe Fresco. This is a big release for the Photoshop family of products," she writes.
On the desktop, the big news is improvements to "the fidelity and quality of the automatic selections" as well as expanding the types of objects Photoshop automatically recognizes.
The Object Selection tool, for example, has been trained to recognize complex objects and regions like the sky, buildings, water, plants, different types of flooring and ground.
In addition, you can now quickly delete a selection with the new One-Click Delete and Fill tool under the Lasso. Make a selection, hold down Shift and tap Delete and the selection will be deleted with the space automatically filled using content-aware fill.
You can also now copy and paste Live Text from Illustrator. "Pasting live type as layers preserves type attributes such as font, font style, size, alignment orientation, tracking, kerning and color in Photoshop," she writes. Area type, type on a path and touch type are also supported.
Several neural filters have been improved with this release and the Photo Restoration Neural Filter has been added to detect and eliminate scratches and other minor imperfections on old photographs using machine learning.
Share for Review has been released in beta so you can create a snapshot of your document and invite a reviewer to comment on it. Comments show up in real time in a panel within Photoshop where you can view and respond to them. As you continue to update the file, reviewers see those updates as soon as the file is refreshed or reopened.
The update brings Guide Enhancements that 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.
A beta version of Content Credentials lets you attach attribution information to an image when exporting from Photoshop, helping to ensure proper attribution for the work. It also establishes an edit trail for images that have been changed or enhanced.
Substand 3D Materials lets you apply parametric Substance materials as layers in your projects. Substance materials work like 2D patterns in Photoshop but offer a greater range of customization.
The update to Photoshop on the iPad includes One-Tap Remove Background which uses Select Subject technology to isolate the main subject from the background and automatically apply a layer mask.
One-tap Content-Aware Fill can remove unintended objects in your photos, clean up defects like dust, and more.
Auto Tone, Color and Contrast correct tonal issues or color imbalances just like the desktop version does.
Leveraging Adobe's AI technology, Improved Select Subject for Portraits can select and refine small details like wisps of hair and the edges of clothes with one click.
Web
While the Web version of Photoshop is still a small subset of the desktop's power, the current iteration includes Object Selection, Remove Background, Adobe Camera Raw's image adjustments and Content-Aware Fill.
"Access to the beta is limited at this stage while we continue to test, learn and optimize the web experience," Clark notes. "Creative Cloud subscribers can find and try Photoshop on the web by going to the beta section of Creative Cloud home."
Improvements to Camera Raw include better masking workflows, removal of unwanted elements from your images and the application of presets with AI masks. Today's update include tools to select people, select objects, Content-Aware Remove and Portrait Adaptive Presets.
LIGHTROOM
In her blog post, Lisa Ngo highlghts the advances in Lightroom's new release today. Those include more advanced AI-powered masking, healing with content-aware removal and additional update by surface.
New Select People, Select Objects, and one-click Select Background join the existing Select Sky and Select Subject masking tools.
The June release of presets that use AI masking have been expanded to include AI-powered preset capability to portraits on both desktop and mobile versions of the app. You can target the entire portrait or specific features with presets like Enhance Eyes, Whiten Teeth, Darken Eyebrows, and more with a single click or tap.
You can also now access the power of AI masks for Sky and Subject on mobile through Adaptive Presets. With one tap, Lightroom can detect and create an adaptive mask based on the contents of the image.
A Mask Amount Slider allows you to adjust the intensity of the edits applied to local adjustments. And more Android devices are getting masking support with the introduction of server-side support for Android devices.
Healing With Content-Aware Removal
Utilizing the same Content-Aware technology as Photoshop, Lightroom will adaptively fill in removed blemishes based on surrounding content. The feature includes a Refresh option and the option to pick the sampled area with keyboard commands for finer healing control.
You can now edit in Compare Mode while looking at image side-by-side on the Windows and macOS version of Lightroom. With GPU acceleration, images load faster, too.
In Lightroom Classic you can swap the left and right panels for all modules or just Develop.
There's Faster preview loading and importing on Windows machines from connected portable devices such as phones, tablets, etc.
And the same Camera Raw improvements Photoshop are available in Lightroom.
For more, see the blog for details.
FRAME.IO
Frame.io's Michael Cioni explains the New In-Camera Integrations With RED and Fujifilm that address "the inconvenient disruption of needing to download or ship some sort of physical media in order to edit or share it."
He sees today's announcement as a preview of the future:
With the Camera to Cloud integration now built directly into the cameras, we've taken the next step toward the cloud-based workflow we've been envisioning -- no additional hardware and no hard drives required. This is more than just a technological first -- it's a snapshot of the way every creative will work in the future.
The only still camera with this currently is the Fujifilm X-H2S. It natively integrates Frame.io Camera to Cloud.
"When paired with the FT-XH file transfer attachment to establish an Internet connection, photography workflows will be fully cloud-based, with Frame.io supporting high-resolution Raw files with loupe, navigation and annotation tools," he writes. "You can shoot anything -- from a wedding to a sporting event or live concert -- send your photos (or video) to someone on your team so they can retouch the asset -- and share it or post it without ever having to exchange a drive or camera card or any kind of physical media."
MORE TO COME
In addition to the updates rolling out today to Creative Cloud subscribers, Max promises a few Sneak Peaks at upcoming technologies. So stay tuned!