By: Tanyia Foster
Calling all creatives!: Collaborating on projects, just got easier with Adobe Creative Cloud! Adobe followed through with October 2020 talks of new updates, and released the new “invite to edit” feature, on February, 9, 2021.
The timing of these updates couldn’t have been any better, considering the current state of the Covid 19 pandemic. As we all know, much of the world has been forced to work from home, or away from others; but for many industries, teamwork is still required, even from afar. During the pandemic, there has been an increase in the need for digital content as well. From graphics, to photo and video editing and social media posts, designers and editors can now get these projects done in a joint effort, asynchronously, with the click of a few buttons.
Who Benefits From This
Whether you’re a creative in corporate or entrepreneurship, these features can benefit you. Companies and agencies who require designers to work on the same project together can now have designers and editors individually make their edits and allow the next person to pick up where they left off. Designers who have junior designers benefit from the new feature as well, in which they can monitor the work of their mentees even closer, and physically make any adjustments they might need to make themselves. This can even be beneficial to teachers and students during this time of virtual learning. As a graphic design minor at Howard University, I can attest that learning design is a lot harder when you don’t have your professor in the same room. Instead, we are stuck trying to navigate design softwares by communicating through zoom, and that is not always easy to understand and apply. Professors can now help students with their design work, directly in the design applications. They can also go in and review the exact tools students use when completing homework and assignments. I’m sure there are many other ways the invite to edit feature can be beneficial, but this is just to name but a few!
How It Works
(video embed : https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=26&v=c2L kvnP)
The process is actually quite simple. The “invite to edit” button is currently accessible in the Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, Fresco, and XD workspace. You can click the button at the top of the screen, then type in the creative cloud email address of the person you want to share and edit the files with. The process only works with cloud documents, saved as .AI and .PSD files, so you must save your files correctly for seamless collaboration. Be reminded that as of now, the collaboration feature is only asynchronous, so you can not work on projects at the same time. However, going back in when the last person is done, can still be very helpful.
More Perks From The Update
Preset synching with Adobe Photoshop is another cool feature within the update. In case you’re unfamiliar with Photoshop, if you have the software downloaded on different devices you will also have to download certain presets on each device as well. Well, that was before the new update. Now, Photoshop has a “preset synching” feature which allows you to synch all your downloaded presets across devices that have photoshop, using your creative cloud login. You no longer have to worry about downloading your custom gradients and brushes on your Mac, Macbook, and Ipad; simply hit the preset sync button and it will do the work for you.
Adobe creative cloud remains the standard design and editing software, and innovations like these are a clear induction as to why. This is a game changer for creative collaboration and according to Adobe there is more to come. Be sure to update your Adobe CC apps to the latest version to take advantage of these new features.