Monday , March 18 2024
With this new app you can you can brainstorm on the fly and prototype your designs in a mobile environment, then send them directly to InDesign, Photoshop, or Illustrator as fully editable native objects.

New Software Newsflash: Adobe Comp CC Lets You Design Directly on Your iPad

In its continuing effort to bring you innovative new tools to help you design and create both in the office and on the go, Adobe has just released Adobe Comp CC. This application is designed for use on the iPad and it offers pioneering design capabilities that lets you work like you would on a sketch pad, but unlike the sketch pad lets you instantly convert your designs to live implementations.

Adobe Comp CC
Adobe Comp CC

Through the use of layouts, shapes, fonts from Typekit, and other resources from your Creative Cloud Libraries, you can quickly and easily combine everything you need to design and perfect your creations which can then be sent directly to InDesign, Photoshop, and Illustrator as fully editable native objects. There you can refine and develop them into a production-quality project to be handed off to a printer, client, or developer.

Normally when people design new layouts they will get pencil and paper or dry erase marker and whiteboard and begin sketching out the new design. This works great in getting the creative juices flowing, but you then have to redo everything back at the computer. Adobe Comp CC lets you do your sketching on your iPad, and it will translate your design into real objects and components directly. You can then add your company’s or your client’s brand colors and assets directly into your layout, giving you the ability to prototype your design live.

Adobe Comp CC
Adobe Comp CC

Adobe Comp CC is the latest app in Adobe’s Connected Creativity platform, which connects your mobile device to your desktop via the Creative Cloud. With Connected Creativity, mobile development is not a disconnected standalone app, but rather an extension of your whole workflow. In this model it represents another tool in your arsenal to accomplish a needed task.

Adobe Comp CC
Adobe Comp CC

While you may create assets, elements, and other things on your desktop, they are also housed, through your Adobe ID, in the Creative Cloud libraries. This way, when you log in with an application, such as Adobe Comp CC, all of those resources are also available for use on your mobile device wherever you are, so you now have everything you need when you need it. An added benefit is that everything you design on your mobile device is automatically backed up to the cloud in the event something were to happen you your device.

On launching the app you are presented with some example designs that you can play with, or you can press the plus sign on the left bar to create a new project. To create a new project you begin by selecting a format template such as a mobile device layout, paper layout, web layout, or you can create a new design.

Adobe Comp CC
Adobe Comp CC

There are two modes once you are in: Drawing and Editing. When in Drawing mode, you can use your finger to draw rough shapes that correspond to the Drawing Gestures guide. These are 16 shapes that correspond to things like multiline text, headlines, images, rounded rectangles, and more. This is how you build the general layout. From there you can add text, images, and other assets as you need. Once you are done, you can send it off to Adobe InDesign, Photoshop, or Illustrator.

Adobe Comp CC
Adobe Comp CC

Adobe Comp CC is very straightforward and easy to use from the get-go. It lets you be creative in a direct, forward-moving way, giving you all the basics for layout and the ability to add your own assets and branding as needed. That means that you can not only brainstorm on the fly, but prototype your designs as well in a mobile environment, making it easy to make changes based on the needs and directions of others that you work with. While this is a Version 1 release and I think that there is more that can be done with it, such as working with more applications, such as Adobe Muse, and working on other mobile platforms, I do think that this is a very good first effort and for that reason I can highly recommend this app.

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About T. Michael Testi

Photographer, writer, software engineer, educator, and maker of fine images.

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