Adobe Create Now — Melissa Lee

Recently, I had the honor of being a local showcase presenter at Adobe's Create Now Sacramento June 4th event! I went to an Adobe event in San Francisco way back in 2015 and it was great so I was already considering attending the Sacramento event this year, and then lo and behold, I received an email from the host asking if I’d like to present. 😳❣️

Adobe Create Now is a space for you to connect with fellow local creators, explore new ways to collaborate, and enhance your creative process with pro tips for Photoshop, Illustrator, Adobe Firefly, Adobe Express, and more!✨

FREE entry, snacks, and drinks!🥤🥨 PLUS a chance to win a Creative Cloud membership! 😱🌟🕺🏻

Check out Adobe's event page to see if they're hosting an event near you! #AdobeCreateNow

ADOBE CREATE NOW EVENT PAGE

Photography by Sean Stewart. (@art_is_life_photography).

Everyone at Adobe was so kind and helpful; it really made the whole experience so easy and enjoyable. Don’t get me wrong, my presentation was still pretty nerve-wracking (despite it only being about 5-6 minutes long), but it could have been a lot more anxiety-inducing had I not had the support of such genuinely lovely and cool people.💖

For my presentation, I was asked to create or edit a project using new Adobe Creative Cloud features. Over the past month, I have been experimenting in the beta builds of both Illustrator and Photoshop and one of the new features that I'm most excited about is Generative Expand in Photoshop.

I found the first graphic on the Adobe Create Now Sacramento event page and I wanted to use it for an Instagram story so I popped it into Photoshop, and using the Crop Tool, I dragged the edges of the top and bottom until it looked to be about the right shape, and clicked Generate. You can also enter an exact ratio with generative expand, but in this case, I didn't really care if it was the perfect Instagram story 1080 by 1920 pixels so I opted for freely dragging the edges with the Crop Tool. It took less than a minute! 🪄

I did the same thing with photos of flowers that I've taken and came up with some really beautiful results, again in seconds. So far, I've found that it works best with pictures that have some blur to them, but you can still come up with some nice results with sharper images as well.

The new feature that I am the most excited about, and have been having the most fun with, is Generative Recolor in Adobe Illustrator.🎨

This is the original artwork I created and after about 40 minutes (give or take) of experimentation with Generative Recolor, I came up with...

…all of these beauties.🤩

I am someone who has always liked the idea of having a bunch of different colorways for one print, at least if you have your work on print-on-demand (POD) sites because then you wouldn't be overproducing and causing waste, as it's printed to order. I'm also required to make three different colorways as a quilting fabric designer. Having multiple different color variations gives buyers more options for a wider range of tastes and design aesthetics. However, in the past, I have found recoloring to be too time-consuming to do for all of my artwork. Generative Recolor has cut down on that time astronomically.🎨🌟

I mostly used the default prompts that are included by Adobe, which include: Terracotta Desert, Lavender Storm, Dark Blue Midnight, and Trippy Disco Lights. I also tried some of my own prompts: Evergreen, Vintage Blue, and Plum Purple.

I’ve noticed that Generative Recolor tends to skew to the brighter, bolder, more saturated end of the color spectrum, while the colors I tend to be drawn to are on the dustier, somewhat desaturated spectrum. When I tried the prompt “plum purple” the first time, it generated bright, saturated purples, which was really not the vibe I was going for. I tried the same prompt again, but this time added a few different dusty purple color swatches for reference before hitting “Generate.” The added color swatches gave it the direction it needed to generate the version you see here.😍💜

I made a few changes here and there, popped open the Recolor Artwork Tool (or the RAT, as I affectionately like to call it 😉 🐀), and switched a couple of colors around and/or bumped up the contrast, but most of these color variations required little to no tinkering.😱 I really like that it retains similar values so you rarely need to worry about contrast issues.

It works better for some art than others. You’re not always going to magically generate a ton of really great options, but even so, it can still provide ideas and be a great jumping-off point. Oh, and it’s really fun to use! It can both save a ton of time and cause you to waste time playing with it.😂

I made a fun Instagram reel of the event that you can watch HERE.💖

Now, to address the elephant in the room…I know generative AI brings up a lot of fears and worries for a lot of people, especially creatives. I’m one of them! If you’re interested in reading my complicated, somewhat lengthy, feelings on this issue, specifically in regards to Adobe, I made a blog post about it.

READ IT HERE

We are in unprecedented times, folks. We can only do our best to act as ethically as possible in a capitalist landscape. We are in A Society™️ and it is tough. Adobe hasn’t been perfect, but at least they’re trying. Your mileage may vary, but to me, that matters.

That said, do what feels best for you! I’m not here to tell you what to do. And whatever the case, keep on keepin’ on. Keep making art, and don’t forget to be creative purely for the simple joy of it. Thanks for reading!😊