At the Adobe Max keynote recently, Adobe announced several new mobile apps that connect you directly with your Adobe profile and makes it easy to access what you do between your devices. One of those is Photoshop Mix.

My Test Run

I decided to go ahead and try a quick feature and play with the new Adobe Photoshop Mix. Heres what I did.

1. Get an image. I opened the app and imported a typical cell phone portrait of my daughter. The app can see your camera roll, camera, Creative Cloud, Lightroom Mobile and Facebook.

2. Extract an object. I was able to remove the background fairly easy. Its not perfect but for an average user, this is very intuitive and user friendly. This will either create a lot of bad composites from the regular phone user or allow those with more advance skills to create some pretty creative pieces with just their phone. You can also composite the image over itself to adjust foreground and background independently.

Note: These files can be sent on to a desktop version of Photoshop for refinement.

3. Enhance. If you notice along the bottom, you can create looks, crop and more. For example, if you go into “adjust” you can play with Exposure, Contrast, Clarity and Saturation. You click on the adjustment and swipe left or right with your finger to create the look you desire. Once you are done, hit the checkmark. “Looks” are the “Instagram” type filters you can apply to your image. The “Cut Out” allows you to remove the background as I’ve already done.

With some quick sizing I was able to create a composite all within 5 minutes of downloading and using this app.

4. Go Desktop. Heres where it gets fun. You can then upload your photos and access it right from your desktop version of Photoshop. With Creative Cloud synced to all your devices this allows for easy access to your files between devices.

Conclusion

The picture examples I used are typical everyday phone photos. They aren’t spectacular or amazing but for the average user, this is seemly a pretty awesome tool to import, edit and play with photos stored on your phone.

For more serious phone photographers, this opens a wonderful new world of edits and ingrates work flows between your phone and Photoshop. All you have to do is import your images and click upload. Once you open photoshop your images are in photoshop saved as a PSD. I know several very serious phone photographers and this tool will only enhance what they are already doing.

Here’s an in-depth look at Photoshop Mix from frequent Photofocus guest Terry White.

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