Adobe Creative Cloud is a Platform for Developing and Sharing Ideas
Ten years ago, media production software like Photoshop, Acrobat, and InDesign was used primarily by specialists in communication and creativity. Since then, the Adobe Creative Suite of applications has dramatically evolved alongside and within the digital transformation revolution.
Today, Adobe Creative Cloud is a digital ecosystem, a platform, for everyone to create and share ideas. Within higher education, this means that every student, every faculty member, every class, every major, and every discipline can now use the breadth of solutions within Adobe Creative Cloud to solve problems and share knowledge, both traditional and emerging.
In other words, the dozens of applications and services within Creative Cloud are equally relevant across the curriculum. Consider, for example, the four most fundamental student learning outcomes shared by all courses, disciplines, and academic programs -- the famous four Cs of education:
- to communicate effectively
- to think critically
- to work collaboratively
- to solve problems creatively
Cultivating these outcomes to prepare students for the world of today and the workplace of tomorrow hinges increasingly on digital, information, and networked technologies. Such preparation aims to moves students away from being passive consumers of other people's content toward becoming active creators of their own ideas. This is why creativity tools such as Photoshop, Lightroom, InDesign, Spark, Premiere Rush, Acrobat, and Illustrator are equally relevant in every course and discipline.
Creative Cloud is not just for design and art majors
So you have an assignment to complete, and can choose any genre or format you like to get your work done. Should you make a magazine, a film, a poster, a podcast, a website, or a mobile application? How can you pick the best genre, format, and media approach when it’s up to you to choose?
The best way to accomplish this, the best way to get your work done, is to focus first on questions such as:
- What problem do I need to help solve?
- What does my community, organization, classmates, or collaborators need?
- What do I want to learn?
- What knowledge do I want to produce and share?
Click below to jump down to browse examples in your areas of interest
Writing Assignment Examples
Literary/Media Analysis
"OH, THE THINGS THEY MAKE!"
This project came from an in-class prompt where students were asked to create composite images as a way of explaining or responding to or representing critical ideas from a selected course reading.
Class: 200-level course (Intro to Digital Rhetoric)
Software: Photoshop, Spark Post
Winter in My Country
Tianqi Cai, a student in my class last summer, produced an expository writing assignment through a community/history discourse, but did so as a video project.
She produced the audio and video elements on separate devices. Did her storyboarding and writing on another. And then used Premiere Pro CC as just assemblage platform (minus a few edits). Comparing the video to the original essay provides a meaningful comparison between the two.
Class: 200-level course (Expository Writing)
Software: Adobe Audition, Adobe Premiere Pro
Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math
Collections of examples of creativity in STEM projects
"Using digital tools in addition to traditional research techniques enables researchers to go “the next step”.
- Enriching the traditional presentation or symposium
- Socializing/promoting work to a wider audience
- Most importantly, new assets/artifacts to include in CV’s, resumes and portfolios
Examples of Student Work
Electrical Engineering
Software used: Lightroom, Illustrator, Spark, InDesign, Acrobat, Premiere
Research Poster
Students at Northwestern University were tasked to create a visually rich and scaleable poster that could be used both online and for poster printing; from a few inches in size to 3' by 4 '.
Class: Materials Science Engineering
Software: Illustrator, Photoshop, InDesign, and Acrobat
Graduate Communications Course Website
Students were tasked with creating and socializing a new course for improving communications skills for scientists and engineers. The students needed to build a full featured website quickly that could be scaled up as the site evolved.
Class : Research Communication Training Program
Software: Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Dreamweaver
International Engineering Competition sponsored by Shell Oil
Environmental, automotive, and electrical engineering students combined as team to submit a winning proposal at the international competition
Software used:
- Adobe XD to design a mobile application prototype to regulate emissions
- Illustrator to design graphics and infographics in their proposal
- Premiere Pro to produce and edit a video that illustrates and narrates their project
- After Effects to animate key aspects of their video
Biological Sciences Research
Collaborative research project. Students use video, 3D rendering and graphic illustrations for digital presentation on patterns in movement with this data story.
Software: Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere, InDesign, Acrobat Pro
Interactive 3D Report
Adobe Acrobat Pro used to integrate multiple media types including 3D objects. Once created, These 3D objects can be viewed and manipulated and marked up directly within the free Adobe Reader
Class: Biology
Software: Adobe InDesign, Adobe Acrobat Pro
Understanding Calculus - Visualizing Volumes of 3D images
High School Students in Connecticut develop imagery to better visualize how complex volumes are described through Calculus. These students worked in a multi-disciplinary environment that blended Art, Mathematics, and Science to understand the relevance of each in the real world.
Class: Interdisciplinary project between Math and Blended Art courses
Software: Adobe Photoshop, Adobe InDesign, Adobe Acrobat Pro
Business and Marketing
Data visualization, collaboration, and digital literacy are among the top skills needed in today's workplace
Examples of student creativity in Business and Marketing
Rapid prototyping of applications, websites, and marketing campaigns focuses on the user experience
Using a cohesive design system in Adobe XD, teams can collaborate asynchronously and easily share without code.
Students Jam with Adobe to improve their digital skills and get inspired.
Class: Multi-disciplinary Collaboration
Software: Adobe XD, Adobe Creative Cloud, Spark Post
Student Portfolios
Examples of student work
Portfolio development and professional networking is an essential skill allowing students to curate cohesive artifacts focused on specific opportunities while increasing awareness of their personal brand
Students using Creative Cloud have access to Adobe Portfolio and Behance; a professional networking platform for showcasing creative work.
With Adobe Portfolio, choose from a selection of layouts created with a portfolio in mind, designed to fit any creative field, from art, illustration, photography, graphic design, fashion, architecture, motion graphics, to web design, business, and more.
Portfolios can include all types of components for multi-modal delivery that demonstrates digital fluency.
Software: Adobe Creative Cloud, Adobe Portfolio
Health Sciences
Renewed interest and enrollment in Health Sciences with an emphasis on digital skills and enhanced visual communication benefit both the medical professional and patient
Health Sciences Research
The University of Colorado Anschutz medical school has lead the way for their entire campus in Denver to provide Creative Cloud to all of its students. CU MD student Vincent Fu has leveraged Creative Cloud in the health sciences in the following ways:
Research Poster
Department of Biology
PSA and Patient Guides
Syllabus for a IDPT 6674 Digital MD: Social Media & Scholarship
Software: InDesign, Illustrator, Spark, Acrobat
Photoshop in Medicine
Photoshop's 3D workspace allows researchers to repurpose 3D models and DICOM Scans to create interactive views that can be published to Adobe Acrobat Reader or as MP4 video
Photoshop's 3D Workspace provides a number of tools for repurposing and publishing to universal file formats.
Additional Learning Resources
Explore this new practical guide created by Dr. Todd Taylor, Professor of English at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. Adobe Creative Cloud Across the Curriculum: A Guide for Students and Teachers is a rich online resource for students who want to tackle their academic work in innovative, digital ways and teachers in all disciplines who want to incorporate digital assignments into their coursework.
Click on the links below to learn more.
Explore Adobe Tutorials from Beginner to Advanced
Creative Cloud Projects for Students
Learn the basics, or refine your skills with tutorials designed to inspire.
Get Noticed = Get Hired
As part of Adobe's Creative Cloud, the Behance Student Show is an exclusive community for current students to share work and gain exposure. Search by discipline or major - Upload projects or works in progress today to gain real-time feedback, make connections, and even get hired.
For more information and resources on how Adobe can help you explore new boundaries in teaching and academic innovation, please visit this URL below.
Credits:
Special thanks to Todd Taylor; Professor UNC Chapel Hill, Justin Hodgson; Professor Indiana University, Jim Babbage and Robert McDaniels - Adobe Systems