Section 8. Introducing Adobe Stock Photos

#8. Introducing Adobe Stock Photos

Searching for and managing stock photography has always been a bit of a challenge. You usually have to search across multiple vendors using separate log ins, select the best images, and then download comps for use in your designs. Once your designs are approved, you then have to recount which images came from which vendors, buy the rights for use, and download the high-resolution images to use in your final designs. Adobe saw room for improvement in this process and now offers the Adobe Stock Photos service.

Buying Photos via Illustrator and InDesign

Illustrator and InDesign offer convenient access to Adobe Stock Photos right from their Links palette. Once you've placed your downloaded comps into your designs and you're ready to buy the actual image, just select the comp from the Links palette, Control-click (Mac) or right-click (Windows), and choose Purchase This Image from the menu. Adobe Stock Photos opens, and the image is automatically added to your shopping cart.

Once you've purchased the full version of an image, you can replace the comp version by clicking the Relink button in the Links palette in Illustrator or InDesign and choosing the full version found in the Purchased Images folder in the Adobe Stock Photos folder: Documents/AdobeStockPhotos (Mac) or My Documents/AdobeStockPhotos (Windows).

Adobe Stock Photos is available on the Favorites tab in Adobe Bridge (Figure 8). With Adobe Stock Photos you can search, view, try, and then buy royalty-free images from various stock photography vendors all in one manageable window and from one account. What makes Adobe Stock Photos even more appealing is that it offers tight integration with all the core CS2 applications. You can download low-resolution comps and easily place them in your designs via Bridge. These comps have metadata associated with them, which is read by Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, and GoLive, so they recognize that you're working with stock images even if you rename the files. When your design is finalized, return to Adobe Stock Photos in Bridge to buy and download the high-resolution images used in your design.

Figure 8. Adobe Stock Photos is a welcome feature for those using stock photography in their designs. Its seamless integration within the suite makes the use of stock photography easier than ever before.