Have you ever had creative writer's block?
Spending hours on a creative project and ending up with a blank canvas?
I was having this problem when I made the video on
19 Photoshop tips and tricks you probably don’t know.
It was a great video,
but I could not figure out what to do for a thumbnail.
So, I decided to try Adobe Express.
A web-based design application with 1,000s of free templates.
I found a YouTube thumbnail template,
edited the text,
and used one of the free photos from Adobe Stock.
I decided to give it ago. And it was a total success!
This video now has over 1.9 million views
and has one of the highest click-through rates on my channel.
Adobe Express has many features that can save creative professionals a ton of time.
And even some money.
You may not be a YouTuber
or need to create YouTube thumbnails,
but if you ever have creative writer’s block,
just go into express.adobe.com
and browse through the template categories.
Like greeting cards, flyers, or menus.
You will find templates for almost any project!
And I'm not saying Adobe Express will replace Photoshop.
If you’re watching this channel, you know that I love Photoshop and wouldn’t trade it for the world
But as a creative professional, I’m always on the go.
Whether it's creating content for YouTube,
Working on a client's project.
Or flying to speaking events
I have NO time to waste.
I'm looking for every opportunity to save time and if possible money.
This is where Adobe Express comes in.
Let me show you four more reasons why you should use Adobe Express as a creative professional.
I'm sure you felt frustrated by not having
the time to post on all your social media accounts.
It's a very time consuming task,
and there are so many other things to take care of during the day.
You can definitely save some time by using a social media management tool,
but that is another additional cost to add to your budget.
But you probably already have access to a social media management tool,
and you might not even realize it if you're a member of the Creative Cloud.
Either with the Creative Cloud All Apps
plan or some single app plans, you can go to schedule.adobe.com
and access a new Adobe Express Content scheduler.
From here, you can post and schedule
content to multiple social media platforms.
You can add content from your computer or
the projects you've created in Adobe Express.
You can even schedule a post directly from your Creative Cloud desktop app.
Under the Your Files tab, select an image and click on the Calendar button.
Having a social media scheduler in the same ecosystem as your
Creative Tools is a huge time saver and a big advantage over other paid schedulers.
Another huge advantage with Adobe Express
is you can design once and use that template on multiple platforms.
As you know, there are many social media
networks now, and they all require different aspect ratios.
Oftentimes I've uploaded the same YouTube
graphic to all social media platforms because I don't have the time to create
a graphic in each different aspect ratio for each platform.
But with Adobe Express,
you can use the resize feature to easily convert a YouTube thumbnail
into an Instagram story, a Facebook post or a Pinterest graphic.
As a professional Creative and freelancer,
I always deal with contracts, invoices and other business related documents.
It's not the most fun part of the job, but it needs to get done.
Just a few days ago,
my accountant needed several documents and receipts, and he prefers them all
in one PDF, which is a bit frustrating, but thankfully it was no problem at all.
I placed all the files in one folder
and use the combined PDF Quick Action in Adobe Express to create a single PDF
from different file types, including JPEGs, Excel files and Word Docs.
The other PDF Quick Actions allow you to arrange and edit PDFs,
and you can use these Actions to create portfolios and resumes.
But if you're looking to do that,
I also recommend using Adobe Express as a free web page builder.
In Adobe Express, you can generate a link to share anything you create.
You can start with a template to create portfolios, resumes or newsletters.
Or you can use a web page option, select a theme and add anything you like.
My good friend and professional graphic designer Theresa Jackson uses them all
the time to create web pages from her travels.
I'm sure you can also find other creative uses for this web page feature.
But best of all, there is no need to spend money on hosting or learning web design.
You can make as many web pages as you like.
There are no limits.
The other quick actions in Adobe Express are equally incredible.
They allow you to quickly complete tasks
that would normally take multiple steps in other apps.
I know this video is only showcasing five
features, so I'll lump all the other Quick Actions into the fifth spot.
Some of my favorites include the photo into SVG
Quick Action.
It generates full vector images from pixels.
There's also incredible quick actions for video.
The Resizing Quick Action allows you
to quickly fit any video into any aspect ratio perfect for social media.
The newest Quick Action is a QR code generator.
QR codes are all around us now.
Whether they're on menus in restaurants,
on business cards or YouTube videos, they are here to stay.
And you can now create QR codes
directly from Adobe Express and add them to any project.
Even if you're not a member of the Creative Cloud,
head over to express.adobe.com to check out the free version.
There are plenty of free features that I'm sure you'll love.