Adobe Enters the Mac App Store With 'Photoshop Elements 9 Editor

As noted by Macworld, Adobe has finally dipped its toe into the Mac App Store for the first time, releasing a slightly scaled-down version of its consumer Photoshop Elements software, Adobe Photoshop Elements 9 Editor. Priced at $79.99, Photoshop Elements 9 Editor drops the Adobe Elements Organizer functionality found in the retail version of the software, but is also discounted by $20 off the retail list price.

The omission of the Elements Organizer, a tool for managing images, will not affect users who depend on iPhoto to manage their image library, and is in fact designed to be used alongside iPhoto for more advanced editing features than iPhoto offers. 

The Mac App Store version of Elements 9 includes the same editing tools that made the full version popular, including content aware-fill, Group Shot, Panorama, and Style Match Photomerge tools. The novice-friendly application offers guided edit modes that walk users though adding effects and cleaning up photos.

Apple has of course been pushing its Mac App Store as the future of software delivery for the Mac platform, going so far as to distribute its new OS X Lion exclusively through the store beginning today. While a number of other developers have embraced the Mac App Store for its ease of software distribution and consumer convenience, observers have been waiting for some of the software heavyweights like Adobe and Microsoft to make their presences felt in the marketplace. 

Microsoft has also dabbled in the Mac App Store with its free Windows Phone 7 Connector, and while it may be quite some time before the software giants release their flagship Creative Suite and Office software through the Mac App Store, if they ever choose to do so, it is encouraging to see them making their first efforts at distributing content through Apple's preferred software marketplace.

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