Adobe has rolled out the Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 update, which provides significant upgrades to their entire Creative Suite line of products. The new version is available now and can be purchased starting at $1299 (Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 Design Standard).

5.5 includes updates for InDesign, Dreamweaver, Premiere Pro and Flash Professional, and also includes digital publishing opportunities for mobile device platforms such as the Android, Blackberry and iOS mobile devices.

The major release here is the aforementioned Adobe Digital Publishing Suite (DPS) which includes full Creative Suite program and application integration with iOS, Android and RIM Blackberry (Playbook) devices. Basically it allows users to create and manage select mobile device applications using Creative Suite programs. Designers and programmers can then use the DPS suite to publish and distribute the related applications.

In addition to the Digital Publishing Suite, Adobe released updates for alternate Creative Suite applications as well.

What’s Included in the Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 Update

Also included in the new Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 update are fresh features and upgrades for every application included in the bundle.

Adobe InDesign, Adobe’s professional ebook and page editing software. New updates to InDesign include support to add a cover graphic when exporting files, and additional support to edit story and article layout via a new placement panel. The new update also includes support to natively create mobile device compatible epub documents for iOS, Android and Blackberry devices.

Dreamweaver, Adobe’s premiere CSS3 and HTML5 web authoring tool, includes various updates such as JQuery code mobile device support, Adobe BrowserLab compatibility, and FTPS and FTPeS support. Adobe also introduced a new multi-view panel that allows designers to preview web designs on various display resolutions and types.

Premiere Pro, Adobe’s professional video editing software, now includes support for rendering video clips in real-time. The clip rendering feature uses the GPU or installed video hardware to increase overall performance and framerate/rendering issues. Additional update features include support to merge media clips together and edit them as one project, increased rolling shutter correction support, and the addition of various mobile device codecs for use with mobile application publishing.

Flash Professional is of course Adobe’s Flash authoring Suite. The new CS 5.5 update improves mobile flash development tools, better supported content layer controls, better overall content scaling and integrated mobile application testing and preview support through the development tools.

Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 Update Bundles

Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 includes 5 different price bundles and variations which are offered for different professionals.

• Creative Suite Master Collection- $2,599
• Creative Suite Design Premium Collection- $1,899
• Creative Suite Web Premium Collection- $1,799
• Creative Suite Production Premium Collection- $1,699
• Creative Suite Design Standard Collection- $1,299

As you can tell Creative Suite version 5.5 focuses more on the new HTML and CSS5 standards as well as digital mobile publishing. As the mobile application and game market continues to rise, so will the need for proper industry developers and designers. For more information check out our featured article on why developers should be paying attention to the “mobile gaming and applications market“.

This release also marks the first mid-cycle release as Adobe plans to provide a new release every 24 months. This will allow designers and programmers to experience new software and features every year if Adobe keeps on schedule.

Adobe also introduced a new subscription pricing plan which allows new and independent developers the option to try the CS5 Design premium edition for as low as $95 per month and the CS5 Master Collection for $129 per month. This new pricing plan will make the Adobe Creative Suite more readily accessible to all types of developers, and will hopefully open up the mobile development, professional design and graphic art, and HTML/CSS5 programming markets even more.

Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 Update

For more specific information about Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 update and product line you can visit the official product press release, or Adobe’s official CS5 product information page.