These free Adobe drawing apps will help you get creative in the cloud

ADOBE is throwing some free iPad apps into the mix this year.

The new Adobe Creative Cloud Pen and slide set.

ADOBE charges $50 a month for Australians to access its extensive Creative Cloud suite, but this year it’s also throwing some free iPad apps into the mix.

The first, Adobe Sketch, lets you sketch using a virtual pencil, pen, markers and brush. There’s also an eraser. The app has a colour picker; alternatively you can create a colour theme based on an uploaded image. Multi-touch gestures enable panning, and swiping with two fingers lets a user undo and redo elements of work.

There’s a palm rejection mode so that a palm doesn’t inadvertently wreck the design.

The second app, Adobe Line, is a digital replacement for drafting tools. It uses virtual versions of tools such as rulers, T-squares and shape templates. Shapes range from circles and triangles to desert flora and fashion figures. You can draw lines, circles and French curves with your finger.

The commercial side of these apps is the new Adobe Creative Cloud ink and slide set. The ink — a digital pen — links to an iPad using Bluetooth 4.0. The slide is a digital ruler that draws shapes on an iPad. The set sells for $US200 in the US and will be sold in Australia in future.

Adobe says you don’t need the ink and slide set to enjoy the free apps. If you’re happy with using your finger and gestures, the free offering can be entertaining.

The third app is Photoshop Mix, a photo correction tool that includes an ability to cut out shapes from images as well as automatically enhance and adjust them. Users can also open Photoshop documents and work with individual layers from PSD files in the app.

An interesting feature of Mix is how it works with the cloud. It can send requested image changes to the cloud and perform the hard computational work on Adobe’s servers, rather than overtax the grunt on an iPad.

The three are iPad-only apps, but Adobe hasn’t ruled out making them available for Android in future. To use them, you’ll need to open a free Adobe Creative Cloud account.