Google rolls out new perks and Chrome OS features to facilitate creativity with Chromebooks

Chromebooks are often seen as productivity devices meant for business and education. But they are also great creative tools — a point Google hopes to get across with new updates and perks.

In a blog post on Tuesday, Google highlights how Chromebooks can be used for designing and editing photos and videos. To encourage Chromebook owners to explore their creative side, Google announced new perks that will provide access to special deals on apps. These perks include a few months of free premium access to WeVideo, Adobe Spark, Canva and more.

Google also highlights improvements it made to handwriting recognition. With the changes, the on-screen keyboard is better at recognizing different types of handwriting and annotations. If you want to delete a word from a sentence, for example, simply cross it out with your stylus. Improvements like that make writing and editing on Chromebooks feel a lot more natural.

In case you’re skeptical of a Chromebook’s capabilities as a creative tool, Google commissioned artists to create new wallpapers for Chromebook built on Chromebook.

“To explore the creative potential of Chromebooks, our team worked with Dutch artist Rick Berkelmans, who runs a design studio in the Netherlands and recently began exploring digital illustration on Chromebook,” Google said. “Rick used the built-in Canvas app with a stylus to design wallpapers just for Chromebook, using a Chromebook.”

When put in the right hands, the results look fantastic, and show the potential of Chromebooks for designers. For photographers and videographers, these devices can access many of the market’s most well known apps, including Adobe Lightroom and Clipchamp.

If there’s an artist in your life, or if you want to explore your creative side, Chromebooks can do a lot more than access Google Docs. These updates and perks are a great way for Google to reach out to a new audiences, particularly with the busy holiday period just around the corner.

The post Google rolls out new perks and Chrome OS features to facilitate creativity with Chromebooks appeared first on xda-developers.

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