2026 Oscar-nominated filmmakers on why they chose Adobe
Image Source: A24.
Awards season culminates this weekend with the 98th Academy Awards®. And once again, many of this year’s Oscar®-nominated films share something in common: They showcase bold storytelling crafted with Adobe Creative Cloud tools like Premiere, After Effects and Frame.io.
From Best Picture contenders like “Marty Supreme” and “Train Dreams” to acclaimed documentaries like “The Perfect Neighbor,” “The Alabama Solution,” and “Cutting Through Rocks,” filmmakers relied on Adobe to move faster, collaborate globally and work with complete creative control.
“One of the biggest advantages of cutting ‘Train Dreams’ on Adobe Premiere,” editor Parker Laramie said, “is I was able to get a finished offline edit that was much more polished than with other tools I’ve used. It’s very malleable. You can use it however you’d like to use it.”
Let’s take a closer look at how filmmakers used Adobe tools to bring these award-winning stories to life.
Image Source: Neon.
Managing complexity while maintaining momentum
Across genres, filmmakers turned to Adobe to manage complexity without slowing creative momentum.
The editors of “Marty Supreme" leveraged Productions in Premiere—a tool designed to organize multi-project workflows, share assets between projects, and keep everything streamlined—to power fast-paced, collaboration across multiple editors. On “Train Dreams,” Laramie used Premiere, After Effects and Frame.io from assembly through final delivery to shape a polished, performance-driven edit.
For Best International Feature nominee “It Was Just an Accident,” Premiere and After Effects enabled a secure, proxy-based workflow under constrained production conditions, demonstrating how creative control can endure even in the most challenging environments.
In documentary filmmaking, which often involves sifting through hundreds of hours of footage whether archival, found, original capture, body cam or surveillance footage - editors turned to Premiere. Its format-agnostic workflows, which make it easy to deal with many different kinds of footage together, and tools like Speech-to-Text transform vast and complex material into cohesive, emotionally resonant narratives.
“The magic of Premiere is how easy and seamless it is to work with so many different types of media,” said “The Perfect Neighbor” editor Viridiana Lieberman. “All of our sources were different frame rates, sizes, colors — you name it. The solutions were embedded in the application.”
Behind each of these projects is a common theme: creative control without compromise.
Why editors choose Adobe
Image Source: Netflix.
Editors consistently credit flexibility, efficiency and intuitive workflows as reasons they continue to choose Premiere. Their experiences reflect how Adobe tools adapt to different storytelling styles, from intimate documentaries to kinetic features.
Page Marsella, editor of “The Alabama Solution” said, “I think that Premiere is a really common documentary choice because it makes it really easy to just create something right away and I think that’s really valuable to directors and producers.”
Adobe’s creative tools support filmmakers at every stage of production and post, from multi-cam editing in Premiere and dynamic graphics integration with After Effects, to remote collaboration with Frame.io. Whether managing complex timelines or refining invisible visual effects, teams rely on interoperability, streamlined workflows, and intelligent tools that keep creativity moving from first cut to final delivery.
Empowering filmmakers through innovation
As production timelines accelerate, the need for streamlined, collaborative tools continues to grow.
Built in partnership with the filmmaking community, innovations like Productions in Premiere, Text-Based Editing, Dynamic Link and Media Intelligence are designed to reduce friction, simplify complex workflows and help creative teams stay focused on what matters most — telling powerful stories.
Year after year, from rising new voices to the season's most acclaimed talent, filmmakers continue to demonstrate that exceptional storytelling depends on exceptional craft. We are honored to support the artists behind this year's standout films and series.
To learn more, check out Premiere, After Effects and Frame.io.