Adobe (News - Alert) is putting a lot of effort into strengthening its Adobe Connect web conferencing platform, with a new round of updates announced this week.

Adobe Connect 9.2, which is set for release in early 2014, incorporates a filmstrip view for the video pod, enabling the presenter to choose between the filmstrip view and the grid view as well as decide which camera should be highlighted as the main video feed.

“Video is an extremely important element of web conferencing,” said Alistair Lee, adobe senior product enablement manager. “Video can establish eye contact between individuals and often helps to improve communication through the use of facial expressions. The video pod has always been one of the most commonly used pods in Adobe Connect.”

Adobe Connect 9.2 allows the presenter to choose between the filmstrip view and the grid view.

The video pod also will include a new fullscreen mode. Presenters can force their view on all participants, ensuring everyone sees the video pod in full screen. It’s also possible to hide the title bar of the video pod.

Lee said the latest version of Adobe Connect has an improved user interface to make it easier for new users to get started quickly. New users will receive an email with their username and a link, which will take them immediately to their new Adobe Connect room.

“The first time they visit, they’ll be asked to give their room a name and a custom URL,” Lee said. “That’s it. Nothing to schedule, nothing to setup. The virtual room is automatically created and ready to use immediately. Since it persists forever, the new user can simply distribute their custom URL to invite anyone to their room.”

Adobe Connect 9.2 also will streamline registration by integrating social profiles to register for an event, allowing attendees to use a Facebook (News - Alert) or Google profile to register for an event and login to the webinar. Event hosts will still be able to ask registration questions and capture basic profile information like email address automatically.

“We believe this will result in a significantly lower abandonment rate for marketing webinars and events,” Lee said.