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Adobe recently introduced its own artificial intelligence family called “Firefly,” focused on image generation and text effects.
This is good news for genuine artists since Adobe has been in the creative market for years and has created some of the best artistic tools.
The company described it as a “family of creative generative AI models.”
On its website, Adobe showed an image created by the new tool, which was generated after receiving a short text command.
The prompt was something along the lines of “make a 3D version of a paper dragon in studio style photography.”
You can access the Adobe “Firefly beta” right away, but know the page may not load since thousands will be trying to connect.
Copyright
In the presentation, Adobe also talked about copyright, the hot topic of how AI models are trained.
To illustrate, Stable Diffusion has come under fire for training its algorithms with copyrighted material from the internet. That would violate legal protections.
Adobe said that “Firefly” was trained on Adobe’s massive image collection as well as openly licensed content or internet matter that is no longer under copyright protection.
So, in theory, “Firefly” produces copyright-free results.
Also, Adobe created a system in which photographers can ask to have their work out of the algorithm training.
According to Gizmodo, Adobe Stock trained “Firefly” with over 330 million assets, in addition to millions more coming from other sources.
But this is just pocket change. The data used by Stable Diffusion, LAION-5B, included over 5.85 billion images mined from the internet.
Speaking of which, several AI models use Stable Diffusion as their primary source to create illustrations.
Adobe is not an arriviste
Adobe Inc. is an American multinational company best known for its amazing photo-editing software Photoshop and its video-editing software Premiere Pro.
Professional video editors and photographers have used these two programmes for years to create their work.
But this brand has other products in the fields of multimedia, creativity, and digital marketing.
For instance, Adobe Creative Cloud is a suite that includes Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Premiere Pro, After Effects, Lightroom, Audition, Animate, and XD.
Another famous product from the Adobe family is Acrobat, which allows users to create, edit, view, and manage PDFs.
Adobe Experience Cloud is an additional clan member with online marketing and web solutions that include Analytics, Audience Manager, Campaign, and Target.
The creative company also offers cloud-based services and applications for working with documents across devices, such as Acrobat DC, Sign, and Scan.
The race for AI image generators
Big names are already enrolled in this contest for leadership.
Shutterstock is one of them. Earlier this year, it introduced its own generator based on OpenAI’s DALL-E model. But, as opposed to Stable Diffusion, Shutterstock plans to compensate those who offer their images to train the AI.
Nvidia, the graphic processing unit giant, is also lined up and announced its generative AI service called Picasso, which will generate images, video, and 3D presentations based on simple prompts.
But not all image banks and technology companies want to fight for market share.
Getty Images, a leading global provider of visual content, is going the other way round.
It has vetoed all AI-generated images from its platform over IP concerns and is suing Stability AI, maker of Stable Diffusion, for allegedly breaking copyright laws.
The company stated it granted licenses to top technology innovators to train artificial intelligence systems while respecting intellectual property rights. However, Getty claims that Stability AI didn’t seek any license from them and instead ignored viable licensing options and legal protections in pursuit of their stand-alone commercial interests.
Conclusion
Adobe is not an upstart, so no surprise it created AI solutions.
This company has been at the forefront of the creative market for years and as well supported professionals and authentic artists with tools to create and refine their work.
But someone is missing here: Apple.
Wouldn’t it be great if the Cupertino giant took part? Most of the big players in the tech sector are rushing to engage in this AI race.
Google and Microsoft have already launched their ChatGPT-like systems – Bard and Bing – with much fanfare.
Perhaps Apple prefers not to be involved with this artificial intelligence club.
Anyhow. All these resources change the way we work, create, and communicate, whether through images or text, but just remember that those tools will not replace the human mind.
To conceive something original, use your own brain. Even if the result is not the best, carry on instead of resorting to automated systems, which might give you the same results as other users.
Let’s take these tools for what they are: tools. They create nothing; lack creativity or imagination. They just combine elements of an extensive detailed database, following the instructions from an algorithm written by someone.
That’s all.
