Adobe launches text-to-image generator Firefly

Creatives such as photographers, graphic designers and art directors always need inspiration. Why not get all that ‘inspiration', feed it into a computer and let AI churn out a result that is theoretically unique and copyright free? So is this the democratisation or the dumb-ification of the creative industry? Is the saying ‘you can’t buy style’ going to evolve into ‘style = press button’? More importantly, what effect will AI image generation have on working photographers?

This week, imaging giant Adobe marked its entry into the AI image creation space with the announcement of FireFly, an application capable of producing images and artwork from simple text descriptions. The software is currently in beta development and will be available as part of the Adobe Creative Suite.

"Adobe is designing Firefly to give all creators superpowers to work at the speed of their imaginations,” claims the press release. 

“With Adobe Firefly, everyone who creates content – regardless of their experience or skill – will be able to use their own words to generate content the way they dream it up, from images, audio, vectors, videos and 3D to creative ingredients, like brushes, color gradients and video transformations, with greater speed and ease than ever before.

"With Adobe Firefly, producing limitless variations of content and making changes, again and again — all on brand — will be quick and simple. Adobe will also integrate Firefly directly into its industry leading tools and services, so users can effortlessly leverage the power of generative AI within their existing workflows." 

Over the past few years, Adobe has lost ground to the Australian-based online design platform Canva. Firefly will compete with Canva's recently launched Text to Image software and other AI image generators including Midjourney and Dall-E.

Stay tuned for our upcoming article on the state of AI and its impacts on professional photographers.