Adobe wants Photoshop to be more like a new acquisition Figma – BNN Bloomberg

(Bloomberg) — Adobe Inc. is tweaking its most famous product to work more like the design tool it was given $20 billion to acquire.

Photoshop, the company’s flagship photo editing product, will add more collaboration tools, artificial intelligence features and web capabilities as the creative giant intends to update its software portfolio for a younger and more casual audience. Last month, Adobe announced it would buy Figma Inc. to try and attract some of the small businesses, social media creators, and laypeople that have been flocking to the burgeoning web-based design tools maker.

Unveiled Tuesday at Adobe’s annual product conference, the updates symbolize the company’s efforts to streamline its offering as smaller competitors like Figma and Canva Inc. threaten the software juggernaut’s market dominance. Adobe has responded with updates to its suite of desktop creative tools and the launch of a slimmed-down online Photoshop and Adobe Express, a web-based service that looks more like Canva than other Adobe products on the desktop.

Browser-based products are critical to Adobe’s efforts to attract new customers, Chief Product Officer Scott Belsky said in an interview. “There’s no problem when you can just click and be in a web app in seconds.”

Integrating design tool Figma could help “modernize the entire Creative Cloud product portfolio over the next 3-5 years,” Piper Sandler analyst Brent Bracelin wrote in a note on Monday. Adobe has said the deal is expected to close sometime in 2023, subject to regulatory approvals.

Nevertheless, Wall Street judged the takeover to be too expensive and revealed stronger competitive pressure than previously thought. Adobe’s shares have fallen 22% since the deal was announced, more than three times the rate of the broad-based S&P 500. Management will likely try to calm investors’ “fears” during its annual conference and shareholder event, which begins Tuesday Calm down,” Bloomberg Intelligence Rana’s Anurag wrote in a note.

A new feature called Share for Review allows Photoshop, Lightroom, and InDesign files to be shared for feedback in a web browser, rather than exporting large files or requiring reviewers to install the program. The workflow mirrors that of video rating platform Frame.io, which Adobe acquired for $1.3 billion last year.

The company will also add new artificial intelligence updates such as: For example, the ability to remove objects from images with one click, recognize people, and remove the background in Adobe Express. AI-generated images have gained prominence this year thanks to vendors like OpenAI’s Dall-E, and Belsky said Adobe is focusing on how to integrate this type of AI into creative workflows, rather than just making “dumb JPEGs out of words.” .

As online content manipulation becomes more common, creative artists have expressed concerns about protecting their intellectual property. To address such concerns, Adobe’s Content Authenticity Initiative is now working with camera makers Nikon Corp. and Leica Camera AG on technology that appends a photographer’s credentials to an image’s metadata at the time of capture through advanced encoding. The image retains the identity of its creator while being edited, published and shared on social media.

“It’s important to remember that technology companies — like Adobe and social media platforms — aren’t telling the truth,” said Dana Rao, Adobe’s chief trust officer. “You don’t want to sit in that judgment seat trying to decide if something is true, misleading, or satirical. This solution gives them the opportunity to put power back in the hands of the people.”

Adobe isn’t the only software titan using web-based creative tools with built-in artificial intelligence. microsoft corp announced last week a new theme feature that will be part of its suite of Office products like Word and Teams. The tool called Designer is integrated into Dall-E which generates images based on text commands.

Microsoft’s new solution “right now appears to be fairly focused on a very limited set of features for some of their Office products,” Belsky said. “We have a close partnership with Microsoft and they are also looking at ways to integrate with Adobe Express.”

(Updates with the Content Authenticity Initiative in the ninth paragraph)

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