Adobe has expanded language support for its Firefly suite of generative AI models. From today, the standalone Firefly web service now supports text prompts — the descriptions used to generate images and text effects — in over 100 languages.
The Firefly web interface itself will also be available in over 20 languages, with support for French, German, Japanese, Spanish, and Brazilian Portuguese added from today.
After conducting a preliminary review, the European Commission has set a provisional deadline of August 7th to decide whether to clear Adobe’s proposed Figma acquisition or launch an in-depth probe that could block the merger.
[Bloomberg.com]
According to the Financial Times, European regulators are set to launch a formal antitrust investigation into Adobe’s purchase of product design platform Figma amid concerns the acquisition will reduce innovation and increase prices.
“Adobe is trying to buy a credible competitor,” said one Financial Times’ source. “It’s bad.” The US Department of Justice is also reportedly preparing a lawsuit that could block the transaction.
Just weeks after integrating its Firefly tech with Photoshop, Adobe is bringing its AI tool to Illustrator. The feature, dubbed “Generative Recolor,” is designed to help users “quickly experiment with colors using simple text prompts.” The GIF below should give you some idea of what it’s capable of.
It’ll be available as a beta feature starting today, Adobe says.
A new AI-powered Lightroom tool introduces automated denoising that instantly removes static-like grain on images taken in low light.
One-click noise removal is something that competitors like TopazLabs and DxO have offered for a while now. It seems a lot of recent updates for Creative Cloud applications focus on automating professional processes as Adobe races to remain competitive with smaller, nimbler apps.
As a video person myself, I absolutely love seeing screenshots of Adobe Premiere timelines from major movies. For one, it’s weirdly mesmerizing, and two... sometimes it makes me feel better about my own organized mess.
Here’s a short snippet where Paul Rogers, the editor of Everything Everywhere All At Once, talks about his workflow. (Also, be sure to check the replies to that tweet to see some other examples.)
More Katy videos at YouTube, but congrats to Adobe, which was founded in 1982 and launched Photoshop in 1989, Premiere in 1991, and the PDF in 1993. The company will also be trying to kill Flash for the rest of human history.
The US Justice Department is preparing to investigate Adobe’s acquisition of rival creative software company Figma, with Politico reporting that the DOJ has contacted Adobe as well as Figma’s customers, competitors, and investors to determine if the transaction will hurt market competition.
The $20 billion deal caused Adobe shares to tumble in September, resulting in the worst one-day decline since 2010.
In an interview with Bloomberg, Adobe Chief Product Officer Scott Belsky admitted that “XD has become a pretty immaterial product for us” and that its support will be re-evaluated if the Figma acquisition goes through. Belsky thankfully also doubled down on keeping Figma a free-to-use service, even if it does spiritually replace Adobe XD: “We don’t want to fix something that’s working really well.”
Open-source design software Penpot has been gaining users ever since Adobe agreed to buy Figma for $20 billion. The company said sign-ups also jumped by 5,600 percent in a single day following the acquisition.
“Adobe is a toxic brand for designers, and now Figma is tainted,” said Penpot co-founder Ruiz-Múzquiz to CNBC.
Penpot just announced $8 million in new funding to help fuel that growth.
Forbes calls the retention package historic, with Figma CEO Dylan Field set to take home about half of the $2.3 billion earmarked as part of the acquisition by Adobe. Figma and Adobe would jointly decide what “subset of Figmates” would be entitled to the stock grants which vest in four years.
Neither Adobe nor Figma were available to speak to Forbes about the behemoth retention package, though we imagine those sharing in the riches would say “10/10, would be acquired by Adobe again.”
–Figma CEO Dylan Field, in the unenviable position of having to reflect on an old tweet.
Field tweeted last year that Figma’s goal “is to be Figma not Adobe.” Fast forward to today and... Figma is going to be part of Adobe! My colleague Jay Peters spoke with the two companies’ leaders about what the merger means for designers everywhere.
