Google Photos, the popular photo storage and sharing service, is making a significant move by offering its AI-powered editing tools to all users for free. This includes the Magic Editor, a tool that uses generative AI to perform complex photo edits.
The Magic Editor, initially introduced with the launch of the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro, allows users to perform tasks such as filling in gaps in a photo, repositioning the subject, and making other edits to the foreground or background of a photo. With this tool, users can change a gray sky to blue, remove people from the background of a photo, recenter the photo subject while filling in gaps, and remove other clutter.
In addition to the Magic Editor, other tools that are now freely available include Magic Eraser, which removes unwanted items from photos; Photo Unblur, which uses machine learning to sharpen blurry photos; and Portrait Light, which lets users change the light source on photos after the fact.
These tools were previously a selling point for Google’s high-end devices, the Pixel phones, and were also a draw for Google One subscribers. However, with the growing number of AI-powered editing tools flooding the market, Google has decided to make its set of AI photo editing features available to more people for free.
There are some caveats to this expansion. The tools will only start rolling out on May 15, and it will take weeks for them to make it to all Google Photos users. There are also some hardware device requirements to be able to use them. On ChromeOS, for instance, the device must be a Chromebook Plus with ChromeOS version 118+ or have at least 3GB RAM. On mobile, the device must run Android 8.0 or higher or iOS 15 or higher.
With the expansion, Magic Editor will come to all Pixel devices, while iOS and Android users (whose phones meet the requirements) will get 10 Magic Editor saves per month. To go beyond that, they’ll still need to buy a Premium Google One plan.
Read more at: techcrunch.com