Adobe's Project Concept AI is a secret game-changer, and here's why

Adobe's Project Concept AI platform could be a game-changer for artists and designers, and no-one is really talking about it. While I was at Adobe MAX 2024 many other announcements grabbed the headlines, such as the new Adobe Sneaks I saw first-hand and the new AI tool for Illustrator that can turn any image into a vector. But Project Concept could quietly be revolutionising how art is made.

To date we've seen how Adobe has developed AI in Firefly at arm's length, then merged the best-use AI tools into Photoshop, Illustrator and Premiere Pro when the time is right, and when they make sense. But outside of the browser-based AI in Firefly, Adobe has yet to develop a pure AI platform for new artists who have embraced generative AI. That is until it revealed Project Concept at Adobe MAX 2024.

At first glance Project Concept is a concepting and mood-boarding platform, one that uses AI to easily generate, mix and remix art, photos and images to create new ideas. In the demo at Adobe MAX I saw how an artist was able to generate three images from her own art and prompts, group them and create a new series of images inspired by traits in the base art with one click - further text prompts could make adjustments. While this was happening a second artist was working up further concepts within the same document, which is an infinite palette.

In the demo, I also saw how the artists using Project Concept could refine and control the output of the gen AI, which is one of the biggest flaws in AI image creation - artists simply can't control the output in any meaningful detail, and so struggle to find a use for the 'art' being created. Project Concept is a first-step to offering the tools needed to control AI generative art's final image.

It's impressive, but drifted past me as I've become desensitised to such AI workflows, until I met with Alexandru Costin is Vice President, Generative AI and Sensei at Adobe, who explained Project Concept is Adobe's first tool aimed at "what we call Gen AI creatives", or "next generation" artists to "create as a team". In summery, Project Concept is an AI-first art tool developed by Adobe for a new generation of creatives that isn't held back by legacy software or workflows.

It also has practical considerations - if you're generating AI images and projects all in one space, perhaps combining multiple tools and artists' inputs, you're saving on your GPU budget, your power use as well as time.

As Alexandru explains, Project Concept is not about looking back and figuring ways to make AI work on legacy software like Photoshop, but it's purely focused on the future. This new platform enables Adobe to develop "innovative new user interactions" because the team making it is "starting it from scratch".

Alexandru tells me, "We have more freedom in not having to bring in all the capabilities of Photoshop into Project Concept. So we have more freedom in what capability to build". He stresses it's not exclusive to any customer base, and all Adobe users will eventually have access to it in Adobe Creative Cloud, Photoshop, Illustrator and Adobe Express, but it's fundamentally "more forward looking in how the workflows of the future will be".

So while at some stage Project Concept will make it into those legacy apps, it's not being developed with "backwards compatibility" as an anchor, as Alexandru tells me, Photoshop has a 40-year legacy and nothing can be removed, and new additions need to be thoughtfully considered.

So for now, Project Concept is an AI-first platform aimed at developing new workflows for what Adobe sees as a new generation of creatives who want to embrace generative AI. Its ability to offer a space to 'source, organise, ideate, edit and showcase concepts in one tool' will appeal to artists who have moved on from legacy software and find linear workflows restrictive.

Adobe showed us a glimpse of the future of art creation at Adobe MAX, and many may have missed it. Visit the Adobe Project Concept blog for more information.