Adobe announced it will acquire Topaz Labs, an AI company known for its industry-leading video and photo enhancement software, providing image upscaling, sharpening, and denoising tools.
The bid to further strengthen its stance by acquiring Topaz Labs comes as no surprise, as Adobe competes for the market with the new Affinity by Canva, which offers a comprehensive editing suite for free, and high-end video editor DaVinci Resolve.
While most photographers are disgruntled about the recent AI push, Adobe Firelfy, the firm’s generative AI tool, remains in incredibly high demand. Acquiring Topaz Labs means Adobe could tackle a major technical hurdle, cloud processing, as Topaz Labs’ expertise lies not just in the image enhancement part but also in optimising AI models to run on local devices. This should make advanced editing faster and more cost-effective.
Adobe features Topaz tools within its AI upsizing, which require Photoshop credits, but now we can expect a wider array of tools, like the popular Topaz Photo sharpen and denoise, to be integrated into Firefly and other Creative Cloud apps. However, Adobe confirmed that Topaz apps will remain available as standalone products under Topaz CEO Eric Yang, who will continue to lead his team.
Whether this means another subscription hike for Adobe Creative Cloud users remains to be seen.
In the meantime, if you are in the market for the existing Photography Plan Adobe offers, make sure to check out Amazon’s latest Prime Day deal, offering a 50% discount on the yearly subscription.
Related reading:
- Adobe Lightroom’s new Denoise tool – how does it compare?
- Evoto AI review: can AI really make photo editing less of a drag?
- Best Photoshop alternatives – no-subscription photo editing software
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