In brief: Generative AI features that allow users to seamlessly insert or remove objects from photos have grown in popularity recently. After appearing on smartphone image editors and high-end software like Adobe Photoshop, they are now headed toward Microsoft's ubiquitous bundled app as an additional selling point for Copilot+ PCs.
Microsoft recently announced several upcoming generative AI-based features for Windows on Copilot PCs. Among them are fill and erase functions, which will add to the enhancements that Paint has received over the past year.
In the coming weeks, PCs with Microsoft's Copilot+ branding will enable Paint users to erase objects from photos or add them based on text descriptions – without creating unnatural artifacts. Google Pixel phones have featured similar functionality for some time, and Adobe Photoshop introduced generative AI editing in May. However, using it in Paint won't require a subscription.
Generative AI fill and erase will initially become available to Windows Insider users this month before a more general rollout begins in November. Since these features depend on NPUs for onboard generative AI workloads, they will only be available on devices with Qualcomm Snapdragon X, Intel Core Ultra 200, or AMD Ryzen AI 300 CPUs.
Paint changed relatively little in the decades following its 1985 debut, but it has received multiple important features since Microsoft revised the iconic image editor for Windows 11. Last year, the company added a dark mode, layers, and support for transparency. Insiders also gained access to automatic background removal. Microsoft appears committed to making the lightweight software more powerful than ever.
The Photos app received an AI-based eraser in February, which is available to all Windows 11 and 10 users but remains in preview. The November update will introduce super-resolution enhancement for Photos on Copilot+ devices, allowing users to quickly increase an image's resolution by up to eight times.
Moreover, Windows Search will be able to find photos stored locally or on OneDrive based on text descriptions. A new feature called Click to Do aims to help users discover Microsoft's generative AI functions by making suggestions based on what's visible onscreen. After pressing the Windows key and selecting objects, tips will appear for editing images, refining text, or searching the web.
Elsewhere, Microsoft is attempting to resurrect Recall, the controversial feature that records what appears on a PC so the AI can use the collected information to help users. After Recall was discovered to harbor massive security vulnerabilities, the company delayed its rollout and made the functionality opt-in.