- Paint gets two new features, which are in testing
- The first allows AI to create animations from an image or sketch.
- The second allows you to perform complex editing on an image with a simple one-line message to the AI.
Microsoft is beefing up the Paint app in Windows 11 with a pair of new AI capabilities, one of which allows you to easily create short animations and another of which has lots of shades of yellow (by which I mean: think Google’s Nano Banana).
Windows Latest reports that both features are part of Windows AI Labs, which is the testing ground for testing AI-based functionality.
The new ‘Animate’ option can be clicked to turn any image (or sketch) into a full animation, with AI doing the hard work.
However, according to Windows Latest tests (the technology site shows two examples), there is still a way to go. The function does not request any messages, so there is no control over the final result, the AI simply decides the direction to take.
And in the case of the sample image of Pikachu flying through the night sky, the finished animation based on this goes off the rails. It’s okay at first, then the weirdness kicks in towards the end.
The second feature coming to Paint is ‘Generative Editing’, which, Gemini Nano Banana style, allows you to take an image and apply complex editing to it using a simple AI query. Windows Latest shows an example of taking a banana and turning the background into a “fruit jungle”, and this actually works very well.
Analysis: generation game
Both capabilities take a long time to implement in the examples provided by Windows Latest and, as noted, the results can go wrong, but this is still early testing. We’re told that Microsoft is using its own internal model for creating animations, so if you thought it was based on third-party technology, apparently not.
We can’t even be sure that these AI features will ever go out of testing, but it’s probably a fair bet. They’re obvious pieces of functionality to include in Paint, an app that’s gradually becoming more AI-packed and more complex overall.
If you’re wondering how to join Windows AI Labs to access this type of experimental functionality, you’ll need to sign up for the program. However, right now, invites are only rolling out to select Windows 11 testers, so you have to be a Windows Insider; then you will see an invitation pop up at some point in Paint (like Windows Latest did). So for now, all you can do is sit back and wait (and join the Windows Insider program if you’re not already a member).
Note that AI Labs is Paint-only to begin with, but will eventually bring in other Windows 11 apps (Photos will likely be next in line).
There are already quite a few AI features in Paint, the main one being Cocreator, along with other abilities. Microsoft isn’t afraid to complicate its default Windows 11 apps these days, as noted, and Paint is moving far away from its original concept as a basic image editor. The same goes for Notepad, much to the chagrin of some people.
