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Key Takeaways
- Some AI photo editing tools are useful, but others are the complete opposite.
- Sometimes it’s quicker to make the changes manually.
- Some AI editing tools can border into deceptive territory, and you need to be careful when using them.
I’ve tested several AI photo editing features to see whether they’re worth using in my editing workflow. Some, such as denoise, are excellent. But others? Not so much. Based on my experience, I’ll reveal what I think are the most useless AI editing tools.
1 Sky Replacement
Many AI tools will let you replace the sky, but I have never understood the point. While I’m more than happy to edit my photos, I draw the line at manipulating aspects that change the overall mood; switching from a gray sky to blue is one of those.
Sky replacements almost always look fake, and I also don’t think they look very good. If you’re editing your pictures just for fun, go ahead—but I personally don’t think it’s a good idea to use sky replacement for anything more than that.
I will say, however, that using AI to detect the sky in your image—before then adjusting the brightness and whatnot—is a pretty handy tool. It changes the sky, sure—but the overarching look and feel is still there. At the end of the day, it’s all about understanding when creative software needs AI and when it doesn’t.
2 Brightening Skin and Eyes
The whole point of AI in any software is to simplify your workflow, and from personal experience, I have never found skin and eye-brightening tools thatdo this. It’s almost always off the mark, and it would have been quicker to make the adjustments myself. The only exception here is if I’m using the Auto button in my editing software, but even then, that’s hit-and-miss.
If you’re going to use AI when editing, I would recommend using retouching tools in Photoshop and similar apps. But when it comes to using it for most editing solutions, you’re better off skipping it in my opinion.
If you want to see how AI retouching compares to manual, consider checking out what happened when I used AI to retouch my photos.
3 AI Blurring
One of the first AI tools I tried was AI blurring, and to be honest, I would rather just change the aperture on my camera. Most of the time, blurring of any kind looks obvious when done in post-production. Maybe there’s an argument that I’m not very good at this, but my pictures look fine without it, so I don’t care.
AI blurring can be useful if the tool you use is good at detecting backgrounds, but this isn’t always the case. If you don’t have a professional camera, you can do several things to make your image backgrounds look blurry (such as moving closer to your subject).
4 Enlarging Body Parts
Some AI tools let you change the shape of people’s bodies, but this is something that I’m strongly against for several reasons. First and foremost, it’s another editing technique that I think would be easier to do yourself. But beyond that, I don’t agree with manipulating parts of your body to make them look different than they actually are.
It’s deceptive if you use these features and then post them online, in my opinion. You can argue that editing pictures is the same thing, but I disagree. Besides moving further away or closer to the subject, and utilizing lighting, the person’s shape still stays the same if you’re editing lighting and colors. Changing the shape of a person goes beyond that.
If you’re going to do this, you should note that some countries might require you to mark your images as being retouched. For example, Norway has a photo retouching law where you must state that you have changed the shape, skin, and other aspects.
You can always discard my thoughts if you find these tools useful. But to me, none of these AI photo editing features are particularly relevant. I’m always open to trying new technologies, but if they don’t work, I am also happy to ditch them and keep using what already works.
