- Microsoft Designer wants to compete with Canva
- It makes the production of visuals accessible to all
- The service is open to the public, without registration
Announced in October, the AI-assisted graphic design tool Microsoft Designer has just been launched in free access for the general public. The latter aims to compete with Canva, which has conquered the hearts of budding designers around the world. His particuliarity ? Your designs always start with a prompt, like a ChatGPT.
When design becomes accessible to all
The more time passes, the more graphic creation becomes easier. These last years, Canva has experienced exponential growth, with an extreme simplification of the creative process. The tool has enabled millions of people to avoid having to go through training in software like Photoshop to create visuals, social posts or even presentations from predefined and easily modifiable templates.
A prompt is enough to have a proposal of several visuals © Presse-citron x Microsoft Designer
By launching Microsoft Designer, the Redmond firm wants to go even further. Based on DALL-E 2, OpenAI’s generation tool, it is able to generate original images from a short written description. As with Canva, you can then modify and adapt the visual according to your needs. No more blank sheets at the start of a project.
A tool that goes much further than design
Since its announcement last October, Microsoft Designer has evolved and added new AI-powered features. The new version also allows to generate texts for social networks. Currently, Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram are supported. There is no doubt that without the uncertainties around the Twitter API, Elon Musk’s social network would be in the game. After creating your visual, all you have to do is give a brief on the content to be produced and the Microsoft AI will offer you several versions of teasers to publish.
Proposals for social texts © Presse-citron x Microsft Designer
Apart from social posts, it also allows to create animated visuals, with dynamic backgrounds and text transitions.
Microsoft also plans to add even more editing options to its tool in the future. In particular, it will be possible to place an object at a specific location in a graphic and automatically fill the rest of the image. “Erase” and “replace background” options will allow you to erase objects, people or backgrounds that they don’t want to see in their graph.
A free tool… for now
Microsoft Designer is available for free during the trial period via the app website or in the Microsoft Edge browser via the sidebar. At the end of the beta version, the software will be fully accessible to Microsoft 365 subscribers. The firm still plans to keep the basic features accessible to everyone, to make itself essential, and encourage you to subscribe.
Microsoft’s acceleration around artificial intelligence has been impressive in recent months. Bing AI was able to overtake Google, invest a billion dollars in OpenAI and take a major position in THE booming sector in 2023.
If you are part of half of France under the rain on this May 1st, we advise you to take a look at the appthe potential is there.
