Apple shocked us final 12 months by abruptly buying Pixelmator, the small firm behind a largely eponymous set of photograph modifying apps for the Mac, iPhone, and iPad.
The unique Pixelmator “Traditional” was launched for the Mac in 2007 and was adopted by iPad and iPhone variations in 2014 and 2015, respectively. In 2017, Pixelmator Traditional for Mac was retired in favor of Pixelmator Professional, a extra highly effective utility that redesigned the interface and leveraged Apple’s newest applied sciences, together with Steel, Apple silicon, and machine studying and AI options. It additionally beat Adobe to the Apple silicon celebration by about six months.
In 2021, the corporate expanded its choices with a extra centered product, Photomator, which options comparable capabilities to Adobe’s Lightroom and Apple’s sadly long-defunct Aperture.
It wasn’t exhausting to see why Apple would need to purchase Pixelmator. The apps at all times felt like a pure match into the Apple ecosystem, and it appeared just like the transfer may deliver Photoshop- and Lightroom-level apps into the fold — apps that might be to Images what Last Minimize Professional is to iMovie and Logic Professional is to GarageBand.
Issues quietened down following the acquisition. It wasn’t till February that we noticed the primary updates below Apple’s aegis. Nevertheless, the one change was the branding. The replace seems to have been made solely to current an introductory splash display saying that Pixelmator Professional, Pixelmator, and Photomator are “now a part of Apple.”
Since Apple is fairly tight-lipped about issues like these, we couldn’t make sure what else it had deliberate for the suite of apps. When the Pixelmator Workforce introduced the acquisition in November, it stated that the apps would stay obtainable and unchanged, however that we should always “keep tuned for extra thrilling updates to return.” Apple, after all, stated nothing, though it presumably blessed the Pixelmator Workforce’s announcement.
So, when the February updates arrived largely unchanged, many welcomed the affirmation that Apple was certainly letting Pixelmator stay on as standalone apps, reasonably than shelving them and incorporating their options into its personal apps, because it did with Darkish Sky in 2020.
Nonetheless, there was no motive to imagine Apple would let the Pixelmator apps coast. Whereas the final replace introduced nothing significant to the desk, Apple has now rectified that with a brand new replace to Pixelmator Professional that provides all of the options you’d anticipate in a first-party Apple app, from Apple Intelligence integration to accessibility help.
Contemporary out of the gate, Pixelmator Professional 3.7 integrates Picture Playground and Writing Instruments. For the reason that app was already closely powered by machine studying and AI options for issues like background removing, there’s nothing notably revolutionary in these additions — they’re largely leveraging what’s already constructed into macOS Sequoia and past — but it surely nonetheless makes them really feel extra seamlessly tied into the world of Apple Intelligence.
Some helpful twists transcend simply pulling in apps from Picture Playground. For instance, a brand new “Add to Playground” characteristic will allow you to ship your work from Pixelmator Professional over to Apple’s generative AI instrument to show picture layers or drawings into inventive types like animations, illustrations, sketches, and even different ChatGPT-powered types if you happen to’re utilizing macOS Tahoe.
This may also be performed on a per-layer foundation, so you may additional solely a part of a picture, flip it right into a layer, after which ship it over to Picture Playground for processing into one thing extra whimsical. The ensuing picture can both exchange the present layer or be inserted as a brand new one.
Help for Writing Instruments appears rather less related in a photograph modifying app. Nonetheless, it might be useful for these engaged on posters and different artwork designs, as these instruments will can help you proofread and rewrite textual content blocks in your work and even use the Compose characteristic to have ChatGPT insert authentic textual content content material from scratch.
Apple has additionally enhanced VoiceOver help to supply spoken and Braille descriptions for all instruments, in addition to spoken prompts for keyboard navigation and huge Hover Textual content help when hovering over objects within the sidebar.
As with all Apple Intelligence options, you’ll must be utilizing a supported gadget to benefit from the Picture Playground and Writing Instruments integrations, however that’s a comparatively low bar for Pixelmator Professional, because it’s completely a Mac app, and practically any Mac launched prior to now 4 years will qualify because the minimal customary is Apple silicon — an M1 chip or later.