During WWDC at Apple Park in California this week, the company unveiled visionOS 26 updates for its mixed reality Vision Pro headset that will up the ante for both consumer and enterprise users, with new spatial widgets and more realistic avatar Personas among the noteworthy updates. The customizable widgets will appear to blend into a headset wearer’s physical environment, “integrating seamlessly into a user’s space” and reappearing exactly where the user left them each time the Apple Vision Pro is activated. A great deal of effort has gone into improved iPhone integration, including the ability to initiate calls directly from the headset. Continue reading Apple visionOS 2026 Features Spatial Widgets, Better Avatars

Snapchat is offering experimental augmented reality and generative AI tools through its new Lens Studio iOS app and web tool. According to the company, “you can generate your own AI effects, add your dancing Bitmoji to the fun, and express yourself with Lenses that reflect your mood or an inside joke.” The app responds to text prompts, producing filters that can be published to Snapchat. Snap previously offered generative AI capabilities only to professional creators as part of its Lens Studio. The company has also launched an app that lets users read and reply to messages using their Apple Watch. For professional developers, Snap’s Lens Studio has added tools to build Bitmoji games. Continue reading GenAI Powers Snapchat Tools for Creating AR Lenses, Bitmoji

Chatbot platform Character.AI is rolling out its video generator, AvatarFX, in general release after a month in closed beta. It’s also adding a sharing feature called Scenes and Streams that will serve content to Character.AI’s community feed, coming soon to mobile. Users can now tap AvatarFX to create up to five videos per day, starting by uploading a photo, choosing a voice and writing dialogue for the character. Character.AI started as 1:1 text chat in the summer of 2023. Now the company is “expanding into a multi-modal world” with “more ways for creators to build immersive narratives and dynamic experiences.” Continue reading Character.AI Goes Wide with AvatarFX, Adds Mobile Features

Google is celebrating 10 years of Google Photos by introducing a redesign of the Photos editor, including helpful new tools. The Photos editor gets some AI editing features previously available only on Pixel phones as part of its generative AI Magic Editor. The Photos platform is also expanding access to its AI-powered text-to-image Reimagine and automatic framing and related features first introduced with the Pixel 9. The company explains there are currently more than 1.5 billion monthly Photos users that have stored 9+ trillion photos and videos. The updates reflect Google’s AI push as it continues to integrate Gemini across its growing family of products and services. Continue reading Google Photos Rolling Out Redesign and New AI Editing Tools

The new smartphone lineup from Chinese manufacturer Honor will include AI image-to-video capabilities developed in partnership with Google Cloud. The Honor 400 series will let users generate videos from static photos, according to the company. Google recently added support for Veo 2, which generates videos at up to 4K, for Gemini Advanced subscribers, and Honor says its new phones will have Veo 2 baked into the operating system, beating Google’s own Pixel phone to the punch. The Huawei spin-off is set to launch the 400 series May 22. Continue reading Google Veo 2 Video Generator Coming to New Honor Phones

Pinterest has added more AI options for visual search, hoping to drive discovery. The idea is to make it easier to segment elements in Pin image searches, building databases of relevant or personally associated products. When users view a Pin, they’ll now also see AI-generated words that can be used to learn more about elements of an image that interest them, including informationally and to facilitate shopping. “We’re breaking down and decoding images so users can quickly search and shop for the details of an outfit — whether it’s an aesthetic, color palette, fit or product category,” according to Pinterest. Continue reading Pinterest Aims to Improve Discovery with Its AI Search Tools

Adobe has released its free Content Authenticity web app in beta. The app is designed to help protect creators’ work and allows them to embed a request that generative AI models don’t use their work for training. Users can apply tags for up to 50 images at once. In addition to applying tags, users can customize and inspect Adobe Content Credentials using the the Adobe Content Authenticity browser extension for Google Chrome. The information is invisible until the inspection tool is opened and can include links to a creator’s social media account, website or other identifying attributes. Continue reading Adobe Launches Its Content Authenticity App in Public Beta

The new Vivo X200 Ultra smartphone is being released in China with a triple back-camera array and the ability to upgrade the main 35mm camera to zooms — including an 8.7x converter — for capturing still photos or video that makes it comparable to a dedicated device. No news yet if or when it will launch in the U.S., but shutterbugs are buzzing. Powered by Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon 8 Elite — the processor inside Samsung’s Galaxy S25 Ultra — the X200 Ultra packs up to 16GB of RAM and can accommodate up to 1TB of storage. An optional photographer kit comes with a removable grip and 8.7x converter that captures native telephoto. Continue reading Vivo Unveils Its Latest Smartphone with Emphasis on Camera

Meta Platforms is developing a deluxe entry for its popular Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses line that is said to incorporate hand-gesture controls and will include a screen for displaying photos and apps. The price tag will reportedly be more than $1,000 (and possibly as high as $1,400) when the item hits the shelves, possibly by the end of this year. Code-named Hypernova, the souped-up eyewear is part of a Meta plan to make a wearable alternative to Apple iPhones. Existing Ray-Ban Meta glasses can pair with Android phones to make calls. Continue reading New Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses to Include Built-In Screen

Popular social media platform Pinterest is now labeling generative AI content. The app, which earned a reputation as fertile ground for design inspiration related to hand-crafted goods and human artistry, has recently been plagued by an onslaught of “AI slop,” something its regular users have been complaining of on Reddit and to Pinterest directly. The GenAI content was often used to redirect people to spammy sites, according to a recent report. Pinterest’s labeling news coincides with an earnings report of $1.15 billion in Q4 revenue, marking an 18 percent increase year-over-year. Continue reading Pinterest AI Labeling Policy Unveiled as Q4 Earnings Top $1B

Instagram is experimenting with a community chat feature that lets users gather in groups of up to 250. Meta’s photo- and video-sharing network is prototyping the feature internally, though external sources with knowledge of it are comparing it to Discord since it reportedly allows users to form chats around different topics and control who can join. While participation is said to be capped at 250 simultaneous users per community, all are invited to join and message. Instagram has had a flurry of new features, among them a video tool called Edits, and “profile cards” geared toward small businesses that want a more professional presence on the app. Continue reading Instagram Is Internally Testing Discord-Style Community Chat

Japanese camera company Sigma has announced the Sigma BF, a 24-megapixel compact with a full-frame sensor whose body is carved from a solid block of aluminum. Designed with simplification in mind, the BF features interchangeable lens and 6K video capture at up to 30p and full high definition at up to 120p. There is 230GB of internal storage but no memory card slot, and the I/O interface is reduced to a single USB-C port. “By simplifying and stripping away all excess elements, this full-frame mirrorless camera redefines the process of taking a photograph as a natural act,” the company says. Continue reading Sigma Strips Photography to Its Essence with Latest Camera

Amazon has pulled the plug on Inspire, its TikTok-type, short-form video and photo mobile feed designed to help customers explore and discover new products by browsing various categories. Like TikTok, Inspire used a vertical feed and opportunities to purchase products used by influencers and other customers. The shopping giant is instead referring customers to its shopping chatbot Rufus. Amazon has since November 2023 partnered with Instagram to promote shopping within the app, and also has a deal with Snap, so it still has ties to social shopping. Inspire was launched in December 2022 and expanded to national availability in May of 2023. Continue reading Amazon Replaces Social Shopping Feed with Rufus Chatbot

ByteDance has developed a generative model that can use a single photo to generate photorealistic video of humans in motion. Called OmniHuman-1, the multimodal system supports various visual and audio styles and can generate people doing things like singing, dancing, speaking and moving in a natural fashion. ByteDance says its new technology clears hurdles that hinder existing human-generators — obstacles like short play times and over-reliance on high-quality training data. The diffusion transformer-based OmniHuman addressed those challenges by mixing motion-related conditions into the training phase, a solution ByteDance researchers claim is new. Continue reading ByteDance’s AI Model Can Generate Video from Single Image

Cloudflare is making it easier to assess the authenticity of online images by adopting the Content Credentials system advanced by Adobe and embraced by many others. Images hosted using Cloudflare now integrate Content Credentials, ensuring metadata remains intact. The platform tracks ownership and subsequent modifications, including whether artificial intelligence was used to edit the images. With touchpoints to an estimated 20 percent of Internet traffic, connectivity firm Cloudflare substantively expands the reach of the Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI), founded in 2019. Continue reading Cloudflare Joins CAI, Adds C2PA Image Authenticity Protocol