Adobe's experimental iPhone camera app is taking an unexpected turn. Project Indigo launched last year with a specific pitch: give phone photos a "more natural (SLR-like) look," as The Verge describes it, echoing the appeal of a traditional camera over the heavily processed images phones usually produce.
Now Adobe is updating the app with a suite of generative AI tools. According to Engadget, the new features include removing distractions from a shot and offering immediate photo feedback. TechCrunch highlights one feature in particular: the app can now critique your photos using AI, essentially acting as an automated coach that tells you how a picture turned out.
The Verge frames the shift as Adobe stepping into a familiar argument, writing, "Welcome to the 'what is a photo' debate, Adobe." That is the tension at the heart of the update. Project Indigo's original selling point was authenticity — pictures that look the way a real camera sees the world. Layering generative AI editing on top of that promise raises the question of how natural a photo still is once software can add, remove, or reshape parts of it.
Adobe, the company behind Photoshop and Lightroom, has spent years building AI into its editing products, so extending those capabilities to its own camera app is a logical next step. What makes Indigo notable is that it started as the opposite pitch.
Why it matters: as AI editing moves from separate software directly into the moment you take a picture, the line between capturing a scene and manufacturing one keeps getting harder to see — and increasingly, the tools deciding what your photo looks like belong to the same few companies.