Smart new Photoshop CC tool detects objects with one click

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Adobe has released a video that shows off an intelligent new selection tool coming to Photoshop CC soon, called Select Subject. This tool uses Adobe Sensei – the artificial intelligence and machine learning platform that headlined the tech reveals at Adobe Max last month – to work out where the main subject is in an image.

It promises to make basic and time consuming tasks such as performing cutouts and making photo edits with masks quicker and more straightforward than ever before.

Whereas you were previously forced to use the lasso, quick select or pen tools if you wanted to select an individual subject, Select Subject does all that work with one click, making working in Photoshop CC much easier.

It sounds too good to be true, but watch the Select Subject tool in action with the video below and prepare to be amazed.

Picked up your jaw from the floor yet? What's so amazing about this machine learning tool is that it can work with single objects or group shots, plus it's clever enough to filter out any foreground details that could potentially clutter the subject.

As well as being powerful, this tool is flexible too, allowing users to refine the mask edge to their heart's content – keen-eyed readers will notice that the image in our header could do with a little refinement, as the model's lost part of her left arm.

All the plebs are gonna just denounce people that make this our job

YouTube user Starius2

Every innovation comes at a price, though, and lo and behold the comments on the Select Subject tool's sneak peek video are filled with creatives anxiously wringing their hands that this feature could lower the bar for entry when it comes to graphic design.

We know that the YouTube comment section is usually best thought of as a no-go zone, but just this once we decided to take a look at what designers are saying about this impressive tool. 

Most were quick to sing its praises, with one user claiming that "Adobe has commercialised actual magic", while another was slightly more cautious with their admirations: "PLEASE STOP MAKING PHOTOSHOP EASIER! PLEASE. All the plebs are gonna just denounce people that make this our job."

With no release date set in stone (the video teases that the Select Subject tool "is coming to an update to Photoshop CC") it remains to be seen if the tool leads to amateur designers running amok.

Related articles:

• Age a photograph in Photoshop CC
• 9 things we learned at Adobe Creative Meet Up 2017
• 95 top Photoshop tutorials

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