HitPaw Photo AI Photo Editor Review (2024)
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is now a core part of our daily activities, from utilizing GitHub Copilot for coding assistance to employing tools like ChatGPT and Copy.AI for enhancing content creation and editing. In the world of photo editing, the use of AI to create and modify images is becoming increasingly prevalent.
This post delves into HitPaw Photo AI, a user-friendly desktop application designed for creating and editing photos with minimal technical expertise required.
What Are AI Photo Editors?
While many of us are familiar with traditional photo editing software, with a wide range available from free online options to paid versions, AI photo editors represent a significant leap forward. Essentially, AI photo editors utilize artificial intelligence to assist in various aspects of photo editing.
Take, for instance, Photoshop 2024, which employs generative AI. This feature allows users to fill a blank canvas based on verbal prompts or to effortlessly edit or remove elements from an image. That’s AI photo editing in action, combining traditional techniques with the power of AI.
How AI Photo Editors Work?
AI photo editors operate in various ways, primarily leveraging AI technology to simplify the image editing process.
Whether it’s enhancing image clarity, upscaling images, removing unwanted backgrounds or objects, or accelerating the editing process, these editors make these tasks easier without requiring extensive technical knowledge from the user.
HitPaw Photo AI for Windows and Mac
HitPaw Photo AI is a desktop application that provides easy-to-use AI-powered photo editing tools. It’s designed for users who want to edit images effectively without delving into the complexities often associated with advanced photo editing software like Photoshop.
Upon installation, HitPaw Photo AI offers immediate access to several powerful features, including:
- Enhance Image Quality: This tool allows you to enhance facial features, reduce noise in photos, and even colorize images, resulting in more vibrant and striking visuals.
- Generate AI Art: Like Midjourney and DALL-E, this feature creates new images based on the prompts you enter, harnessing the power of AI to generate unique art.
- Remove Objects and Erase Background: With just a few clicks, the app can remove objects or backgrounds from images, a feature reminiscent of Photoshop’s generative AI capabilities.
How to Use HitPaw Photo AI for Photo Editing
Now, let’s dive into the practical side of things and explore how HitPaw Photo AI performs in photo editing tasks.
To begin, simply drag and drop your desired image into the app.
Enhancing Images
Once your image is in the app, click ‘Preview’ to see a glimpse of the potential outcome. Under this feature, there are several AI models designed to refine your photos with greater accuracy:
- Face Model: Improves low-quality photos featuring faces.
- General Model: Available in ‘Fast’ and ‘Quality’ options to enhance low-quality images.
- Denoise Model: Removes noise from images.
- Colorize Model: Adds color to black and white images.
- Color Calibration: Perfect for underexposed photos or those lacking saturation.
- Scratch Repair: Repairs photos with scratches, such as scanned old photos.
- Low Light Model: Enhances photos taken in low-light environments.
Here’s an example of a photo before enhancement:
And here it is after being enhanced:
AI Image Generation
Moving on to the app’s AI image generation feature. To start, click on “Generate AI Images“.
On the next screen, input your prompt, choose an art style, select your preferred image size and resolution, and you can even upload an image for the AI to use as a reference. Then, click "Generate".
For my test, I entered the prompt “Tokyo city, sunset view” with an ‘Unreal’ art style:
and here’s the result:
Background Removal
To evaluate the app’s background removal capability, I tested it with two images, one with a simple background and another with a more complex background.
Here’s the one with a simpler background:
And here’s the outcome after using HitPaw Photo AI for background removal:
Here’s an image with a more complex background:
And here’s the result:
Object Removal
Comparing to Photoshop’s generative AI, let’s see how HitPaw Photo AI fares in object removal. I uploaded the same image as before and used the brush tool to highlight the area for removal.
Here’s the final result after the object removal:
It’s quite impressive!
Conclusion
I must admit, I’m pleasantly surprised by how well HitPaw Photo AI performs with its array of features. My only critique is that it’s limited to just four functionalities: enhancing images, generating images with prompts, background removal, and object removal.
While these AI capabilities are available online, some for free, having an all-in-one desktop app, especially useful in offline scenarios, is a significant advantage. Now, let’s discuss the cost of the app and weigh its pros and cons from my perspective.
Finally, here’s a breakdown of the app’s pricing and its advantages and disadvantages in my view.
Price of HitPaw Photo AI
The app offers a free trial to test all its features, but exporting the final image requires a subscription. The pricing plans are as follows:
- 1 month – $24.99
- 1 year – $99.99
Alternatively, you can purchase a lifetime license for $159.99.
Pros
- Combines several AI image editing features into a single application.
- Accurate in background and object removal tasks.
Cons
- Limited to only previewing the output in the trial version.
- The app has a substantial size of about 1.5GB, which requires some time to download and install.