AI Tools for Image Creation

  1. Canva

Canva is a popular design and presentation tool that lets you create stunning visuals for various purposes. With Canva, teachers can create images for slideshows, handouts, posters, websites, social media, and more. It has many art-generation tools and features, several powered by AI.

For instance, Canva offers a Text to Image feature that allows you to generate images from text prompts. Text to Image can also generate art in a range of styles, from photos to drawings, paintings, 3D, patterns, and concept art. The Background Remover feature allows you to remove the background from any image with one click. You can use it to create transparent images or replace the background with another image or color. The Magic Write feature helps you create written content. You can generate text based on your topic, tone, and audience. You can also edit and customize the text as you like.

Canva for Education is a free version of Canva that is specially designed for K-12 (primary and secondary) teachers and students. Canva for Education gives you unlimited access to all the premium features of Canva Pro, such as millions of images, fonts, icons, videos, animations, templates, and more. Canva for Education enables you to create and manage virtual classrooms where you can invite your students and colleagues. You can also assign and review student work, give feedback, and track progress. Canva for Education integrates with core classroom tools, such as Google Classroom, Canvas, Microsoft Teams, Schoology, D2L, Moodle, and Blackboard. Canva for Education also provides you with free teacher resources to help you use Canva effectively in your teaching.

Price: Free for primary and secondary school teachers at eligible schools.

URL: https://canva.com/

Tom’s Take:

Canva is a powerful and versatile tool that can help you create amazing art from text or images. It has many AI-infused features that make it easy and fun to use. It also has a free version for educators who want to use it in their classrooms. Canva can also be used with students and integrates with popular learning management systems.

Powerful, fun, and free. A no-brainer for teachers. Try it.

2. Adobe Firefly

Adobe Firefly is an easy-to-use image creation tool from a company that’s synonymous with visual creativity. You can sign up for free, but it’s in beta and you’ll have to request access.

Adobe Firefly offers features like Text to Image, Generative Fill, Text Effects, Generative Recolor, and 3D to Image, which can be very useful for creating engaging educational materials. Adobe Firefly provides you with ideas to create your own image. In Text to Image, simply enter a prompt, and then refine the image based on the parameters Adobe provides. You can download the images for free, though there are watermarks. Adobe has some interesting features. It can create patterns, synch with other Abobe tools like Photoshop, and social media services.

Adobe announced in October major updates to Firefly in a new Firefly model called Image 2. Firefly can now generate more realistic images, more integrations with existing Adobe apps, and increased control over design style.

Price: Free up to 3 presentations/month or $10/month for unlimited access

URL: https://www.adobe.com/sensei/generative-ai/firefly.html

Tom’s Take:

Adobe Firefly is easier to use than Midjourney and provides high quality images. It also provides ideas for image generation and downloading is simple. intuitive interface, making it accessible to both beginners and experienced designers. This ease of use can be particularly beneficial for teachers who may not have extensive experience with graphic design tools. In terms of pricing, Adobe Firefly offers a free plan that includes 25 monthly generative credits1. This could be sufficient for teachers who only need to create a limited number of images each month.

But, unlike Midjourney, it’s not a community and so you don’t have images created by others that you can use and remix. In addition, images are watermarked.

3. Midjourney

Midjourney enables users to generate images quickly and efficiently based on short text input. Midjourney works through Discord, a widely used chat platform that users must download. Users interact with MidJourney with simple commands.

Since Discord is a public chat platform your images are publicly viewable and remixable, which means others can use your images and you theirs. Midjourney has a “dream” command that allows users to modify the generated image by adding or removing elements. This feature gives users the flexibility to iterate and refine their creations until they achieve their desired result. Additionally, Midjourney provides a “reimagine” command that generates a new image based on the previous one, offering an appealing way to explore different interpretations of the same concept.

Midjourney offers a limited number of free image creations, so you can test it out before committing to a paid plan. Midjourney images have a “dreamy” quality to them and recent updates are making their images seem increasingly realistic.

Pricing: 25 free queries; paid plans from $10/month.

URL: https://www.midjourney.com/

Tom’s Take:

Midjourney is impressive and has some unique features, such as the ability to generate animations. It’s also upgraded regularly and the quality of its images are constantly improving.

But Midjourney is a bit disorienting at first. It’s not a website with a clean and intuitive interface, but rather a crowded chat room. But once you locate the chat box at the bottom of the screen and enter “/imagine” followed by your text prompt, you’ll be underway.

Midjourney nominally has free features, but it is often too busy to serve free users and gives priority to paid subscribers. So expect Midjourney will prompt you to pay for a subscription. I this frustrating and have little luck generating free images. Also, like with other AI, things can go wrong and the image Midjourney creates might not have a clear connection to the prompt you gave it.

Midjourney’s subscription plans range from $10 to $60 per month, which might be a significant cost for some teachers. But 25 free queries might be enough for you.

In all, Midjourney produces colorful and (often) abstract images. If you’re looking for less “dreamy” output, turn to Canva, or even DALL-E2. And if you prefer to work with a clean website with a simple interface, then consider Craiyon.

AI Tools for Teachers

My goal is to help teachers find AI tools to assist them with their various teaching responsibilities.

As I review AI tools I have three main criteria in mind:

  1. A robust range of features to help teachers.

  2. An intuitive interface to help teachers

  3. An affordable price for teachers (and schools).

I color code my rating of each criteria as follows:

  • GREEN= Very Good

  • YELLOW= Fair

  • RED = Poor

I do not accept money for reviews.

- Tom Daccord

Tools worth mentioning

DALL-E2

DALL-E 2 is an AI model by OpenAI that generate high-quality images from text descriptions. DALL-E2 is a user-friendly website that allow users to enter their text, see the generated image, and download or share it.

The successor to DALL-E, DALL-E 2 is capable of generating more realistic images at higher resolutions that incorporate different artistic concepts, attributes, and styles. DALL-E2 also boasts a number of advanced features that make it a powerful tool for visual content creation. For example, DALL-E2 generate images from multi-sentence prompts, allowing users to create complex scenes with multiple elements. It also has the ability to generate animations by creating a series of images that transition from one to the next. Furthermore, DALL-E2 can generate 3D objects and even design entire rooms based on textual descriptions. These features make DALL-E2 not just a tool for creating static images, but a vehicle for creating all kinds of visual content.

DALL-E3, the successor to DALL-E2, is set to be released soon. It leverages ChatGPT, to make easier the process of refining the text that users enter to create images. In other words, it can make it easier to produce sophisticated AI images.

Pricing is a bit complicated. In a nutshell, you get 50 free credits when you sign up. One credit is 4 images. If you want extra credits you have to buy them.

  • Pricing: 50 free credits that expire one month after granted; 115 credits = $15.

  • URL: https://openai.com/dall-e-2

Craiyon

Craiyon AI is a free-to-use AI art generation tool from Open AI that creates images from a text prompt. Previously known as DALL-E mini, Craiyon generates art, photos, and drawings. It's user-friendly, and teachers can easily generate unlimited images for their presentations and handouts. t

Among its many features, Craiyon offers an “Enhance” option to generate images in higher resolutions, a “negative words” option to remove non-desired elements, and an active community where users share tips to create better images.

Craiyon has a free version that is ad-supported and has longer image generation times that paid users. Craiyon offers subscription plans starting at $5/month (billed yearly) that remove ads and reduce image generation time.

  • Price: Free for up to 9 images a month; $5/month = Unlimited images with no watermark

  • URL: https://www.craiyon.com/

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