TRELLIS.2 Image-to-3D Now Runs on Apple Silicon Without Nvidia
A community port of Microsoft TRELLIS.2 brings image-to-3D mesh generation to Apple Silicon. No Nvidia GPU required, GLB output ready for Blender and Unity.
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Deep dives, tutorials, and analysis for AI-powered creators.
OpenAI GPT-Image-2 Rolls Out to Plus and Pro Users
OpenAI has quietly begun rolling out GPT-Image-2 to paid ChatGPT subscribers -- no announcement, no blog post, just a significantly more capable image model showing up in Plus and Pro accounts.
xAI Launches Grok Voice API: $0.10/hr STT, $4.20/M TTS
xAI launched the Grok Voice Agent API April 18 with standalone speech-to-text and text-to-speech endpoints priced at $0.10 per hour batch STT and $4.20 per million characters TTS.
Google Flow Music Launches: AI Song Studio Built on Lyria 3
Google launched Flow Music on April 18, 2026, rebranding ProducerAI into a standalone AI music studio powered by Lyria 3. Create full songs, AI music videos with Veo, and remix tracks with new Replace and Extend features -- free at flowmusic.app.
Eddie AI Night Shift Turns Overnight Footage into Rough Cuts
Eddie AI v3 launched Night Shift at NAB 2026, a mode that processes raw footage overnight and delivers an organized rough cut to editors by 8 a.m. PST.
RODE Launches RODECaster Studio: AI Podcast Post-Production App
RODE announced RODECaster Studio at NAB 2026 on April 17, 2026 -- a new Mac and Windows desktop app that brings AI-powered editing to podcast post-production.
Claude Design: Anthropic's Visual Workspace for Opus 4.7
Anthropic launched Claude Design on April 17, a research preview that lets Claude Opus 4.7 generate interactive prototypes, pitch decks, and landing pages through conversation.
Seedance 2.0 Now Available via Runway API
ByteDance’s Seedance 2.0, ranked #1 for image-to-video on the Artificial Analysis leaderboard, is now available via the Runway API for developers.
HeyGen Open-Sources HyperFrames: Write HTML, Render Video for AI Agents
HeyGen open-sourced HyperFrames on April 17 -- an HTML-to-video framework built for AI agents. Write HTML, get an MP4. No timeline editor required.
Character.AI Launches Books Mode to Roleplay Classic Novels
Character.AI opened c.ai books on April 16, 2026, letting users play through Pride and Prejudice, Dracula, Frankenstein, and 20 plus classics with either canonical plots or freeform roleplay.
Avid Adds Gemini AI Agents to Media Composer for NAB 2026
Avid and Google Cloud announced a multi-year partnership on April 16, 2026, embedding Gemini and Vertex AI into Media Composer for agentic search, B-roll, and metadata workflows. Public demos run at NAB Show April 19 to 22.
Vizrt AI Keyer Replaces Green Screens at NAB 2026
Vizrt launched AI Keyer on April 16, 2026, a real-time background separation tool that removes the need for green screens in virtual production, with a showcase at NAB 2026.
Canva AI 2.0 Launches Agentic Design Assistant at Create 2026
Canva launched Canva AI 2.0 on April 16, 2026 at Create in Los Angeles, upgrading its AI assistant into a fully agentic design engine with tool orchestration, persistent memory, and workflow integrations.
Google Gemini Mac App Adds Image, Video, and Music Generation
Google launched a native Gemini app for Mac on April 16, 2026, bringing image, video, and music generation directly to the desktop for the first time.
Alibaba Happy Oyster Lets You Walk Through AI-Generated 3D Worlds
Alibaba's Happy Oyster generates navigable 3D environments and interactive video from text prompts, letting creators walk through and direct AI-built worlds in real time.
Luma and Wonder Project Launch AI Filmmaking Studio
Luma AI and Wonder Project launched Innovative Dreams on April 16, 2026, a production services company built around AI video generation for professional filmmaking.
Adobe Lightroom 15.3 Adds Background AI Processing
Adobe released Lightroom Classic 15.3, Desktop 9.3, and Mobile 11.3 on April 16 with background AI processing that keeps photographers working while Denoise and Super Resolution run.
Maxon Launches Cinema 4D for iPad Beta at NAB 2026
Maxon announced Cinema 4D for iPad at NAB Show 2026, opening beta registration for the first professional 3D application on iPadOS.
Runway CEO: AI Could Let Hollywood Make 50 Films for $100M
Runway CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela argued at the Semafor World Economy 2026 conference that AI production tools could allow studios to produce 50 films for the same $100 million budget currently spent on one blockbuster.
Tencent Open-Sources HY-World 2.0: 3D World Generation
Tencent open-sourced HY-World 2.0 on April 16, 2026, a multi-modal framework that turns text or images into navigable 3D environments with meshes and Gaussian Splattings ready for Unity, Unreal Engine, and Blender.
Gemini Now Uses Your Google Photos to Generate Personal Images
Google added Nano Banana 2-powered personalized image generation to the Gemini app on April 16, 2026, letting subscribers create images grounded in their own Google Photos library without writing detailed prompts.