Engineer builds free Adobe alternatives using AI

An American software developer has launched an ambitious challenge against one of the world's leading companies in design, photography and video.

Brandon Thomas, a software engineer and founder of ArtCraft, used artificial intelligence to rebuild a series of applications associated with Adobe and offer them free and open-source.

The project, called ArtCraft, currently includes seven applications designed to provide alternatives to Adobe's core software: PhotoCraft for Photoshop, FilmCraft for Premiere, VectorCraft for Illustrator, LightCraft for Lightroom, EffectCraft for After Effects, DesignCraft for InDesign, and PDFCraft for Acrobat.

Thomas enlisted the Claude Opus 5.5 AI model to develop the software in the Rust programming language. According to him, these are rebuilt substitutes, not code copied from Adobe's applications. Most of the programs are available for Windows, Mac and Linux systems, and in some cases can be run directly through a browser.

Thomas said he is frustrated with Adobe and its subscription model, and even claimed he was previously charged cancellation fees. His goal is to provide creators with professional tools without dependence on a subscription to closed software.

But the project is still in its early stages. Some of the applications are defined as early alpha versions and others are in development, and initial reports indicate there are still significant bugs and gaps compared to Adobe's original software. Therefore, despite the similarity in interface and tools, it's still too early to determine that this is a full replacement for Photoshop or Premiere.

And yet, it's precisely the pace of development that's generating excitement. The idea that a single developer can use AI models to build in a short time a series of applications that previously required massive development teams illustrates the change that artificial intelligence is bringing to the software world.

Thomas has even set an ambitious goal of reaching a very high level of compatibility with Adobe's software within months, while also relying on the user community to report bugs and suggest improvements.