What Is AI Image Editing? How It Works, With an Example

Classic photo editing works on pixels by hand: you pick a tool, draw a selection, adjust sliders and paint over mistakes. AI image editing moves the work from your hands to an instruction. You say what should change, an AI model reads the picture and your words, and it returns a new image with the change made. An AI image editor is simply an app built around that loop: show it a picture, describe the change, review the result, and try again if it is not right.

AI image manipulation is the wider name for the same idea. It includes adding or removing objects, swapping a background, changing colours, extending the canvas beyond the original edges, copying the look of another picture and changing the light in a scene. An AI photo editor usually means the same thing applied to real photos, such as product shots, portraits or property pictures, rather than images that were made by AI in the first place.

Most AI image editors follow the same pattern, whichever app you use.

1. Bring in the picture. Upload a photo or pick an image you already made.
2. Choose the scope. Decide whether the change applies to the whole picture (style, light, colour, size) or to one area (an object, the background, a patch of text).
3. Mark the area if needed. For local edits you brush over the part to change, or click an object and let the app outline it.
4. Describe the change. Write one clear instruction, for example "replace the grey wall with warm wood panels". Short, concrete words work better than long wish lists.
5. Review the new version. Compare it with the original, zoom in on edges, hands, faces and any text.
6. Iterate or go back. Add another instruction, or return to an earlier version if the last change made things worse.

The key difference from manual editing is step 4: the instruction replaces most of the tool work, so a change that once needed careful masking can take one sentence.

Edits fall into two groups. Whole-image edits change the full picture: resizing or cropping to a new shape, colour grading, restyling to match another image, relighting the scene, extending the edges to fit a wider or taller format, and upscaling to a bigger, sharper file. Local edits change one marked part: erasing an unwanted object, removing the background so the subject sits on transparency or a new backdrop, replacing a product colour, or fixing a small detail.

Some of these do not need generative AI at all. Cropping, fitting and colour grading are classic operations that work on the pixels you have. Upscaling and sharpening also work on existing pixels and do not invent new content. Generative edits, such as extending a canvas or replacing an object, ask the AI to draw new pixels, so they need more checking afterwards.

Say you sell ceramic mugs and have one plain photo of a white mug on a grey table. You want a warm, seasonal social post.

Edit 1, the scene: "make the background a cosy kitchen with soft morning light". The AI keeps the mug and redraws what is behind it.
Edit 2, the detail: brush over the mug handle area and ask to "remove the chip on the handle". Only the marked part changes.
Edit 3, the format: extend the picture from a square to a tall shape for a story, and let the AI fill the new space above and below.

After each edit, check that the mug itself still looks like your real product: same shape, same glaze, same logo. If an edit drifts, go back one version and reword the instruction more narrowly, for example "change only the background, keep the mug exactly as it is". Writing the edits as separate, ordered steps makes it easy to see which one caused a problem.

AI image editing is fast, but it is not always the best choice. For pixel-exact work, such as retouching a brand logo, matching a print colour exactly or cleaning a technical diagram, a manual editor where you control every pixel is still more reliable. Generative edits can also change things you did not ask for: small text on packaging, fingers, or fine patterns may come back slightly different, so always compare the new version with the original before you publish.

It also helps to keep the original. Good AI editors save each edit as a new version rather than overwriting the source, so you can step back. Finally, check the cost model before a big batch: many AI editors charge per edit or per image made, so ten tries at one change cost ten times as much as one.

In Infinall AI you edit by describing the change in a Studio project. Select an image and click Edit (shortcut E), type the first change, use Add step for more, and choose Apply. One edit holds up to 8 steps, run in order. You can also click an image so the Editing this image chip shows above the chat prompt box, then type the change and send it.

For one part of a picture, Markup, Erase, Comment pins and Remove BG work on a brushed area, and Auto-select outlines an object for free. For the whole picture, the edit toolbar has Resize (Crop, Fit and AI Extend), Grade, Style and Lighting, and Enhance sharpens an image or makes it 2 or 4 times bigger. Resize with Crop or Fit, Grade and Enhance are free. If you pin a brand to the project, edits use its name, colours, voice and logo.

Every edit makes a new version and keeps the old one, and going back to an older version costs nothing. Edits use credits, and you see the price in a chip next to Apply before you confirm. One edit request can cost at most 100 credits, and nothing is charged if the edit fails. Free gives 1,000 credits every month with no card, and both Free and Pro can edit by describing.