The Z Fold 6’s new AI photo tricks are fun, but I’m not sure they’re needed

OPINION: The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6, along with the clamshell-style Z Flip 6, continue Samsung’s foray into the world of generative AI under the Galaxy AI banner with a handful of new features, mainly focused on image editing technology. 

I spent well over a week with the Galaxy Z Fold 6 ahead of my review going live, including trialling out the new additions to the Galaxy AI roster, and I’ve been left wondering whether Samsung’s AI efforts would’ve been better spent elsewhere.

The new additions come in two forms; AI Portrait Studio and Draw Assist. In its simplest form, AI Portrait Studio allows you to take your selfies and create AI-generated likenesses in a handful of different styles, including Watercolour, Sketch, 3D Cartoon and Comic. 

I’m not quite sure what you’re supposed to do with these AI-generated selfies however; are they for profile photos on social media? Are they just for sharing? If so, what’s the reason for sharing a photo with the same look as every other Z Fold and Z Flip user? 

I understand that some users want a more artsy look to their profile photos on social media. However, these are generally used to make you stand out from the crowd, which is why people have traditionally paid digital artists to create unique hand-drawn digital pieces of art. 

But, again, with everyone having access to the same handful of AI-generated art styles, will your new profile photo actually stand out? I very much doubt it. It’s something fun that you’ll show off to your mates once, and likely never actually use it again. 

Then there’s the fact that some of the images generated look a little, well, odd.

Take the below selfie of me, generated using AI Portrait Studio in the comic style. It looks fine on the surface, and there is some resemblance to the original photo I submitted, but it doesn’t look exactly like me. And, on occasion, the AI can misinterpret my facial hair and create results that look nothing like me. 

It’s not just me that gets that odd uncanny valley feeling when looking at some of these generated results. Even at the launch of the Z Fold 6 in Paris, actor Syndey Sweeney hardly looked impressed when Samsung revealed an AI-generated photo of her using the tech. She said it looked cool, but we all know exactly what she was thinking with that unsure look in her eyes. 

In fact, that moment has become a bit of a meme in the past few weeks. Not a great look for Samsung there. 

Drawing Assist is arguably the more interesting of the two new features. The tech essentially allows you to doodle things on your photos and use AI to turn them into something photorealistic, while also taking elements like lighting into consideration to make sure that the generated element blends in with the photo.

From a creative perspective, this can be a lot of fun. You can add visual flare to otherwise boring photos, like the addition of a hot air balloon in the background of a photo of a statue I recently shot during a trip to Milan. It looks exactly as I imagined, despite a pretty rough-and-ready drawing of a hot air balloon using my fingers. 

On the flip side, however, I feel a little bit weird about using GenAI to add and completely change the look of my images. For me, photography is, and always will be, about capturing those amazing, intimate, hilarious moments. Adding something extra to the background for the aesthetic flies directly in the face of that idea. 

It doesn’t fall directly into the category of misinformation, of course, but it’s not exactly that far off either – especially if you try and crop out the ‘Made with AI’ watermark on your edited images. 

Maybe I’m just missing the point, who knows?

That said, the Drawing Assist can come in handy in other areas of the smartphone experience, allowing you to turn your quick doodles in the Notes app into something much better-looking for a nicer note-taking experience. Even that, though, is something people will likely use a few times before going back to text-only note-taking like most of us. 

I’m not saying that Samsung shouldn’t add these fun elements to its software offering, far from it. I just don’t think these are the killer features that Samsung’s Z Fold 6 and Z Flip 6 marketing suggests they might be. 

I’d rather that development effort go into a GenAI feature that’ll make my day-to-day life a little easier; a GenAI virtual assistant, notification summaries, or maybe a feature that’ll automatically add events to my calendar that I discuss in phone calls. 

So yes, while the new photo features on the Z Fold 6 and Z Flip 6 are undoubtedly fun, I’m not sure they’re actually needed when other areas of the OneUI experience need that same GenAI magic.