I Was Never the Artist
The moment what I imagined showed up on the screen
I have used Adobe tools for a long time.
I worked there briefly in the 90s. Before that, I worked with designers who loved the tools, who made them look effortless. From the outside, they always seemed powerful, but also just out of reach for me.
I’m not an artist.
I have a strong sense of what I want something to look like. I can see it clearly. But when I try to put pen to paper, it never quite comes out the way I imagined.
So I built around that.
When I ran my own business, I partnered with designers. They made things beautiful. I worked on the back end code. It was a clean division of labor that made sense to me.
Even when I briefly went to culinary school, I found my way back to the tools. I made a small video project instead of a traditional presentation. A walking pie.
It was fun. But more importantly, it reminded me where I belonged. I knew I wasn’t going to stay. Tech was where I still wanted to be.
Since then, Adobe has mostly stayed in my life in quieter ways. I’ve kept a subscription for years. I use it when I need it. PDFs more than anything else. Occasionally something slightly more creative, but nothing that stretched me too far.
Last week was different.
We were creating a logo for Sail Away Studios. I opened Illustrator, mostly out of habit, and noticed Firefly. I hadn’t really paid attention to it before.
I had a clear idea of what I wanted, so I described it.
The first result was almost perfect.
That doesn’t usually happen to me with design.
I tweaked a few things, but not much. For the first time, the thing in my head showed up on the screen without a long gap in between.
That’s new for me.
I’ve created images with M365 Copilot and been genuinely happy with them. But this felt different. More precise. More aligned with the tools I already understood, even if I hadn’t used them deeply in years.
Adobe has always felt like that to me. Powerful, a little intimidating, something I respected more than I used.
Firefly changes the relationship.
I’m still not an artist.
But I don’t have to be in the same way I used to.
As I rebuild my personal desktop and think about the tools I want within reach, this is now part of that set.
Not because it replaces anything.
Because it removes a barrier that has been there for a very long time.
Alison + Wiggins