Imagen 2 on Vertex AI is now generally available

Today, we’re sharing a significant upgrade to Google Cloud’s image-generation capabilities with Imagen 2, our most advanced text-to-image technology, which is now generally available for Vertex AI customers on the allowlist (i.e., approved for access).

Imagen 2 on Vertex AI allows our customers to customize and deploy Imagen 2 with intuitive tooling, fully-managed infrastructure, and built-in privacy and safety features. Developed using Google DeepMind technology, Imagen 2 delivers significantly improved image quality and a host of features that enable developers to create images for their specific use case, including:

• Generating high-quality, photorealistic, high-resolution, aesthetically pleasing images from natural language prompts
• Text rendering in multiple languages to create images with accurate text overlays
• Logo generation to create company or product logos and overlay them in images
• Visual question and answering for generating captions from images, and for getting informative text responses to questions about image details

Importantly, Vertex AI’s indemnification commitment now covers Imagen on Vertex AI, which includes Imagen 2 and future generally available upgrades of the model powering the service. We employ an industry-first, two-pronged copyright indemnification approach that can give customers peace of mind when using our generative AI products.

Enterprise-ready text-to-image capabilities

Imagen 2 on Vertex AI boasts a variety of image generation features to help organizations create images that match their specific brand requirements with the same enterprise-grade reliability and governance customers are used to with Imagen.

New features now available in Imagen 2 include:

High quality Images: Imagen 2 can achieve accurate, high-quality photorealistic outputs with improved image+text understanding and a variety of novel training and modeling techniques.

Text rendering support: Text-to-image technologies often have difficulty correctly rendering text. If a model is prompted to generate a picture of an object with a specific word or phrase, for example, it can be challenging to ensure the correct phrase is part of the output image. Imagen 2 helps solve for this, which can give organizations a deeper level of control for branding and messaging.

Logo generation: Imagen 2 can generate a wide variety of creative and realistic logos — including emblems, lettermarks, and abstract logos — for business, brands, and products. It also has the ability to overlay these logos onto products, clothing, business cards, and other surfaces.

Captions and question-answer: Imagen 2’s enhanced image understanding capabilities enable customers to create descriptive, long-form captions and get detailed answers to questions about elements within the image.

Multi-language prompts: Beyond English, Imagen 2 is launching with support for six additional languages (Chinese, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Spanish) in preview, with many others planned for release in early 2024. This feature includes the capability to translate between prompt and output, e.g., prompting in Spanish but specifying that the output should be in Portuguese.

Safety: Imagen 2 includes built-in safety precautions to help ensure that generated images align with Google’s Responsible AI principles. For example, Imagen 2 is integrated with our experimental digital watermarking service, powered by Google DeepMind’s SynthID, which enables allowlisted customers to generate invisible watermarks and verify images generated by Imagen. Imagen 2 also includes comprehensive safety filters to help prevent generation of potentially harmful content.

Check out how customers are using Imagen API — and how to get started

We look forward to organizations using these new features to build on the results they’ve already achieved with Imagen.

Snap is using Imagen to help Snapchat+ subscribers to express their inner creativity. With the new AI Camera Mode, they can tap a button, type in a prompt or choose a pre-selected one, and generate a scene to share with family and friends or post to their story.

“Imagen is the most scalable text-to-image model with the safety and image quality we need,” said Josh Siegel, Senior Director of Product at Snap. “One of the major benefits of Imagen for Snap is that we can focus on what we do best, which is the product design and the way that it looks and makes you feel. We know that when we work on new products like AI Camera Mode, we can really rely on the brand safety, scalability, and reliability that comes with Google Cloud.”

Shutterstock has also emerged as a leading innovator bringing AI to creative production — including being the first to launch an ethically-sourced AI image generator, now enhanced with Imagen on Vertex AI. With the Shutterstock AI image generator, users can turn simple text prompts into unique, striking visuals, allowing them to create at the speed of their imaginations. The Shutterstock website includes a searchable collection of more than 16,000 Imagen pictures, all available for licensing.

“We exist to empower the world to tell their stories by bridging the gap between idea and execution. Variety is critical for the creative process, which is why we continue to integrate the latest and greatest technology into our image generator and editing features—as long as it is built on responsibly sourced data,” said Chris Loy, Director of AI Services, Shutterstock. “The Imagen model on Vertex AI is an important addition to our AI image generator, and we're excited to see how it enables greater creative capabilities for our users as the model continues to evolve."

Canva is also using Imagen on Vertex AI to bring ideas to life, with millions of images generated with the model to date. Users can access Imagen as an app directly within Canva and with a simple text prompt, generate a captivating image that fits their design needs.

“Partnering with Google Cloud, we’re continuing to use generative AI to innovate the design process and augment imagination,” said Danny Wu, Head of AI at Canva. “With Imagen, our 170M+ monthly users can benefit from the image quality improvements to uplevel their content creation at scale. The new model and features will further empower our community to turn their ideas into real images with as little friction as possible."

To get started with Imagen 2 on Vertex AI, find our documentation or reach out to your Google Cloud account representative to join the Trusted Tester Program.