4.6 – Editing Our Images with Microsoft Designer Lesson

Lesson Overview

This lesson introduces you to editing and enhancing AI-generated images using Microsoft Designer. Up until now, you’ve learned how to create images with DALL-E 3 in Microsoft’s Image Creator. While downloaded images are ready to use as-is, Microsoft Designer unlocks further possibilities by allowing you to refine, adjust, or completely redesign your images.

Microsoft Designer is both an image editor and a robust design platform. Its AI-powered features, such as Generative Erase and background manipulation, make it easy to remove unwanted objects or isolate subjects—even for users with minimal graphic design experience. Additional options like templates, graphics, and customizable text help you quickly reformat your images for advertising, educational slides, or social media.

This lesson is especially useful if your project needs images that stand out or fit a specific theme or requirement. Tools like filters and sliders help bring your creative vision to life, while downloading in multiple formats assures you can present or share your work anywhere. Whether you’re adjusting a classroom graphic or preparing visuals for a business campaign, these editing skills streamline the customization process and improve results.

Who This Is For

Whether you’re editing for clarity, visual impact, or brand consistency, this lesson is for you if you:

• Create classroom materials and want to polish visual aids
• Prepare reports or presentations that use custom graphics
• Manage marketing or social campaigns, requiring distinctive images
• Design ads with branded elements or personalized messages
• Need to quickly edit and format images for multiple uses
• Are new to Microsoft Designer and seek an accessible editing workflow

Where This Fits in a Workflow

This lesson comes into play after you’ve generated images using DALL-E 3 and need to make adjustments before using them in real-world contexts. You might return to Designer to fix minor details—removing a stray background item, resizing a composition, or overlaying purposeful text for clarity. For example, if you’re preparing a research slide deck, use Designer to tidy up images and integrate titles or annotations. In marketing, a generated image can be enhanced with product info or branding using templates and text features. By editing directly within Designer, you keep all your changes non-destructive and ready for download whenever the design is finalized.

Technical & Workflow Benefits

Editing with Microsoft Designer replaces manual, time-intensive workflows. Traditionally, customizing images required learning dedicated design software or relying on a professional. With Designer, features like Generative Erase and background removal use AI to automatically clean up images, saving significant time. Instead of painstaking manual selection, you erase or isolate elements almost instantly. Applying ready-made templates or prebuilt text layouts streamlines ad and social post creation—a process that could take hours now done in minutes. Adjusting filters, colors, and shapes can instantly change the mood or focus of a graphic, reducing back-and-forth during revision rounds. The final downloadable formats suit classroom, web, or print needs, minimizing compatibility issues.

Practice Exercise

Try practicing your editing skills on a DALL-E 3 image you’ve already generated:

1. Open Microsoft Designer through your Creations history and select an image you want to refine.
2. Experiment with the Generative Erase tool to remove an unwanted object, and then apply a recommended filter to give your image a new feel.
3. Add a text title using the available pre-designed layouts, and adjust its style or position for visual balance.

After editing, compare your new version to the original. How does your custom edit improve the image’s suitability for your intended project?

Course Context Recap

This lesson builds on your previous experience generating images with DALL-E 3 by teaching you how to refine and enhance them with Microsoft Designer. You’ve seen how to access advanced AI tools and design features, empowering you to create visuals that better serve your personal, educational, or professional needs. In the next part of the course, you’ll discover another approach to generating and customizing images by using DALL-E 3 within ChatGPT. Continue learning to expand your creative toolkit and get even greater flexibility with generative AI.