Dev recreates Adobe suite with Claude, but only 5 of 30 filter tests match Photoshop
APPSO · wechat · 2026-10-11
Brandon Thomas, a developer with 15 years of experience, launched ArtCraft: seven free, open-source Rust apps mirroring Adobe's Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere, Lightroom, Acrobat, After Effects and InDesign, built largely with Claude and originally promised full feature parity within a month — a timeline that has already slipped, with the author now saying parity may take months.
Hands-on testing shows large gaps: PhotoCraft opens images, handles basics and reads/writes PSD files, but chokes on smart objects, lags on professional files, and matches Photoshop's filter output in only 5 of 30 test cases. FilmCraft does multi-track editing but runs effects and Lumetri-style grading on CPU and lacks third-party plugin support.
The piece argues AI coding has warped perceptions of "doneness": interfaces now look finished in days, but mature software's hardest parts are the unwritten edge cases born from years of user feedback. It also surveys similar attempts like PhotonStudio, Concat and GenOffice, concluding these challenges to decades-old software are more slogan than substance.
Related event: Dev Rebuilds Adobe Suite in Rust with Claude, Open-Sources Seven Apps(2 posts)→
More from coding & agent
- LoreKit: open-source deterministic memory layer for coding agents, no vector index — madsthines · 2026-10-11
- Devs push back on AI slop panic: codebases have always contained human-made slop — ctjlewis · 2026-10-11
- Shrike: open-source MCP server that gives Claude Code a recording of your app's crash — S_m_nt · 2026-10-11
- Grok agent gets its own email and proactivity, winning back skeptical users — Baconbrix · 2026-10-11
- Zed CEO's dashboard shows 295M tokens burned by 2 devs in 30 days, mostly cache reads — zeeg · 2026-10-11
- Claude Code's TAB+ENTER flow: accepting recommended next steps for semi-autonomous coding — tristanbob · 2026-10-11