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The digital renaissance is perhaps best embodied by the unlikely duo of Paint and Windows Notes, two stalwart tools tucked quietly into one of the world’s best-known operating systems. Once revered for their sheer simplicity—and, in moments of stubborn nostalgia, their refusal to keep up with the cool kids—these applications have undergone an AI-infused glow-up, courtesy of Microsoft’s ever-tightening alliance with OpenAI. Suddenly, the most powerful creative and productivity tools on your desktop are the ones you probably last used to sketch out a meme or jot down a hastily conceived password.

A smiling man on a computer screen with Windows and Copilot logos in the background.
How Paint Got Its Groove Back​

For decades, Paint has been the pocket lint of Microsoft’s software suite: harmless, overlooked, but oddly comforting when rediscovered. Then came AI—smashing into Paint’s world with the glitz and promise of a celebrity trainer rebuffing sedentary routines. The results? Transformative.
Among Paint’s new AI tricks, the “Remove background” function stands out. Picture this: you snap a blurry selfie at a family picnic, and the background chaos—crying toddlers, nosy cousins, maybe even a dog doing something unspeakable on your shoes—overwhelms your frame. Select “Remove background,” and, as if by digital evanescence, everything but you fades to white. No manual tracing, no polygonal lasso dances. Just you and endless possibilities. Though the magic works best when the subject is in stark focus (so maybe skip the group shots at midnight), even imperfect photos are given a new lease on life.
Embracing the AI paintbrush does come with a catch. Features like “Generative Draft” and “Remove background” are free to use, offering playful experimentation at no cost. But when you catapult into the realm of the “Image Creator”—the feature that births new images from the ether of your suggestions—you’ll find yourself dipping into a well of AI credits. These credits aren’t like the tokens you’d win at an arcade; they’re tied to your Microsoft account and bundled into a Microsoft 365 OA Copilot Pro subscription. It’s creativity with a meter running, so choose your AI-powered masterpieces wisely.

Copilot in the Notes Game: Notepad Steps Up​

If Paint is the impulsive doodler of Windows’ family, then Notes is the scrivener, long typecast as a humble code editor or the digital equivalent of a napkin on which genius ideas are scrawled. Lately, however, Microsoft has recognized Notepad (often referred to simply as the Notes app) as a blank canvas for more than just plaintext. Enhanced formatting and autosave are now mere table stakes—as is the appearance of a Copilot button tucked discreetly into the upper right of its window.
Here’s where things get spicy: Copilot isn’t there to spit out long, ChatGPT-style creations on demand. It requires a seed—a fragment of your own writing—to germinate. Highlight a block of text, click the Copilot button, and you’re suddenly presented with an arsenal of options: “Shorten,” “Lengthen,” “Change tone,” “Change format,” and “Rewrite.” These aren’t one-dimensional edits. You can render your meeting notes as punchy bullet lists, rework a dry memo into Hemingway-esque prose, spin poetry from the dull clay of to-dos, or simply trim the fat from rambling thoughts.
Let’s linger, for a moment, on the tone-change options. Imagine you’ve composed a formal apology to your team for accidentally hitting “reply all” with a meme-laden chain. With a click, Copilot can soften that message into playful banter, or harden it into CEO gravitas. Try transforming “I’m sorry I sent the wrong file” into a verse of motivational haiku for a touch of workflow zen.
Opting for the Rewrite menu opens a smorgasbord of alternatives. Instead of nervously wondering what your edited pitch will look like, a modal window slides out with previews. You can compare drafts, pick the best vibe, and hit “Replace”—the digital equivalent of summoning a squad of professional editors on a moment’s notice.

The Value of AI Credits: Not Quite a Free-for-All​

In both Paint and Notes, your access to AI horsepower is somewhat rationed. Many rewriting features in Notes are offered free of charge to all users, which is a generous taste of what’s possible. But for the eager creative, hungry for unlimited image generations in Paint or copious text variations in Notes, a subscription to Microsoft 365 OA Copilot Pro unlocks the full buffet. There’s no piecemealing these credits—they live and die with your subscription—and that exclusivity forms the backbone of Microsoft’s user-to-subscriber pipeline.
The notion of AI credits may sound novel, but it’s not too different from the old-school rationing of printer ink or cloud storage. Use them judiciously: burning through your credits for the umpteenth version of a cat photo or a never-ending draft of your “world’s best banana bread” recipe may leave you high and dry when inspiration truly strikes.

Why the Windows Workbench Needed AI​

This leap into AI isn’t just about feature parity with competing platforms. It marks a broader evolution in the everyday Windows experience. Paint and Notes, by virtue of being universally accessible, have become showcases for AI tools that are at once powerful and approachable.
AI in the Windows environment is less about replacing creative spark and more about providing scaffolding for ideas. Remove obstacles—like tedious background deletion or writer’s block—and you lower the barrier to invention. You don’t have to be an artist to clean up a photo, or a Pulitzer-winning author to whip your ramblings into something presentable.
There’s also the matter of trust. Microsoft knows that its user base spans everyone from nervous technophobes to die-hard power users. Enabling AI in Paint and Notes provides a low-risk, high-reward playground—the chance to try out generative tools without the existential dread of catastrophic failure or learning curves that resemble Everest.

Is This the Dawn of the Copilot-Everywhere Era?​

Paint and Notes serve as a microcosm for what’s brewing elsewhere at Microsoft. The company’s Copilot vision is, at its core, one of gentle augmentation: software quietly helping users get unstuck, polish their output, or leapfrog to results that once seemed out of reach. It’s no surprise, then, that Copilot looms over other Microsoft products—from Bing to Word, Excel, and PowerPoint—offering encouragement in the form of context-aware suggestions and AI-fueled shortcuts.
What’s remarkable is the seamlessness. The Copilot button, present but unobtrusive, invites casual experimentation. Even the act of disabling Copilot—simply a matter of toggling a gear-icon switch—empowers users to pick the level of AI interference they’re comfortable with.
Microsoft’s partnership with OpenAI is not just a business coup; it’s a renewal of purpose for apps that felt dangerously close to obsolescence. Now, they play host to some of the most advanced, accessible AI in consumer tech. The days of ignoring system updates or skipping past new feature announcements might soon be numbered.

When Accessibility Meets Creativity​

Let’s not overlook the elephant in the room: democratizing powerful AI doesn’t just make old tools shiny again. It opens creative and professional doors to groups that might otherwise have been locked out. Universal design meets universal access. Consider a student tweaking a class presentation, a small business owner revamping their brand imagery, or a hobbyist compiling poetry—each is empowered by the subtle, frictionless magic of Copilot.
Every AI tweak, whether it’s brightening an image or rephrasing a thought, has a ripple effect. It saves time, reduces barriers, and levels the playing field. Inclusion isn’t just a box checked; it’s woven into the fabric of these tools.

The Limits and Warnings (Because Nothing’s Perfect)​

Of course, AI cheerleading must be tempered with caution. The “Remove background” feature, as magical as it may seem, is no wizard. Toss it an image with murky focus or camouflage-worthy costumes, and it might cough up a dud—a decapitated flower, a ghostly outline, or a background that clings like a bad memory. Likewise, Copilot’s textual enhancements, while versatile, rely heavily on clarity and intent in the original draft. Ask it to transform an incoherent run-on into corporate poetry, and you might end up with something best described as “avant-garde, but unpublishable.”
And then there’s privacy. Feeding snippets of your poetry, business memos, and pixelated photos into AI systems—even those developed by as trusted a name as Microsoft—demands that you keep one digital eye open. While local processing and cloud security have come a long way, no tool is bulletproof.
Finally, the specter of paywalls and limited credits can feel like a throwback to the Hunger Games of the early app store era. If you fall in love with a feature, prepare to pony up for Microsoft 365 OA Copilot Pro, or content yourself with rationed excitement.

How to Make the Most of AI in Paint and Notes​

With new tools come new habits—a truth as old as Windows 95’s Start Menu. To maximize your AI experience, embrace a workflow that invites experimentation and play. Here’s how:
  • When editing an image, don’t be afraid to combine manual edits with AI suggestions. Sometimes, the best results come from a little human-AI teamwork.
  • In Notes, draft fearlessly. Write clunky, repetitive, or even cringe-worthy text—then let Copilot tidy it up.
  • Test the limits of what removal, rewriting, and reformatting can do. If you’re working with messy, complex images or ambiguous text, see how far the AI can stretch.
  • Keep an eye on your AI credits, especially if you’re on a creative roll. Don’t let FOMO lure you into spending your quota on trivial edits.
  • Use the “Change tone” and “Change format” features to reinvent everything from birthday wishes to business blurbs. Discover the many voices hidden within your own writing.

Looking Forward: The Future of AI in Everyday Apps​

If Paint and Notes can be transformed by the touch of AI, one wonders: what next? Expect more of your digital favorites to get smarter, more helpful, and—dare we say—more fun to use. Microsoft, by betting big on generative intelligence, is inviting users on a journey. The destination? Tools that adapt to our needs, not the other way around.
For now, take a moment to let that sink in. The next time you’re staring at a mediocre snapshot, a block of over-wrought text, or the blinking cursor of creation itself, remember: AI’s not here to take over. It’s here to tee you up for the win—one click, one edit, one surreal poem at a time.
Paint and Notes, once relics of a simpler digital age, are suddenly some of the savviest apps on your desktop. The only real question left is: what will you make with them next?

Source: indianetworknews.com Thus you can use the functions of AI in Paint and in the Windows notes bloc
 

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