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Here’s What I Learned Testing Photoshop’s New Generative AI Tool

Adobe’s Firefly AI feature brings new fun and fakery to photos. It’s a profound change for image editing, though far from perfect.

Adobe has bulit generative AI abilities into its flagship image-editing software, releasing a Photoshop beta version Tuesday that dramatically expands what artists and photo editors can do. The move promises to release a new torrent of creativity even as it gives us all a new reason to pause and wonder if that sensational, scary or inspirational photo you see on the internet is actually real.

In my tests, detailed below, I found the tool impressive but imperfect. Adding it directly to Photoshop is a big deal, letting creators experiment within the software tool they’re likely already using without excursions to MidjourneyStability AI’s Stable Diffusion or other outside generative AI tools.

With Adobe’s Firefly family of generative AI technologies arriving in Photoshop, you’ll be able to let the AI fill a selected part of the image with whatever it thinks most fitting – for example, replacing road cracks with smooth pavement. You can also specify the imagery you’d like with a text prompt, such as adding a double yellow line to the road.

Firefly in Photoshop also can also expand an image, adding new scenery beyond the frame based on what’s already in the frame or what you suggest with text. Want more sky and mountains in your landscape photo? A bigger crowd at the rock concert? Photoshop will oblige, without today’s difficulties of finding source material and splicing it in.

The feature, called generative fill and scheduled to emerge from beta testing in the second half of 2023, can be powerful. In Adobe’s live demo, the tool was often able to match a photo’s tones, blend in AI-generated imagery seamlessly, infer the geometric details of perspective even in reflections and extrapolate the position of the sun from shadows and sky haze.

Such technologies have been emerging over the last year as Stable Diffusion, Midjourney and OpenAI’s Dall-Ecaptured the imaginations of artists and creative pros. Now it’s built directly into the software they’re most likely to already be using, streamlining what can be a cumbersome editing process.

«It really puts the power and control of generative AI into the hands of the creator,» said Maria Yap, Adobe’s vice president of digital imaging. «You can just really have some fun. You can explore some ideas. You can ideate. You can create without ever necessarily getting into the deep tools of the product, very quickly.»

But you can’t sell anything yet. With Firefly technology, including what’s produced by Photoshop’s generative fill, «you may not use the output for any commercial purpose,» Adobe’s generative AI beta rules state.

Photoshop’s Firefly AI imperfect but useful

In my testing, I frequently ran into problems, many of them likely stemming from the limited range of the training imagery. When I tried to insert a fish on a bicycle to an image, Firefly only added the bicycle. I couldn’t get Firefly to add a kraken to emerge from San Francisco Bay. A musk ox looked like a panda-moose hybrid.

Less fanciful material also presents problems. Text looks like an alien race’s script. Shadows, lighting, perspective and geometry weren’t always right.

People are hard, too. On close inspection, their faces were distorted in weird ways. Humans added into shots could be positioned too high in the frame or in otherwise unconvincingly blended in.

Still, Firefly is remarkable for what it can accomplish, particularly with landscape shots. I could add mountains, oceans, skies and hills to landscapes. A white delivery van in a night scene was appropriately yellowish to match the sodium vapor streetlights in the scene. If you don’t like the trio of results Firefly presents, you can click the «generate» button to get another batch.

Given the pace of AI developments, I expect Firefly in Photoshop will improve.

It’s hard and expensive to retrain big AI models, requiring a data center packed with expensive hardware to churn through data, sometimes taking weeks for the largest models. But Adobe plans relatively frequent updates to Firefly. «Expect [about] monthly updates for general improvements and retraining every few months in all likelihood,» Adobe product chief Scott Belsky tweeted Tuesday.

Automating image manipulation

For years, «Photoshop» hasn’t just referred to Adobe’s software. It’s also used as a verb signifying photo manipulations like slimming supermodels’ waists or hiding missile launch failures. AI tools automate not just fun and flights of fancy, but also fake images like an alleged explosion at the Pentagon or a convincingly real photo of the pope in a puffy jacket, to pick two recent examples.

With AI, expect editing techniques far more subtle than the extra smoke easily recognized as digitally added to photos of an Israeli attack on Lebanon in 2006.

It’s a reflection of the double-edged sword that is generative AI. The technology is undeniably useful in many situations but also blurs the line between what is true and what is merely plausible.

For its part, Adobe tries to curtail problems. It doesn’t permit prompts to create images of many political figures and blocks you for «safety issues» if you try to create an image of black smoke in front of the White House. And its AI usage guidelines prohibit imagery involving violence, pornography and «misleading, fraudulent, or deceptive content that could lead to real-world harm,» among other categories. «We disable accounts that engage in behavior that is deceptive or harmful.»

Firefly also is designed to skip over styling prompts like that have provoked serious complaints from artists displeased to see their type of art reproduced by a data center. And it supports the Content Authenticity Initiative‘s content credentials technology that can be used to label an image as having been generated by AI.

Today, generative AI imagery made with Adobe’s Firefly website add content credentials by default along with a visual watermark. When the Photoshop feature exists beta testing and ships later this year, imagery will include content credentials automatically, Adobe said.

People trying to fake images can sidestep that technology. But in the long run, it’ll become part of how we all evaluate images, Adobe believes.

«Content credentials give people who want to be trusted a way to be trusted. This is an open-source technology that lets everyone attach metadata to their images to show that they created an image, when and where it was created, and what changes were made to it along the way,» Adobe said. «Once it becomes the norm that important news comes with content credentials, people will then be skeptical when they see images that don’t.»

Generative AI for photos

Adobe’s Firefly family of generative AI tools began with a website that turns a text prompt like «modern chair made up of old tires» into an image. It’s added a couple other options since, and Creative Cloud subscribers will also be able to try a lightweight version of the Photoshop interface on the Firefly site.

When OpenAI’s Dall-E brought that technology to anyone who signed up for it in 2022, it helped push generative artificial intelligence from a technological curiosity toward mainstream awareness. Now there’s plenty of worry along with the excitement as even AI creators fret about what the technology will bring now and in the more distant future.

Generative AI is a relatively new form of artificial intelligence technology. AI models can be trained to recognize patterns in vast amounts of data – in this case labeled images from Adobe’s stock art business and other licensed sources – and then to create new imagery based on that source data.

Generative AI has surged to mainstream awareness with language models used in tools like OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot, Google’s Gmail and Google Docs, and Microsoft’s Bing search engine. When it comes to generating images, Adobe employs an AI image generation technique called diffusion that’s also behind Dall-E, Stable Diffusion, Midjourney and Google’s Imagen.

Adobe calls Firefly for Photoshop a «co-pilot» technology, positioning it as a creative aid, not a replacement for humans. Yap acknowledges that some creators are nervous about being replaced by AI. Adobe prefers to see it as a technology that can amplify and speed up the creative process, spreading creative tools to a broader population.

«I think the democratization we’ve been going through, and having more creativity, is a positive thing for all of us,» Yap said. «This is the future of Photoshop.»

Editors’ note: CNET is using an AI engine to create some personal finance explainers that are edited and fact-checked by our editors. For more, see this post.

Technologies

Blood of the Dawnwalker Is a Vampire Action RPG with Breath of the Wild’s Neatest Feature

At a preview event, I got an early look at the upcoming dark fantasy game from publisher Bandai Namco.

There’s an ill wind howling through the valley — and no, it isn’t just the plague ravaging 14th-century Eastern Europe. A family of vampires has taken over the quiet stretch between the Carpathian Mountains that you call home, and they’ve made you one of their gifted thralls. Now it’s up to you, a peasant given the powers of the blood-draining undead, to save your family, and perhaps the valley itself.

At a preview event in Los Angeles, California, I got an early hands-off look at Blood of the Dawnwalker, the upcoming action RPG due out in 2026 from Polish studio Rebel Wolves and published by Bandai Namco. While I didn’t play the game, I watched a lengthy presentation shown to a group of media members as a developer played a live build, walking us through the various cycles and mechanics that players will navigate in their quest to save the valley. 

But in conversation with two of the game’s developers, I heard that Blood of the Dawnwalker has an uncommon feature — one that’s perhaps best known from The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. From the beginning of the game, you can march up to the game’s end boss, the vampire Francis, and try to defeat them. 

«We have this narrative sandbox and our goal here is to tell the players, alright, you’re out of the prologue — you do you. If you want to go and storm Brencis’ Castle right here right now, go,» said Piotr Kucharski, writer at Rebel Wolves. «In fact, we invite it, right? We want to see those people on YouTube.»

That prologue sets the stage for the game: Protagonist Coen’s sister is infected with the Black Plague. She’s nearly killed by religious zealots but for the timely intervention of Brencis’ coven of vampires, who turn her into one of them. Their attempt to turn Coen fails, turning him into an empowered half-vampire. He has 30 days to save his family — but players can go about saving them in any way they choose. Each major action takes precious time, but players can choose to progress as they want. This means it’s possible to miss a ton of events and quests in the game. 

Play by day or night — the choice is yours

The demo started at the gameplay overview, embedded above, but extended much further. The game’s developers walked us through a fork in the road in a quest for a magic sword. By day, as a mere human, Coen worked his way through church bureaucracy by hunting down a wayward caretaker who turned into a monster in a quarantined almshouse. He finally got access to a book in the church library, which identified which sigil to look out for in the graveyard. The sword, it turns out, was sequestered in a tomb with its bearer.

Daytime activity can involve swordplay, including use of magic-like hexes used in and out of combat, but it’s mostly geared toward investigation. You’ll talk (including to the dead, thanks to a handy Compel Soul hex), read books and get answers. But, as with nighttime, any prolonged activity like a lengthy conversation (indicated on the screen with a special icon, so players won’t be surprised) could take a segment of time, ticking the clock closer to Coen’s end-of-month deadline.

At the halfway point of the demo, the developer went back to show how things could be done differently at night, using Coen’s vampiric powers to shadowstep across rooftops and walk up walls — making it easy to sneak into that library to find the right book. But guards patrolling the graveyard would have to be dealt with to unearth the tomb, giving the developer the chance to show Coen’s undead fighting capabilities (including goring with claws and draining blood). Descending into the tomb, we found the sword, but it was still held by an undead knight imprisoned in the walls — a Dawnwalker like us gone mad by an extended lifetime of hunger and starvation. 

Killing the knight gave us the vaunted sword, which after reforging, would be a powerful weapon when Coen eventually challenges Brencis. But that quest is optional, meaning some players will never find it. There are complications to choosing whether to do some quests during the day and night, too — for instance, it might be easier to sneak around at night, but that Dawnwalker knight would be harder to kill with his own nocturnal vampiric powers.

So, technically, players can choose to play entirely during the day or solely at night if they like one half of Coen’s abilities better than the other. But they’d be missing out. While some quests have both day and night layers, others can only be accessed in daylight or after the sun falls, said Rafał Jankowski, lead quest designer at Rebel Wolves.

«Some quests require Coen to speak to some corpses and similarly, certain places can only be reached with planeshift or shadowstep,» Jankowski said. 

Splitting real-time combat with action RPG mechanics

The slice of combat we saw during the demo likewise split between day and night strategies. But most of the fighting will be done with a longsword, relying on rhythmically alternating between defense and offense. When enemies come at you swinging their own blades, directional indicators will pop up, requiring you to block in one of the four cardinal directions before counterattacking yourself.

When Rebel Wolves revealed Blood of the Dawnwalker’s combat in gameplay reveal videos, fans in the comments critiqued the potential difficulty of predicting directions to block. So the studio took that as feedback and came up with a solution to add another omnidirectional blocking ability, but which would drain Coen’s stamina in exchange. Likewise, when viewers complained the camera followed the player too closely, developers added a zoomed-out option.

«I do believe that we are still at the stage of development when it’s invaluable to get people involved more in the production, to hear their opinions on the project. We will keep our ear close to the ground,» Jankowski said. 

Otherwise, Blood of the Dawnwalker follows some expected action RPG standbys, with equippable weapons and armor, healing items and upgradeable skills. The game has a trio of skill trees, split between daytime-only, nighttime-only and shared abilities. 

The influence of Warhammer and The Witcher

Set in the Carpathian Mountains that stretch from modern-day Czech Republic to Romania and during the 14th century, with plenty of period-accurate fashion and architecture, Rebel Wolves’ game seemingly vibes with the more realistic Kingdom Come: Deliverance (set in modern-day Czech Republic). But a bigger inspiration, the developers told me, is Warhammer, the dark fantasy tabletop game about warring armies of men, elves, dwarves and monstrous creatures.

«I like the idea of a society, a medieval society that has a city, a thriving community but there is also this outside danger. You have Chaos, you have Skavens, you have all kinds of creatures, Orcs and so on,» Kucharski said. «Here [in Blood of the Dawnwalker], we have a bit of a different situation, because all those creatures come out into the light and they say, OK, we are going to rule you.»

With its corruption of Christian churches into incorporating seeming blood rituals as a vampiric touch, Blood of the Dawnwalker sure takes cues from Warhammer’s dark medieval vibe. But Kucharski also mentioned the tabletop RPG Vampire: The Masquerade (in its medieval variant) as another inspiration, as well as the Dragon Age series for its consequence of choices and system of magic.

But with its third-person sword-and-magic gameplay, supernatural monsters and vaguely Slavic setting, Blood of the Dawnwalker reminded me a lot more of another popular game from a Polish studio: The Witcher 3.

It’s a comparison that the developers have been getting a lot. Jankowski is quick to point out the different natures of both games’ protagonists, especially with Coen’s day-and-night cycles of human and vampiric ability. But more importantly, Kucharski noted how much history Geralt already has in the games, sourced from the popular series of Witcher novels — he’s the Butcher of Blavikan with his own reputation, whereas Coen is just some guy. 

Of course, Coen will build his reputation as the game progresses in its zero-to-hero narrative, Kucharski said. And perhaps there’s more to his saga after Blood of the Dawnwalker ends, too — but the developers were coy about what plans they had coming for Coen.

«We hope that we’ll see some other adventures going maybe in the future,» Kucharski said. «Now we are focusing on the first one — just to get it right.»

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This TCL Phone Outperforms Samsung’s Budget Model and Is Now Even Cheaper at Just $200

With our exclusive code, you can nab the new TCL NxtPaper 60 XE at a record-low price.

Phones are all a bit samey in 2025, so when something different comes out, we can’t help but pay attention. The TCL NxtPaper 60 XE is one of the most interesting phones we’ve reviewed recently, with a full-color, paperlike display. In fact, it’s an impressive budget phone that in many ways outperforms the Samsung Galaxy A16 5G at a similar price.

So you’ll be pleased to hear that the TCL NxtPaper 60 XE is currently reduced. Right now, it’s reduced from $250 to $222 on Amazon for Prime members. And if you use our exclusive promo code CNET10OF, you can bag an extra 10% off, bringing the total down to $200. But hurry, this code expires Aug. 27.

This phone hits top marks for everyday use. Its screen is large, the 120Hz refresh rate is buttery smooth and the battery lasted CNET reviewer Tyler Graham throughout the entire day, even with frequent use. If you take a lot of selfies, you’ll enjoy a big 32-megapixel upgrade to the front-facing camera, though the camera system is otherwise similar to TCL’s 50 series phones.

Hey, did you know? CNET Deals texts are free, easy and save you money.

The shiny bonus features on the TCL NxtPaper 60 XE are the eponymous NxtPaper digital ink and e-reader modes and cloud-based TCL AI. You might not use these features regularly, but they’re solid value adds to an already budget phone. The 60 XE is working off a MediaTek Dimensity 6100 Plus processor with 8GB of memory.

In his review, Graham said: «Compared to other phones in a similar price range, the TCL 60 XE NxtPaper 5G delivers where it counts for day-to-day use, and its impressive bells and whistles sweetened my experience with the phone.»

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Deals are selected by the CNET Group commerce team, and may be unrelated to this article.

Why this deal matters

The TCL NxtPaper 60 XE is one of the most interesting smartphones we’ve reviewed recently. It’s definitely worth being on your radar if you’re on the lookout for a new budget handset. Already at an inexpensive price, this deal makes it a no-brainer for those looking for something a little different. Just make sure you get your order in before Aug. 27 when the coupon expires.

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Technologies

Everything at Made by Google 2025: Pixel 10, Pixel Watch 4, Pixel 10 Pro Fold and More

Here’s what you missed at Google’s big event that included new phones, watches, earbuds, Gemini AI features and numerous celebrity cameos.

At yesterday’s Made by Google 2025 showcase in New York, Google unveiled something unexpected: playfulness. Hosted by The Tonight Show’s Jimmy Fallon in a format more like the talk show he’s famous for, the tech event included presenters and celebrity guests who didn’t look like they were delivering a script they’d been rehearsing for weeks. Everyone seemed to actually enjoy themselves as they revealed Google’s latest products.

And there were plenty of new products and other announcements to share. Following months of leaks and teases, the Pixel 10 phone lineup has now come into focus, with both specs and release dates. The Pixel Watch 4 is making leaps into more health and fitness tracking. And the new Pixel Buds 2A look (and sound) like an affordable alternative to the existing Buds Pro 2 with many of the same features and quality. And yes, AI played a big part, too, but it wasn’t the unrelenting focus of the show.

If you missed the event itself, you can catch the whole thing at YouTube or get right to the important stuff and read on for more details.

Don’t miss any of CNET’s unbiased tech content and lab-based reviews. Add us as a preferred Google source on Chrome.

Pixel 10, Pixel 10 Pro and Pixel 10 Pro XL are real

Surprise — Google announced new phones! OK, this was the least surprising part of the event, but it still feels good to finally know what exists and when it’s coming. The phones keep the same looks as the Pixel 9 series, but they’re powered by new Tensor G5 processors that Google says is more powerful and simultaneously power-efficient.

On the base Pixel 10, however, there’s a surprise just barely visible in the camera bar: a new dedicated telephoto camera that joins the existing wide and ultrawide cameras. It shares the same 5x optical zoom as the pro models, but with a lower-resolution sensor and a lens with a narrower aperture.

Preorders for the Pixel 10, Pixel 10 Pro and Pixel 10 Pro XL began yesterday and the phones will be in stores and shipping starting Aug. 28. Read our hands-on coverage of the phones here:

  • I’m Stoked That Google Made the Pixel 10 a $799 Value-Packed Feature Monster

  • I Tested Google’s Pixel 10 Pro XL in Paris, and I’m Impressed

  • Pixel 10 Pro and Pro XL First Look: Familiar Design, New AI Tricks

  • Google Launches the Full Pixel 10 Line, Including the Pixel 10 Pro and Pixel 10 Pro XL

Pixel 10 Pro Fold opens the next chapter of foldables

Folding phones so far have had an Achilles’ hinge: small particulates like sand can get inside the case and mess things up. The Pixel 10 Pro Fold is one of the first to have an IP68 rating for dust and water resistance, meaning you can take your $1,800 phone to the beach. Or maybe make that the pumpkin patch, because the Pixel 10 Pro Fold is arriving later than the other Pixel 10 phones, on Oct. 9. You can preorder it now.

  • Pixel 10 Pro Fold Is Tougher, Smarter and Totally Dust Resistant

  • Forget the Pixel 10 Pro Fold. Foldables Should Look Like the Microsoft Surface Duo

  • Google’ Pixel 10 Pro Fold Is Here

Pixel Watch 4 talks to Gemini and is your new health coach

The Pixel Watch 4 has new fitness options including real-time guidance while exercising. And if you forgot to start a workout, the watch (with AI help) can detect the activity in the background and remind you of it later, giving you credit for the effort you made. It’s also the only smartwatch that can detect a loss of pulse and call emergency services automatically. 

The smartwatch, which comes in 42mm and 46mm sizes, also has Gemini on board. «You don’t have to repeat yourself, you don’t have to switch to a robo-voice,» said CNET’s Vanessa Hand Orellana. It also includes emergency satellite texting if you find yourself out of cellular range with a dead phone battery.

 Like the Pixel 10 Pro Fold, the Pixel Watch 4 models can be preordered now but won’t arrive until Oct. 9.

  • Well Played, Google: The Pixel Watch 4 May Give Apple Watch Loyalists a Wandering Eye

  • Pixel Watch 4 First Look: Google Just Raised the Bar

  • The Pixel Watch 4 Is Here. Can It Finally Beat Apple?

Pixel Buds 2A are more affordable earbuds

Joining the Pixel Buds 2 Pro in the market are the Pixel Buds 2A, an affordable ($130) pair of wireless earbuds that feature active noise cancellation, a smaller and lighter overall build and a twist-to-adjust stabilizer feature for setting a comfortable fit.

They’re available for preorder now in hazel and iris colors, and ship Oct. 9.

  • Google’s New Pixel Buds 2A Look a Lot Like the Pro 2, but Cost Way Less

  • Meet the Pixel Buds 2A: Google’s Budget Answer for ANC Buds

Pixel Buds Pro 2 owners will see new features

Coming in a software update next month, owners of Pixel Buds Pro 2 will be able to answer calls or send them to voicemail with a nod or shake of the head. You’ll be able to talk to Gemini live in noisy locations, and benefit from adaptive audio that applies noise cancellation while letting important sounds come through. At the other end, a new feature will protect your hearing from loud sounds.

Magic Cue is a Gemini assistant that pulls data from your correspondence

In the rollout of all the various AI technologies in the industry, the current stretch goal is «agentic» interactions with software: Having an AI that knows all sorts of details about you and can act to get the important stuff in front of you when needed. (And do it in a privacy-first way, one hopes.)

Magic Cue is Google’s implementation. It’s a new Gemini-based feature that can look through your earlier messages, emails and photos to pull details about things like restaurant reservations and flight times. Magic Cue runs on the Pixel device itself, so sensitive data stays private and not shared to the cloud.

A lot of Gemini AI intelligence is still coming soon

At the start of the event, Fallon sat down in typical talk-show format with Rick Osterloh, senior vice president of platforms and devices, to chat about Gemini and the marvels of AI. Aside from Magic Cue, which will be shipping on the Pixel 10 phones, a lot of the features and products we’ve been hearing about are still on the horizon.

«For instance, Gemini could do something like plan a team celebration dinner for 12 people tonight,» he said. «It might go find a restaurant that’ll accommodate that group. … Look for a karaoke place nearby and maybe even order custom T-shirts for the celebration.»

And when will that be possible? Fallon asked. «A lot sooner than people think,» Osterloh replied. «This kind of thing is coming this year.»

The Pixel 10 Pro and 10 Pro XL can zoom to 100x with AI help

Pro Res Zoom on the Pixel 10 Pro phones pushes zooming far beyond what would seem to be possible with typical small cameras. Usually when you zoom beyond the optical limits of the cameras, details get fuzzy as the software upscales the image. With Pro Res Zoom, when you go beyond 30x zoom, it uses generative AI to build a sharper version. CNET’s Andrew Lanxon got both impressive and head-scratching results while taking photos in Paris using the Pixel 10 Pro XL.

Camera Coach uses AI to encourage better photos

Smartphone cameras have employed AI for several years, such as identifying subjects in order to blur the background for Portrait modes or quickly snapping several shots at multiple exposures and blending them together to create well-balanced lighting throughout. Now Google is using AI to help you take better photos.

Camera Coach is a new feature in the Pixel Camera app that looks at the scene in front of the lens and generates multiple suggestions for how to improve the photo before it’s captured. To show this off, podcaster Alex Cooper brought Fallon out to be her model and sat him down on a couch. When she activated the feature, Camera Coach suggested that she move the camera closer to the subject, position his head in the upper portion of the frame, lower the camera to eye level and turn on Portrait mode.

«To all the girls that are watching, I personally know how hard it is to train your boyfriend or your husband to get that perfect shot,» said Cooper. «And now Camera Coach can just train all the boys for us.»

Don’t call it MagSafe: Pixelsnap brings Qi2 magnetic charging to the Pixel 10

The Qi2 spec includes not just faster charging but also an array of magnets on the back for connecting to accessories. Sound familiar? The presenters mentioned Apple’s MagSafe system, then paused with the realization that they probably shouldn’t have name-checked it during the Google event. On the Pixel 10 phones, it’s called Pixelsnap and should work with accessories made for Apple’s ecosystem too.

Gemini live translation, and the Pixel 10 will be available in Mexico

In an impressive segment demonstrating Gemini live translation during a phone call, musician Karen Polinesia announced, in Spanish and translated by the technology, that for the first time, the Pixel 10 will be available for sale in Mexico.

This article is being updated; stay tuned for more.

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