Apple Launches Creator Studio Bundle

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Apple just made its biggest move against Adobe's Creative Cloud. The new Creator Studio bundles Final Cut Pro, Logic Pro, Pixelmator Pro, and more for $13/month. While one time purchase options are still available, there's a catch: AI-powered features are subscription-only.

We also have CES highlights worth your attention, plus Anthropic's new Cowork tool that brings Claude Code capabilities to non-developers.

Let's get into it.

Apple Bundles Creative Apps for $13

Apple launches Creator Studio subscription bundle at $12.99/month, taking direct aim at Adobe Creative Cloud. Apps still available individually, but new AI features will be subscription-only.

Apple announced Creator Studio, a subscription bundle that packages Final Cut Pro, Logic Pro, Pixelmator Pro, Motion, Compressor, and MainStage. Pricing lands at $12.99/month or $129/year, with students getting it for $2.99/month. For comparison, Adobe's All Apps plan runs $59.99/month.

The bundle math works - Buying everything outright costs $678. At $129/year, the subscription pays for itself in about five years. For anyone who upgrades regularly or uses multiple apps, this is a straightforward win.
One-time purchases remain available - Final Cut Pro stays at $299.99, Logic Pro at $199.99, Pixelmator Pro at $49.99. You can still buy and own the software outright.
New features split by tier - Here's the catch. Apple says new "intelligent features" will be exclusive to Creator Studio subscribers. One-time purchasers will continue to get updates, but AI-powered tools like Transcript Search, Visual Search in Final Cut, and Synth Player in Logic will require the subscription.
Pixelmator Pro comes to iPad - The acquisition pays off with Pixelmator Pro finally arriving on iPad with full Apple Pencil support and Mac continuity.

For working editors already in the Apple ecosystem, the bundle makes sense. The bigger question is how aggressive Apple gets with the subscription-exclusive features over time.

Read more for a breakdown of every new AI feature in Final Cut Pro, Motion, and Compressor.

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CES 2026: Robots, Smart Toys, GPUs

CES 2026 was heavy on AI integration, humanoid robots, and hardware companies proving they can ship real products. Here are three announcements that stood out.

CES this year felt less about concept demos and more about production timelines. Robotics companies showed units ready to ship. Consumer tech emphasized AI that works offline. GPU makers targeted creators alongside gamers. Three announcements caught our attention:

Atlas goes commercial - Boston Dynamics revealed the production-ready Atlas humanoid at CES. The specs: 56 degrees of freedom, 7.5-foot reach, 110-pound lift capacity, 4-hour hot-swappable battery. More significant is the Google DeepMind partnership integrating Gemini Robotics AI. All 2026 units are already committed to Hyundai and Google. The company plans to manufacture 30,000 humanoids annually by 2028.
Lego Smart Brick - Lego calls this its most significant addition since the Minifigure in 1978. The Smart Brick is a standard 2x4 brick packed with sensors, accelerometers, a speaker with onboard synthesizer, and wireless charging. Twenty patented world-firsts run on a custom chip smaller than a Lego stud. The key innovation: BrickNet, a Bluetooth-based mesh that lets bricks communicate positions and orientations without apps or internet. First sets are Star Wars themed (Luke's X-wing at $100, Darth Vader's TIE Fighter at $70, Throne Room Duel at $160). Ships March 1.
DLSS 4.5 for creators - NVIDIA announced DLSS 4.5 with a second-gen transformer model and 6X frame generation for RTX 50 cards. For creators, the bigger news is 3x performance gains and 60% VRAM reduction for video/image AI generation through PyTorch-CUDA optimizations.

Anthropic brings Claude Code capabilities to non-developers with Cowork.

Anthropic released Cowork, extending Claude Code's autonomous file-handling capabilities to non-technical users. The feature lives in Claude Desktop and lets you designate folders where Claude can read and modify files through natural language.

Born from user behavior - Engineers noticed developers using Claude Code for non-coding tasks like organizing files and processing documents. Cowork formalizes this into a simpler interface.
Use cases - Reorganizing downloads, turning receipt screenshots into expense spreadsheets, drafting documents from scattered notes across your desktop.
Max subscribers only - Available exclusively to Claude Max subscribers ($100-200/month) through the macOS desktop app.
Built in a week and a half - Anthropic says the team built Cowork largely using Claude Code itself.

One caveat: Anthropic warns that poorly worded prompts can trigger unintended file deletions, and prompt injection remains a risk.

Read more about what Cowork means for AI workflow automation and how it compares to existing tools.

Higgsfield Adds 3D Relighting Tool

Higgsfield adds professional lighting control to AI image editing.

Higgsfield released Relight, an AI tool that reconstructs lighting in 3D space by analyzing depth and geometry from your images. Unlike brightness sliders, this rebuilds the actual lighting environment.

3D light positioning - Drag a light cone in real-time to place light sources anywhere in the scene. Enables precise off-axis lighting like Rembrandt or butterfly setups without reshooting.
Soft vs Hard modes - Soft simulates large sources like softboxes for gentle wrapping light. Hard mimics small, intense sources like direct sun for crisp shadows.
Professional applications - Product photography, portrait retouching, real estate interiors. The depth-aware approach maintains spatial relationships while fixing uneven lighting.
Part of broader platform - Higgsfield positions itself for professional filmmakers with text-to-video, image-to-video, lipsync, and cinema tools alongside the new relighting feature.

Watch Kevin Vandermarliere’s simple DaVinci Resolve–Unreal Engine 5 workflow with no plugins required.

Stories, projects, and links that caught our attention from around the web:

📑 SAG-AFTRA kicks off 2026 contract negotiations Feb 9 with AI protections as the centerpiece. Union leaders call a strike "a possibility" if terms fall short.

🎥 IMAX names new 70mm camera "Keighley" after late chief quality officer. The lighter, 30% quieter camera debuts on Nolan's The Odyssey, the first film shot entirely on IMAX.

↕️ Google Veo 3.1 adds native vertical video plus 4K upscaling and improved character consistency. Updates rolling out across Gemini app, YouTube, and Flow.

🎞️ Alamo Drafthouse ditches pen-and-paper for mobile food ordering. The chain's signature in-theater service goes digital.

📱 Alibaba's Wan app launches on iOS and Android with text-to-video, image-to-video, and a "Starring" feature that inserts you into AI videos with voice consistency.

🗣️ Apple confirms Gemini will power next-gen Siri as part of expanded Google partnership. Details on integration timeline remain sparse.

Addy and Joey outline their 2026 tech predictions, sorting them from “super confident” to “long shots,” and discuss likely directions for AI tools, real-time video generation, and VFX-focused models in filmmaking.

Read the show notes or watch the full episode.

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