Google has announced a rollout of new and upgraded features to its AI chatbot, Gemini, including better creative image generation capabilities, expanding language availability, and restoring the generation of images of people.

In February this year, Google came under fire after a flurry of posts on X allegedly showed the AI art generator neglecting to create art with white people, or generating what many classified as historically inaccurate or ‘overly diverse’ depictions of different people, with Google then pausing Gemini’s AI art generator altogether.

Some of the images that caused controversy included a Black Viking, an Asian Nazi soldier and a female Pope.

With this latest model, named Imagen 3, Google claims it has fixed those bugs, with the tech giant touting that the new and improved Gemini can generate photorealistic images in styles from classic oil painting to claymation with a few simple prompts.

Google has reassured users that safeguards are in place to prevent a recurrence of past issues, and that extensive testing has been performed that shows the new model shows significant improvements over Imagen 2 when it comes to content safety. 

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Alongside these improvements, Google is also rolling out Gems, customisable AI chatbots to act as experts on specific topics. The company is offering a few premade Gems for users, such as a learning coach to break down complex topics, a writing editor and a coding partner.

“With Imagen 3, we’ve made significant progress in providing a better user experience when generating images of people. We don’t support the generation of photorealistic, identifiable individuals, depictions of minors or excessively gory, violent or sexual scenes,” said Google.

“Of course, as with any generative AI tool, not every image Gemini creates will be perfect, but we’ll continue to listen to feedback from early users as we keep improving.”