Adobe Previews Project Live Set: Real-Time AI Video Editing

By Tom Whitfield

Adobe will preview Project Live Set at the Adobe MAX 2026 Sneaks panel on Wednesday, Nov. 11 — a research feature that applies generative-AI effects to an existing video in real time, while it plays, rather than making editors wait for a model to process each new prompt.

With Project Live Set, video editors can change a subject, transform an environment, introduce a reference character or redirect the camera as a scene continues — and see the results immediately. Adobe positions the feature as faster than typical generative-AI models, which require waiting periods between prompt and output.

What does Adobe claim it changes?

Gautham Mysore, senior principal scientist and leader of Adobe's video and audio research group, said the feature offers more than an immediate feedback loop. By seeing a result and deciding what happens next, creators get more intuitive ways to direct their work and can generate new ideas during the process.

"The work explores bringing video generation and editing into one continuous experience, so creators can see a result, respond to it and shape what happens next," Mysore said.

His framing is ambitious. "Project Live Set will allow creators and filmmakers to generate and edit video at the speed of thought," he said. "Today, a large part of the video creation process is waiting. This breaks creative flow. We believe Project Live Set will fix this."

Adobe said film teams it spoke with value seeing results during a shoot, while they can still adjust a take. That feedback inspired the research team to explore a more immediate way to create and direct video: changing a prompt, swapping an object or outfit, or adjusting the camera while the video is being generated.

The demo: one cat, four prompts

Adobe's demonstration features a video of a black cat transformed by four different prompts running simultaneously, with results previewed in the editing window:

• "add a chef's hat on the cat"
• "swap the cat with a shiba inu dog"
• "swap the cat with an alligator wearing a miami shirt"
• "swap the cat with a puppy wearing a tuxedo"

The simultaneous four-way preview is the concrete claim underneath the marketing language. What Adobe has not shared is just as telling: Mysore said Project Live Set is an early research preview, and the company is not disclosing details about the underlying models at this stage.

Beyond editing: livestreams and 'sketching'

Mysore pointed to uses beyond conventional editing. "We also see possibilities for interactive worlds and livestreams, where creators or audiences could influence a scene as it unfolds," he said.

He described the feature as a "sketching tool for moving images." "We're interested in how filmmakers and other creators would use that live draft, and what they'd want to preserve from it," he said. That last question — what survives from a live draft into a finished work — remains unanswered, and Adobe has not said.

What does this change for creators?

Right now, nothing ships. Sneaks is a fan-favorite session at Adobe MAX that brings the company's R&D to the stage, with executives sharing early innovations across video, audio, photography, 3D, imaging and design. This year's session, hosted by Terry Crews on Nov. 11, previews 10 innovations including Project Live Set.

Adobe is explicit that these are research previews or early explorations rather than commitments to future product features. The caveat is real, but so is the track record: Generate Soundscape in Adobe Premiere and Relight in Photoshop both began as Sneaks previews before reaching shipping products. Project Live Set may follow that path — or join the majority of Sneaks that never do.