Introduction to Multimodal AI Agents and Tool Use

The next evolution of artificial intelligence goes beyond text. Multimodal agents can now analyze images, read complex documents, and take action using external tools. In this foundational written course, you will learn how to design and build AI agents that process visual and textual data simultaneously. You will start with the core concepts of agentic AI and vision-language models, then progress to practical implementation strategies for document extraction, screenshot analysis, and dynamic tool calling. What you will learn: - Understand the foundational terminology of multimodal AI and agentic workflows. - Process and extract structured data from images, screenshots, and complex documents. - Implement modern tool calling patterns to allow your agents to interact with external systems. - Apply prompt engineering techniques specifically designed for vision-language tasks. - Explore fundamental Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) concepts for handling multimodal data. - Design robust agent architectures that gracefully manage multi-step reasoning. The course begins by establishing essential definitions and the basic architecture of multimodal systems. From there, you will read through step-by-step written tutorials and code snippets to build your own document and vision-processing agents. This course is designed for beginners and developers new to AI agents; no prior experience with machine learning is required. Start building the next generation of intelligent, action-oriented AI agents today.