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How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

InFocus2014
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

I started my photography in the sixties. I also had my own darkroom for processing. There was some latitude available for creatively processing B&W, but not a lot of flexibility for color.

In other words, if you wanted great images, you had to apply most of the creativity necessary just prior to pressing the shutter button. There was a lot of ‘honesty and authenticity’ associated with the resulting images.

Fast forward to today. I recently downloaded the new Photoshop Beta with enhanced AI capabilities. A few days ago, I thought I would take this software’s Creative Content Aware Fill AI for a spin. I was a bit amazed by the results. I was also a bit dismayed, as I will explain, below.

At a recent photography club shoot, I took a few grab-shots as I walked-by other photographer’s setups with very poor resulting exposure and composition. Rather than delete the files, I thought I would experiment with them with the new Photoshop Beta program.

For the first shot, of the couple, I selected the whole frame, then typed-in “space background”. It then displayed the shot shown below, along with five other choices (hey, I was a Trekkie, so I had to pick this one). I then typed-in ‘change hat to space helmet’. It provided six choices and I chose the most amusing helmet. I made a few exposure adjustments to the models – all done very, very quickly.

For the second (throw away) image, I typed in ‘Japanese Garden’. I made a couple exposure and color adjustment to obtain the image, below – just a couple minutes work. It is not a great image, but then, this is only the first release of Photoshop Beta. I’m sure it will evolve.

Of course, we have been working-up to this technical capability for some time. A high percentage of the popular images posted on this, and other, forums have some sort of AI adjustments applied (including mine) – AI de-noising, sharpening, color enhancements, local contrast enhancement, etc. I notice that Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram and other social media platforms are now being flooded with AI enhanced, sometimes completely generated, images. Post an ‘non-enhanced’ photo and such might hardly get a notice.

When I cleaned-out my parent’s attic after their passing some years ago, I found a couple boxes of my things from my youth. In one of them, was a stack of image-filled Leica magazines from the fifties and sixties. I was a bit taken-back with how ‘ordinary’ these photos were compared what we commonly see published today. To be honest, it made me feel a little ‘homesick’. I loved the authenticity of so many of those old photos.

I doubt that I will use Creative Content Aware Fill very often, going forward. While I use AI enhancement to be able to shoot high ISO’s and handle noise, etc, I prefer to remain a photographer, rather than converting to being more of a graphic artist. Perhaps, I am just showing my age, but I find that being flooded with so many heavily enhanced AI images to be a bit annoying, as it seems to detract from “real” photography (whatever the heck that is

A7RV, 35mm, f1.2, 1/3200

A7RV, 24mm, f2.5, 1/250

Aug 28, 2023 at 09:02 AM

RoamingScott
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

My take is very simple.

If you like the final product, or you have a client willing to pay for the final product, you should do it.

Is it art? I think because of the somewhat random nature of AI, the artist can never have total creative input on the final product like the would with deliberate photoshopping, so it puts it in a grey area for me.

Aug 28, 2023 at 09:12 AM

chez
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

People with photoshop skills were making these types of photos for years. The latest releases just brought the skill level down.

I have no issues with people doing whatever they want with their images. I do what I like with mine. If I don’t like what one does, I just start ignoring their work.

The thing I can’t stand is people that are dishonest with their images…trying to come across the photo is exactly what their eyes saw when it’s very obvious things have been exaggerated.

Aug 28, 2023 at 09:21 AM

AmbientMike
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

Wow, pretty cheesy (your originals actually aren't bad at all imo.) Can AI add a cheesy (perhaps velveeta or cheese spray) frame? Looks like some of the over edited photos people were posting on their sites 15+ years ago.

But they steal our photos (or bury permissions in a EULA, not much better) to program this junk, that then makes it harder to make a living in photography. Assuming they get it to the point of quality images.

I posted a couple images on fb one time one too colorful the other more realistic. The more realistic one got more likes. Even non photographers can can see this stuff

Aug 28, 2023 at 11:45 AM

jwpstl
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

chez wrote:
People with photoshop skills were making these types of photos for years. The latest releases just brought the skill level down.
.

That still took talent and skill. Now you just have to type in your request to get what you want. Doing that makes you an art director, not an artist. There's a reason you can't copyright AI generated images.

Aug 28, 2023 at 11:53 AM

chez
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

jwpstl wrote:
That still took talent and skill. Now you just have to type in your request to get what you want. Doing that makes you an art director, not an artist. There's a reason you can't copyright AI generated images.

Shooting sports with manual focus lenses back in the 70’s took talent and skill. Now with AF tracking and 30fps shooting anyone can shoot sports. Are today’s sports photographers just button pushers?

Just because it was hard 30 years ago and easy today makes no difference, it’s the end result that counts.

Aug 28, 2023 at 12:08 PM

dmcphoto
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

InFocus2014 wrote:
...
When I cleaned-out my parent’s attic after their passing some years ago, I found a couple boxes of my things from my youth. In one of them, was a stack of image-filled Leica magazines from the fifties and sixties. I was a bit taken-back with how ‘ordinary’ these photos were compared what we commonly see published today. To be honest, it made me feel a little ‘homesick’. I loved the authenticity of so many of those old photos.
...

For me that authenticity comes from knowing that what you are looking at actually existed when the image was captured. Old photos are images of actual people and places from years gone by brought forward in time.

The user has only general control over the AI generated image, the components of which may never have existed. The user is presented with multiple alternatives based on their input. That's not creativity. It's merely the ability to pick the image the user likes most among the alternatives. A big part of the creativity came from software authors, the software they wrote, and vast image libraries that include images made from scratch by AI, with between most to almost none of the image content having been created by the user. This is much different than cloning, making composites, or otherwise "Photoshopping" your own images. The result has no clearly defined author. That's why AI created images can't be copyrighted while, for instance, drawings, "photoshopped" images, and composite images with all parts created by a known author or authors, can.

The AI Images may look good and serve a purpose, but the photographer is only selecting an image, much of which the photographer did not create, from those created and presented by the software. The photographer with the smartest software that has access to the biggest image libraries, will have the 'best" images. But you don't need to know anything about photography to use software. Advertisers and anyone else who can afford it will be able to describe what they need to AI software. It will spit out any desired number of appropriate alternatives using millions of stock, royalty free, user supplied, and AI manufactured images to produce the results. This will will greatly reduce the future need for creative commercial photography, and creatives in general. With the ability to learn, self improve, and even create its own new software, AI is to creatives what robots were to assembly line workers. It'll happen much faster than most realize.

Regardless of whether it's good or bad, it's the future. The genie is already out of the bottle.

IMO

Aug 28, 2023 at 03:05 PM

schlotz
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

chez wrote:
Shooting sports with manual focus lenses back in the 70’s took talent and skill. Now with AF tracking and 30fps shooting anyone can shoot sports. Are today’s sports photographers just button pushers?

Just because it was hard 30 years ago and easy today makes no difference, it’s the end result that counts.

Agreed

I see others with top gear producing really poor results all the time. In the end, it comes down to the operator's talent & expertise vs equipment used.

Aug 29, 2023 at 04:24 AM

njtrout
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p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

As long as AI produced images are categorized differently as graphic design or art it is OK. It's when you go up against a composite or AI generated image in a competition then there should be rules defining what category an image is categorize as. I belong to a photo club that had competitions and composites would win over a "straight" photograph. I can see that coming with AI if rules are not clearly defined.

Aug 29, 2023 at 12:35 PM

jeffbuzz
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p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

Photography has never really been an "authentic" copy of human vision (if that's what you're comparing it to). Even the most mundane, unprocessed snapshot differs from the scene observed through a human eye. Limitations of dynamic range, selective focus and depth of field in a photo are unlike what the eye perceives.

A human always had to make some decisions about capturing the image. Auto exposure, focus, noise reduction and other built in "enhancements" already took over some of that decision making. AI is removing human choice even further from the end result.

Is it good? Is it bad? It just is.

Aug 29, 2023 at 01:23 PM

RustyBug
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p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

Another level of automation ... bridging the fusion of CGI and Photography worlds. In that regard, it is a different form of making a composite image.

On one hand, we have progressed from making composites where we take all the elements of the image. Then we have those where we use elements that others have taken (stock, etc.). Or we can do Green Screen, double exposure, etc. Now, we have the option for CGI elements to be used for making composites.

In the end, it is still a composite (for whatever that means, or not, to someone).

To that point, I think that the matter of AI ... is just another extended form of what it is NOT. It is NOT a single frame, original capture.

To which, if we are creating composites, AI is just a form of next level automation. If we are creating single frame, original captures ... then, AI is meaningless (imo), since that is what it is NOT.

Does it matter if you are making composites ... or single frame, original captures? For some, it does. For others, not so much.

But, I think there will ALWAYS be a sense of value placed on the single frame, original capture in certain regard to the essence of photography for some, no matter how good AI becomes. Even if

Aug 29, 2023 at 08:46 PM

EB-1
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p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

I don't have the need for anything heavy, but some additional tools to extend the edges or replace something interfering with the image could be useful as the technology improves.

I'm not a photographer nor do I purchase any photographic art, so maybe it has less impact on me.

EBH

Aug 29, 2023 at 10:41 PM

Faraday
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p.1 #13 · p.1 #13 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

It's possible to use an original photo as a prompt for generative AI and basically do almost anything you want with that image. It's just as possible to create an image from no original at all using prompts of what you want to see (this is not drawing from an existing photo library, this is generative AI like Midjourney).

There are plenty of AI artists who will tell you that using prompts well to elicit the result you want is an art in itself.

I was asked recently to pull a bunch of stock images for a website. The specifics were pretty clear and the client was worried about the generic look of so much business photography. We ended up creating every image in Midjourney. I do not think stock has long to live as a business. As others have said - it's not good or bad, it just is.

Personally I'm not going to pull some background that someone else shot and "AI" it into my image - that wouldn't be my work, but someone else's; but I would definitely consider using Midjourney to add to an artistic image of my own. To the point @chez made, as long as the photographer is honest about the process I think it's fine.

Sep 11, 2023 at 09:30 AM

b-mhac
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p.1 #14 · p.1 #14 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

It's definitely here to stay and whether it's considered art or not is a little more subjective. What I do know is we have already encountered many clients who want AI incorporated into their projects and are willing to pay a high amount for something that literally is rendered in seconds. Just another tool in the ol box.

Sep 14, 2023 at 01:23 AM

Zenon Char
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p.1 #15 · p.1 #15 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

Faraday wrote:
It's possible to use an original photo as a prompt for generative AI and basically do almost anything you want with that image. It's just as possible to create an image from no original at all using prompts of what you want to see (this is not drawing from an existing photo library, this is generative AI like Midjourney).

There are plenty of AI artists who will tell you that using prompts well to elicit the result you want is an art in itself.

I was asked recently to pull a bunch of stock images for a website. The specifics were...Show more →

Good luck with the honesty part.

Sep 14, 2023 at 06:37 AM

Zenon Char
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p.1 #16 · p.1 #16 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

I think it is a great tool for people earning and the industry. If a hobby shooter likes working with it great. Whatever is your thing. Personally I'm still in the being at the right place at the right time camp. I have yet to replace a sky and never will. If there is a branch in front of a bird too bad. I'll have to do better next time.

Sep 14, 2023 at 06:45 AM

johnvanr
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p.1 #17 · p.1 #17 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

Advertising photos have been partially fake for ages, but we still call them photographs knowing a lot of the image is airbrushed, photoshopped etc. Movies have been fake with green screens for a long time as well. Again, we accept that because it’s a given.

As long as we know something is manipulated, no matter by what means, I’m fine with it.

We may indeed need new language to separate AI-generated content, but the key is that we know something is meant to be a depiction of reality or captures something that never existed.

It’s not for me personally, though. To me photograph is the challenge of capturing reality in an appealing way, not creating something after the fact at my computer.

Sep 14, 2023 at 06:50 AM

dugaut
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p.1 #18 · p.1 #18 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

If you earn money at photography, especially if it's your main income, the clients you lose to AI wouldn't have paid you enough to make a living. The client that continues to pay you a livable amount will trust and appreciate your abilities, which will include you, the photographer, using AI as a tool of your trade.

If you're a hobbyist, do what you want. I started replacing skies a few years ago, and I've gotten away from it. I was looking at all the presets and LUTs in on1 photoraw recently I and it just popped into my head "what about if I just want reality?" So I've tended toward basic exposure and color correction and maybe a little pop of what I got. In other words, I like the camera end of the business, not the computer processing beyond a certain point.

But I enjoy being active and just use photography to document my activities, so I may not qualify to answer the question. I just recently stopped sports photography (for money), in part because social media produces so much content that I felt my work was just getting lost. We've become desensitized to the point where a good photo doesn't mean as much. And AI makes it easy to generate content now. There's sort of an inverse relationship b/t the amount of content we can produce now, as amazing as it is, and how special it is to us.

I remember walking into a florist a while ago and was totally overcome by the smell. When I checked out, I said to the florist that it must be amazing to work in such a place. He blandly replied that after a half hour of starting work, and after lunch, the smells didn't affect him. The olfactory glands and years of working as a florist had eroded the sensation for him. I think we're at that point with images and AI will continue to erode the sensation.

I'm 69 and remember when less was more. So take my opinion in that context.

Sep 14, 2023 at 07:14 AM

OntheRez
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p.1 #19 · p.1 #19 · How do you feel about heavily AI generated image content?

jeffbuzz wrote:
Photography has never really been an "authentic" copy of human vision (if that's what you're comparing it to). Even the most mundane, unprocessed snapshot differs from the scene observed through a human eye. Limitations of dynamic range, selective focus and depth of field in a photo are unlike what the eye perceives.

A human always had to make some decisions about capturing the image. Auto exposure, focus, noise reduction and other built in "enhancements" already took over some of that decision making. AI is removing human choice even further from the end result.

Is it good? Is it bad? It just...Show more →

I haven't tried the AI thing yet. Does look interesting. I strongly agree with Jeff here. There is no such thing as a real photograph. The very act of bringing a machine to your eye which immediately frames it - thus limiting context - is fake. To think that some how the development process can make it realer is simply delusion. Every artifact that we humans create is fake when compared to the reality of light, rock, wave, sky. This is fact.

How we do it, how we interpret it, how we shape/color/select/manipulate/manage the object is the summation of art. Art is an intrinsically human act, thus one can argue, persuasively it is reality.

I haven't paid any attention to this tool, but will do so. I can think of a number possiblies 'art forms' it could help to create.

As Jeff asked Good? Bad? That question is answered by the skill, passion, suchness of the artist who made it.

Sep 14, 2023 at 08:54 AM


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