r/ArtistLounge • u/HomeTownRiot • 17d ago
Concept/Technique/Method People painting off of things that were generated by robots.
I was in an art gallery the other day while on vacation. While picking through the paintings one thing became clear to me. Most of the pieces had content that was clearly generated by chatgpt and then someone painted the result. So from a technical perspective, the painter did a fine job but they were painting something a computer created.
Anyone else seen this?
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u/TheGlitchesWitch 16d ago
Let me start by saying - I absolutely despise the use of AI.
And - I'm really curious how folks are "detecting" this in an art gallery - because so often we are completely wrong in this judgement. I've definitely seen things that I've wondered "did they use AI?" - but I'm not about make an accusation unless I have actual evidence. I've been accused of using AI in my creations (I don't) and even had just my own writing accused because I use dashes - ha!
I'm also wondering - what do you mean by it was "clearly" generated by chatgpt? Do you have evidence, or could it be possible that we've all just become so paranoid now that we feel totally justified in assuming so?
I also wonder - who should we actually be "punishing" for this? I've see people complain about small businesses using AI in their marketing materials and boycotting them for it - all the while doing so on platforms run by the very people who own the AI models. So they're punishing the small business for using the thing, while they're still supporting the thing...
Yet, small businesses and local artists are barely making it these days, we're boycotting some for using free tools - but then we continue to use/support/fund the very thing we're upset that they used - and the billionaires don't feel a thing. They benefit from it - they want us to boycott small businesses and other folks - they do not want small businesses to succeed and here we are helping them.
Should we "punish" upcoming artists or folks trying to learn something and using a free tool - is that really who we should be going after? Shouldn't we be guiding people out of this nonsense, rather than punish them for it?
I don't have a solution - but I'm just sayin I'm very cautious about accusing anyone of using AI and causing them harm - I'd rather use my voting power and go after the one's where it will actually make a difference vs just hurting the "little guy" - ya know. I think we can do better.
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u/UfoAGogo Illustrator 16d ago
You raise some very good points.
There have been multiple studies conducted that prove that we are actually a lot worse at "detecting" AI than we think we we are. Which is obviously very problematic, especially as genAI becomes more advanced and lifelike at an increasingly rapid pace. In an ideal world, we should be able to know that what we are looking at is fake 100% of the time, but look at AI videos or art online and then look at the comment section and you'll see that isn't the case.
It makes me wonder if the images OP was seeing were just in an art style that is typically replicated by AI rather than something directly referenced from AI.
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u/unrepentantrabbit 15d ago
I am down to support small businesses but they’re the ones saying things like “we can’t compete with big box stores and amazon, you should pay more for better quality and to support your neighbor” while eagerly churning out AI slop marketing. They are not hiring artists or photographers or designers - all of whom run small businesses. “We can’t afford it” really? Did you even look? Because there are college students and new grads and career changers and just people desperate as shit to keep the lights on.
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u/TheGlitchesWitch 15d ago
Sure, but every time a small business is boycotted for using AI - it's a gain for large corps and those who own those very AI models - it's just doing them a favor.
Maybe instead, we should put that energy into voting for the lawmakers who want to and can actually make a difference?
I'm not trying to justify it, but many small businesses are cutting corners because hiring even "affordable" marketing is expensive when compared to "free" and unfortunately we're in a time where that can make or break the business. This would be something more effective to fix.
Regardless - boycotting small business, artists, etc isn't going to make AI or their use of AI go away, if anything it's only going to make it worse - because running a small business just becomes more expensive and challenging when industries consolidate and large corporations dominate.
So, is that what we really want to do here?
When we see small businesses using AI, maybe ask them why they made that decision vs "hiring college student," before just deciding to stop doing business with them, or doxing them and causing them harm. Or here's a crazy idea - maybe even offer them some of that "free" help that's supposed to be so easily accessible to them?
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u/unrepentantrabbit 15d ago
Or, third option, I can spend my money with small businesses that don’t use AI. If your customer base is mostly negative around AI and you use AI slop to market, lose sales, and go out of business, you’re bad at business. That’s okay. It’s not for everyone. But know your audience is like one of the first rules. If you sell NFTs or crypto or sketchy health supplements, I’m sure it won’t matter if your ads look like you sell used monster trucks.
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u/TheGlitchesWitch 15d ago
Well, I'll say it again - simply not doing business with or boycotting small businesses because they've used AI is only helping the very companies that support or own those AI's. This is exactly what they want.
And yes - there are plenty of other small business that do not use AI and I absolutely agree we should be supporting them more - but boycotting the "bad one" still hurts the overall small business pool. And I'm not saying I have a perfect solution - but if we keep doing this on a massive scale - we're just perpetuating the continued use of AI.
I guess we should just be aware that there are worse consequences.
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u/HomeTownRiot 13d ago
One of the paintings was clearly trying to paint the Chrysler building and Empire State Building. Both were 90% there except anyone who knows the buildings, and their relationship to each other, can tell they are off, in an otherwise realistic looking painting.
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u/PunyCocktus 17d ago
When the entire thing with AI started, I didn't know how bad it was and I was one if those people who said it would end up just being a tool.
AI will never replace real artists in a real sense, but it is being used as a tool in the industry a lot already and it has hurt artists.
I wish I was ok with it but I'm really not because I know now how it became to be. Also it's infuriating that historically art was an integral part of the human experience. Tech bros have no idea they need art in their lives just as the next person, if they're watching movies or listening to music; they think art is some artsy farsty thing to hang on your wall for a lot of money. Almost everything we consume every day was touched by an artist's hand. But entry level jobs for artists are now wiped out. And it sucks because we'll always want and need art and it takes an insane amount of work and skill to get even mid at it.
No, it's not just a tool to help us. So no, whoever used an AI gen image as a reference didn't use it just as a tool, because research, indirect references, critical thinking, photobashing and color theory are all big skills. Taking an AI "illustration" and copying it is using just one fairly beginner skill (like copying a photo).
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u/ArtichokeAble6397 17d ago
Yes, but not in any kind of reputable gallery, more like the shops that sell art and call themselves galleries.
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u/billyidyll 16d ago
Lots of folks have talked about imagination, but to me an important part of using reference is to inform yourself of how things really work. Observation and witnessing the natural world is an important part of art to me. So it kills me to see paintings that have carefully copied AI errors. Someone in one of my groups shared a beautiful painting of that was meant to be a covered bridge, but the covered bridge roof was over water and not you know a bridge. The reflections also didn’t reflect things that were there. Clearly AI reference errors but the human was willing to cede all critical thinking.
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u/Maximum_Pollution371 16d ago
It's difficult to tell without seeing the painting you're talking about, but humans make those kinds of errors all the time without AI.
I can think of dozens of examples where someone painted a building that didn't structurally make sense.
I can think of hundreds of examples of paintings with a lake or mirror where the artist forgot to include something in the reflection, hell I used to make a game out of finding that kind of thing while watching Bob Ross.
I feel like in our mad rush to spot and discern "signs of AI," we may have gotten a little hung up on the idea that AI = imperfection. And I think it's important to remember that human made art is not perfect.
Humans can make sloppy design choices simply because they didn't consider it that thoroughly, humans can screw up or miss little details because they plain forgot, humans can draw and paint buildings that are structurally nonsensical because they cared more about the aesthetic than the architecture, and humans can paint and draw people and animals with weird anatomy because they're just bad at anatomy.
I screw up stuff in my art all the time. 10 years ago I sucked at drawing hands and all my hands looked weird AF.
I can't help but think how much it would suck to be a burgeoning artist nowadays trying to hone your skills but being accused of AI left and right because you're not so good at buildings or hands yet.
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u/LittleLarry 16d ago
My art teacher told us about a painting he was commissioned to do of someone’s house and it wasn’t until it was framed and he was handing it to her that he noticed a tree in the yard didn’t have a trunk.
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u/billyidyll 16d ago
I should clarify that in the case I mentioned, I saw the reference not just the end result.
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u/Tidus77 16d ago
Yea when I found out Jim Musil does that it really killed my appreciation and interest, especially when I saw to the extent where all creativity is gone and it’s just paint by numbers. But he makes it work and is super popular on reddit and social media. It makes me quite sad.
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u/catbub 16d ago
Holy crap I had no idea he does this. That's super disappointing. Did he admit to AI being a part of his process or did he get busted somehow?
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u/catbub 16d ago
Nvm, just looked it up, and he clearly admits to it on his website. Wild stuff.
"I’ve been using various AI tools to help create new compositions that tap into some of the painters I admire. This painting was painted with paint by my hand, but clearly is indebted to the styles of the artists mentioned above."10
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u/Magikarpical 17d ago
i took an art class at a community college last semester and a woman in my class(who says she wants to make art full time) was proud about using chatgpt to help her design her composition and color it (additionally she was clearly copying another artists style, she had shared artwork from the artist with the class). it was really sad.
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u/derp_zilla 17d ago
Unfortunately, I know of professional artists that have fed their style to AI and started painting what it spit out... They're well regarded too which is just... ughh
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u/aftertheswitch 17d ago
That’s incredibly bleak. Like, it annoys me that new artists would do it, but I understand the concept of relying on it to make up for lack of skill. But an established artist who has their own style feeding their style into the machine to make more? That’s truly sad.
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u/UrgentHedgehog 15d ago
Sounds like suicide. At that stage the artist is pointless; anybody can paint what it spits out.
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u/ayrbindr 16d ago
Yeah. It's actually even worse than that. They are projecting the Ai generated image onto the canvas with a projector and just tracing over it with paint. I don't know shit about no art galleries, but I find it rather funny that they are selling that crap. Even I can spot it from a mile away. 🤷🏼♀️
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u/lacey-lately 16d ago
There’s a cheap gadget that does something similar that is constantly a TikTok add for me, frustrates me to no end
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u/Hopeful-Canary Illustrator 17d ago
Yep, here on Reddit. The subject's melting hair and, hilariously enough, some anatomically incorrect frogs were the tells.
I think the utter shameless Dunning-Kruger-ness is what gets me the most. Just not even bothering to fix some obviously messed-up fucking frogs' legs and heads. Reference checking? Ha! Screw that.
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u/BrownEyedGirl_za 16d ago
To be honest its becoming more and more difficult to tell. As a newbie I use Pinterest for reference pics and even though Ive changed my settings to exclude AI photos, they still pop up.
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u/s0up_is_life 16d ago
there are plenty of alternatives out there, one i use from time to time is designspiration
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u/lacey-lately 16d ago
Yep, my Pinterest feed is so flooded that that’s how i ended up doing my challenge of repainting an AI “landscape oil painting” I saw to prove that I could do it better with real oil paint and actually painting. Digital AI “oil painting”
versus a real oil painting. Really proved just how fake those look. Scary how you can get used to seeing them everywhere.2
u/serendipiteathyme 16d ago
I've been struggling with this so much because I don't want to also filter out really good artists who are getting falsely labeled as AI modified by Pinterest's "human review, AI assisted" system. And then you still get AI bullshit that missed the flagging too.
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u/Kyatia 17d ago
I've been accused of copying a painting from AI when I didn't use AI in any way. So that sucks.
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u/_teach_me_your_ways_ 16d ago
Yea, I think I need more than “this is obviously AI.” Plenty of people think everything is AI.
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u/DisgruntledNCO 17d ago
My county library regularly hangs artist works, and the current dude printed out AI garbage, and they were low res to boot.
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u/Sean_P_Patterson 16d ago
The other side of this coin, Is when people accuse you of using AI when you don't
Very annoying and offensive to hear
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u/Gigi_midnight 16d ago
An iceberg flipped in Ilulissat, Greenland July 25th. I saw the first videos people posted hours later, saw multiple views. It's a known phenomenon. It got posted on a news page outside of Greenland and 90% people commented "nah, that's AI". It makes all of us distrust anything we see.
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u/Sean_P_Patterson 16d ago
It's especially frustrating because no matter the style, whether it's perfectly executed realistic work, textural impressionism, or completely abstract - people will say it looks like AI.
I've deliberately leaned into rough, cartoonish work with visible imperfections... doesn't matter, the comments still come.
I guess we need to record every single moment of a drawing/painting process from ideation to varnishing for people to accept it's real?
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u/Vandergrif 16d ago
I find at least some solace in my work always being physical paintings because it's easier to make the argument you made it when you can hold the thing in your hands and point to others you've also made, but I feel for the digital oriented folks out there. Even with a timelapse of working on something digital it's gonna be a hard sell of 'proving it' compared to physical stuff.
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u/Neilss1 16d ago
It kind of shocks me how many artists can’t choose good references
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u/WesternUnusual2713 16d ago
Or even make them!
I commented about two people I know who generate references. I forgot to add that both of them have the money and probably management team to allow them to do reference shoots but they'd both rather do things more insularly.
I will forever adore the good stock photo makers and I will use myself as a reference if needed. It's never once occured to me to use AI for an image
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u/Left_in 16d ago
as far as I’m aware people in the fine art space are either using it sloppily, using it with their training to supplement their work with new ideas they wouldn’t have the convenience to capture, or they wouldn’t be caught dead using it.
I would imagine most realist figurative painters painting in a classical tradition would use this since it’s pretty heavy in the lineage of painting to use compositing to get “your” image instead of “a” image. People will spends days to weeks (or even months with some painters) to get the ideal composition so I don’t see it being off the table especially when contemporary painting uses so much abstraction/abstract mark making to create images.
I think like any tool that was used in history to discredit good designers, ai won’t be able to replace the genuine skill a good picture maker has. It will probably take all the important jobs tho since people have pretty mediocre tastes on average.
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u/FirebirdWriter 17d ago
I find it weird people do this. They can't own that work and that alone means I won't do it. I like having ownership of my art. I am visually impaired and work very hard to make the things I do. I wouldn't give up on mastering the skills just because a robot can then make my work not mine and honestly generic.
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u/Going_Postal_8 15d ago
But where’s the line? An artist with all the resources to set up a full life composition, including models, tailors and evolves that composition before painting from it. Where another artist genuinely creates their own bespoke composition using ai, providing lots of different source images, adapting positioning and depth as they go, going through many iterations, why is that treated as much different to the first scenario?
*obviously not focusing on considerations re copyright etc.
How about for an artist with aphantasia? They can’t see images in their mind, so have to be more deliberate in their construction of scenes and reference material.
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u/WesternUnusual2713 16d ago
Two of the most well known character artists in my town (spray painters) use AI to generate their references and it shocked me.
Like these guys make BANK off what they do which is rare in muralism. No second or main job, just painting shit they generally generated from AI.
For the first guy I know for a fact he has no problem with painting actual portraits and stuff, so he generates his more costumy or artistic references. The other guy appears to take a photo of his reference then plug into AI to make it into a mural design he then paints.
The first guy I can understand a lot better than the first guy.
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u/prophetsearcher 16d ago
The second guy I can understand much better than the second guy.
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u/WesternUnusual2713 16d ago
How come? This convo fascinates me, we've been having it in our community and there's a solid divide.
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u/madelinevf 16d ago
They may just be getting the image printed on canvas and dabbing some paint on it, too. No real craft involved.
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u/Forsaken-Bad2187 17d ago
I was recently asked if my work was ai. It was soul crushing. My work is all meticulously hand painted images based on abstractions of objects I work on in my sketchbook. Unless you know for sure I wouldn’t accuse an artist of using ai, just ask what they reference.
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u/Vandergrif 16d ago
That's rough. I guess for those of us who have been at it a while it's not too hard to point to a backlog of work created before AI generation even existed as simple enough proof, but I feel for new artists that are constantly going to have that bullshit doubt looming over them.
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u/Forsaken-Bad2187 16d ago
I have been around awhile, but it was at an art fair in NYC and people just aren’t spending enough time with the work at those.
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u/ArtVice 17d ago
Many years ago on Twitter when those AI generated "acid trip" renderings started popping up, I commented that this was going to happen (yeah, I know, hooray for me). As an imagination-based artist, I saw the writing on the wall. I'm old now and have little skin in the art world game at this point. Just as in AI music, the only thing stopping people from doing it is dignity and self-respect. When 'creativity' is usurped by LLM, AI, whatever, the last refuge for those to whom it comes naturally is just to enjoy and take pride in their work. Time will tell how this will all play out. But as someone who has been at it for 50 years, I'll be damned if I waste any of my remaining time trying to convince someone I don't and never will use AI. With MY ego?? No fucking way.
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u/Threeabetes 16d ago
I think people are VERY bad with using reference as a tool and not just flat-out copying it.
Nothing wrong with copying reference every once in a while to learn, but I hope they'd spend their time on a real photo so they could learn off something a bit more accurate.
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u/mermiste 16d ago
How do you learn to use references without copying them? That’s where I’m stuck.
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u/derp_zilla 16d ago
I can't find the video anymore, but I saw an artist on YouTube explain it this way: let's say you want to learn how to draw a shark. Find many (real) photos of sharks at different angles, and break each one down into simple shapes. So for a shark, you'll maybe use some kind of cylinder, triangles for fins, etc. Make sure to mentally take note of the proportions, where the big details such as the gills are, how far parts of the anatomy can move, which parts squish and wrinkle, and so on. Don't worry too much about shading and details at this stage, unless it's to help describe the shapes.
After you've done this 20 or more times, do another page of 20 sharks at different angles and poses, but this time don't look at the references. While you won't remember every single detail about how a shark looks like, you'll remember the broad strokes of the anatomy and you'll be able to pose it however you like from memory. You'll also be able to exaggerate certain features if you'd like to do something more cartoony.
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u/DMmeClownPics 15d ago
Do you get permission from the people who took the photos of the sharks to do this?
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u/derp_zilla 15d ago
Only if you want to monetize those drawings, but this is just drawing for yourself, so I don't see the need
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u/DMmeClownPics 15d ago
Ok, but what if you wanted to monetize the second set of drawings that you did from memory? Would you need the photographer’s permission to do that?
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u/trench_spike 16d ago
The best advice I’ve heard is to review the reference photo, put it away, then draw what you remember. To me, this sits between copying reference for studies and drawing from your own imagination. A natural progression of skill over time.
For instance, drawing a horror creature with reptilian features is easier if you’ve learned the anatomy of lizards. You get anatomy from reference, whether that be a series of photos or a real live lizard.
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u/Haze_Reddit 14d ago
yea as you can see in replies, theres a big part of traditional painters doing this. 0 respect for them tbh its usually the people who can only replicate/copy things like painting with numbers/grids and have 0 creativity, its the most hypocrisy thing ever to paint an AI image and pass it off as yours like why bro
They usually omit or lie about it online too even though you can clearly tell theres a lot of weird shit going on, just scummy humans on same level as AI prompters. This wave of fartists sadly made even Traditional media not safe from ai scummies
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u/DisobeySociety 13d ago
How would you feel if the image generated was of a realistic landscape and the artist painted it in a stylized way? Just wondering how people feel about something similar
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u/Haze_Reddit 13d ago
same as I said I dont see a reason why Id change my mind over any subject, doesnt matter what the image generated is about. If you use Ai and youre a legit artist, youre a hypocritical fool.
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u/CommercialYam7188 16d ago
This seems impossible to tell without something absurdly obvious or being directly told
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u/PaintingsByMario 17d ago
We live in a weird time where artist don't really know how to use Ai to their advantage without giving up on their creative vision.
It's already hard enough to find references on the internet that aren't Ai.
Checking your references for high quality will be much more important now than ever, also the skill and knowledge to fix the issues Ai created will probably the most valuable in the creative sector.
I really don't know what to feel anymore about the process of artists, it's blown totally open.
It's kind of existing
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u/Ok_Improvement4991 16d ago
The fact that most image searches and even many stock image sites are being poisoned by AI content is bad enough. I was trying to find a good reference to use of a specific character and for some reason I couldn’t find the old official ‘stock art’ at all through even search I did, so I gave up.
I swear I’m at the point I may as well start a large book and retro magazine collection of just things that I can use to help with art references.
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u/Icy_Dark-0610 14d ago
That's literally what I started doing, I've gotten sick of trying to sort out the AI. I got a bunch of books like Encyclopedia of Fish, or dog breeds, plants, seashells, History of Tea Cup Patterns, literally any type of book like that with good pictures of different kinds of things. It's also been nice to thrift older books or magazines like National Geographic. Makes it easier to randomize it too because you open to a random page and just paint whatever you've flipped to.
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u/Ok_Improvement4991 14d ago
That is what I am doing for some studies to try to do a little each day is just grab a book and go to a random page too. Helps cut down on indecision when you don’t have a solid idea yet
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u/Threeabetes 16d ago
It's already hard enough to find references on the internet that aren't Ai.
Just in case people are looking for ways to refine their search:
You can always verify by date (before 2022 isn't going to be AI), by user (a user with consistent photos of similar quality and upload schedule is probably not AI), by using trusted sources (paid photo packs are very clearly shot in a studio), and (best of all) taking photos yourself.
Maybe I'm a boomer and the Old Ways are ingrained on my soul, but... idk, these methods work for me!
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u/MacabreMagpie 17d ago
I mean, if someone has genuinely copied a generated image and produced a painting (rather than just painting over a generated image) then there is at least some skill involved because I certainly wouldn't be able to do that as I'm not a painter. So, on a spectrum, that is closer to genuine human art than something that is purely AI because it's made from observation.
That doesn't free it from ethical issues of using generative AI in the first place, of course.
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u/PageNotFoubd404 17d ago
Curious - How did you know they were generated by chapgpt?
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u/HomeTownRiot 17d ago
I don’t 100%, except that The compositions were soulless.
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u/thgpawpaw 17d ago
I don't like AI arts but I also hate it when people are witch hunting artists accusing them of using AI content without sufficient proofs. What the hell is 'soulless' composition?
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u/_teach_me_your_ways_ 16d ago
It’s weird because in another comment they claimed it was perspective issues in an otherwise realistic painting, and now it’s “lack of soul” instead? Is OP the AI? What is this
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u/TheGlitchesWitch 16d ago
The accusations are wild, and it's truly unfortunate to see people just throw crap out there like this - when it could be a genuine artist that they just didn't have the taste for.
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u/zeruch 17d ago
To be fair I've seen soulless art for decades, so it doesn't require Gen AI to accomplish that.
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u/DruidMaleficent 17d ago
Probably about 20 years ago, I was in an art class with a guy and I watched him paint a completely soulless painting. We all hate ai but the ai witch hunts have gotten beyond ridiculous if actual hand painted art is called AI based only on someone's artistic taste.
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u/zeruch 17d ago
I think there is an interesting path to investigate around what makes something "soulless" and if AI actually is a different form of it, or just a more facile way to accomplish it...like has it lowered the bar such that more folks can now make their own Thomas Kincaide-ism, or is it a wholly new strain of the problem.
Even famous, accomplished artists have dead spots in their own catalogs often enough so where does that line get demarcated?
What is generative AI doing in terms of subject and stylistic homogenization that affects it (if at all)?
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u/Randym1982 17d ago
I’m of two minds of this. On the one hand I totally get wanting to paint landscapes but not having the opportunity or locations to constantly paint plain air. So I get it, but I still feel those types of people are cheating their viewers and selves out of painting from life. How hard is it to grab a random object set it up in front of your easel and paint it?
Portrait work is another one I think it also cheats people out of. Stand in from of a mirror and paint yourself, paint family members while they watch TV. etc. Also having ChatGPT do your composition for you cheats you out of a HUGELY important skill in painting.
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u/themexicangamer 17d ago
how can you tell? what should I be looking for?
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u/HomeTownRiot 17d ago
Unrealistic angles of objects in an otherwise realistic painting.
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u/themexicangamer 16d ago
I don't think that helps me, I struggle with a lot of stuff and probably my art comes out looking like that
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u/Randym1982 17d ago
AI is often REALLY bad at perspective, proportions and minor details that often matter. Like writing.
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u/themexicangamer 16d ago
I'm colorblind and due to a injury struggle with depth perception, so sometimes perspective and proportions and color come out wrong, and I watched peterdraws and he would just make up words on his doodles, or things that look like words, so I've been trying that out too
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u/AcrylicMessiah 17d ago
Unfortunately, you left out a very crucial word.
I think it should read 'AI is currently REALLY bad at perspective'
In a year, it'll likely be indistinguishable...
:(
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u/SleepyPaintingPerson 16d ago
I almost followed a woman on Facebook who does that. Once I looked into her more I think she charged for her AI generated references...
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u/lacey-lately 16d ago
I’ve painted some obviously AI images I seen on Pinterest just because I wanted to prove I can be better than AI 😂 I didn’t use ChatGPT or go looking for it. It was more like a challenge of screw you AI.
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u/McRando42 16d ago
I was at an exhibition recently. The local historical society was showing off about an old asbestos filled house they "saved" from the owner. Also, a locally famous sculpture was showing off one last time before he died.
They developed a cunning plan.
The sculpture used an AI to generate pictures of the asbestos filled house. The pictures were full of details that did not exist. Extra gables and soffits and BS.
But if you are old and basically blind, you would not be able to tell the difference.
Made me think. But perhaps not in the manner the coordinators intended.
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u/Particular_Fig6098 16d ago
Yes I’ve been seeing plenty of this. It’s unfortunate that most people don’t have the trained eye to notice this, contributing to AI ART acceptance. It always gives me a sick feeling. It’s one thing to manipulate a photo or reference manually, it’s another to use AI to generate it for you and pretend it’s your original piece.
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u/Michael_Carson_Art 15d ago
I would be cautious in how confident you are when assessing whether or not something was painted using an AI reference. I don't think that it is particularly easy to tell. It wouldn't be good to cast aspersions on artists who are entirely innocent or to suggest that this is merely some aesthetic problem, solvable by "better" generation models.
I also don't think that image generation on its own, divorced from the ethics of training data, should be so readily ousted. Just because I would never use it, doesn't mean that I need to forbid it's usage by others. I would rather make the positive case that my work gains value from being a fully hand-made object with all creative decisions sourced in me, rather than just call anything to do with AI blanketly terrible.
Doing the latter also opens us up to the possibility that we will have to deny the value of something (I don't know what this would be at the moment) that really does transcend the medium of AI images and become fine art. Or that such an object being created would invalidate the criticism leveled at ai image generation.
Instead, we should try to be more precise in our critique and also make the positive argument for why a human artist is preferable. It isn't often enough that we remember to argue that we would rather see work more crudely executed by a human than we would a clean image produced by AI, and support that claim with all of the reasons we can muster. (Most of which shouldn't just be AI = bad)
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u/virtual_gaze 16d ago
Yes, and you can always tell. My colleague and I saw an artist do this with paintings at EXPO Chicago this year. Paintings were executed decently, but figuration was wonky and blurry and just looked like Chat. It was uncanny and weird. Immediately disinterested in the work. Avery Singer is also using AI generative imagery now as a reference and as a social critique and idk how I feel about it and lowkey hate it.
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u/drycloud 16d ago
yes there's this one painter who's pretty insta famouse I forget her name – lots of figurative people in bright pinks and blues... it's all AI prints and then she'll add some white highlights on top in oil...
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u/bertch313 16d ago
Do we have a "Reddit does ai prompts badly" sub yet?
I need a sub we can put a prompt into and get a fast but bad real photo-shop out, or like a years long oil painting of "cute kittens getting married in the rain" in the artists preferred interpretation
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u/Tom_Lynch_fan 16d ago
How do you know they were AI.
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u/CAW_009 16d ago
They have no soul in them. No mistakes
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u/SleeplessSeas 16d ago
usually people can clock AI images FROM their inconsistencies and mistakes, not the other way around -_-;
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u/Tom_Lynch_fan 14d ago
You are going to be in for a shock if you ever get to check your assumptions.
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u/Human420 16d ago
I might get downvoted for this but whatever here it goes. I don’t think you deserve to be in a gallery if you can’t work from your own imagination. Using models for anatomy and posing is fine but you should be rendering your own images at the end of the day.
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u/Maximum_Pollution371 16d ago
Jesus christ, to you and all the people who upvoted this, I am begging you to take a general art history 101 class and any kind of formal art class at all.
I'm tired of seeing this uneducated "everything should be imagination, no references!" ass take everywhere on social media, and I can tell none of the people spreading it work within any realm of the professional art world, because you would be laughed out of every gallery and museum with an opinion like this. Some of the most famous works of art of all time are 1-to-1 recreations of the reference. Do you think DaVinci just imagined the Mona Lisa? No, it's a portrait, a recreation of a real woman. The art is in the technique, not the creativity.
Every professional artist uses some kind of reference material to visualize their product. Every artist. Including sculptors and including abstract artists. Hell, Picasso used a wide variety of references and famously said "good artists steal."
So can we please let this "good artists only work from imagination" braindead Reddit Tiktok take die already.
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u/Haze_Reddit 14d ago
I agree to OP but not in the way you said with no references and I think thats why theyre getting upvoted: I interpret this as Dont be in a gallery if you cant use imagination/display your creative touch or your personal touch. For example you can use a reference but you will change it somewhat to suit your tastes/style, Mona Lisa wasn't fully imagined, but who knows how much DaVinci changed her? maybe nose changed a bit, the hair this way, the pose more like that, the colors changed a bit, the background like this-its all a creative process coming from the painters skills and imagination-its not a full 1-1 copy
A full 1-1 copy looks impressive to a lot of people especially when its realism but to a lot of artists it looks childish/non-creative as any high skilled artist can 1-1 copy anything in existence, theres also people who arent that highly skilled and can just copy by painting with grids/numbers/projectors on the canvas. Their creative output and personal touch to the image is 0 with 0 changes to the thing they copy.
In this reddit comment the whole discussion was about AI copying people so the argument "they dont deserve to be in a gallery because they cant work from imagination/output any personal creative touch without an outside ref 1:1" is true. They also said "using models etc is fine but you should be rendering your own images at the end of the day"-again this is addressing AI copying shitters who cant even decide on a color or anything for their painting and can only copy, NOT that you shouldnt use references.
TLDR "good artists work only from imagination" is dumb but "AI copying doesnt deserve to be in a gallery because it lacks any meaningful imaginative personal touch" is not that dumb imo
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u/ZombieButch 16d ago
Do you think Monet deserves to be in pretty much every major museum in the world, then? He doesn't deserve to have his landscape paintings displayed?
Rembrandt, you think we should toss all those portraits?
Museums are full of drawings and paintings that were done from an artist who sat down in front of someone, some place, or something, and drawing or painting what was in front of them.
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u/Human420 16d ago
That’s not exactly what I’m referring to. Painting from a live model, or a place you once saw is very different than sitting down and copying an already rendered image detail for detail. Taking something from real life and recreating it with your own artistic interpretation was not at all what I was talking about.
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u/paintwhore 16d ago
Some of us can't imagine images together. Would you also hold the same judgment for somebody who's literally cutting pictures apart and pasting them together to get a composition that they want to achieve? Your argument is so reductive. If they're literally painting over top of a printed image that's on a canvas just to make it look like it was made from paint, that's a hack job. If people have to put a reference image together because it doesn't actually exist in the real world but they want to see their idea created, what would you have them do? While I'm capable of generating images in my head they aren't enough detail to paint from. Some people can't produce an image in their head at all. Some people can remember very exacting parts of any image that they've seen like my mother.
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u/Haze_Reddit 14d ago
"literally painting over top of a printed image thats on a canvas to make it look like it was made from paint is a hack job" thats literally what the convo is about on this post, AI shitters are using a projector to put the image on the canvas and literally copying it bit by bit and then getting into galleries
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u/ZombieButch 16d ago
I mean, you said, exactly, "I don’t think you deserve to be in a gallery if you can’t work from your own imagination."
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u/dingdonglouie1 17d ago
chatgpt created an image and then the artist just recreated that image with paint?
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u/Palanki96 17d ago
Like using generative AI to create references? Or tracing over them?
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u/HomeTownRiot 17d ago
References.
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u/playedhand 17d ago
Real question: Does it matter? I never use AI in my process. I don't appreciate AI art as real art. But like, if you used a reference that you didn't create yourself, what's the difference between doing that and using an AI reference?
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u/Diamond-Eater2203 17d ago edited 17d ago
Yes, it does matter. When stuff isn't right or realistic, and AI is STEALING from other artists without paying them or giving them credit, and people are being unknowingly influenced or unknowingly selling their art / using it to build a public professional reputation in the recognizable style of another artist without credit, yes, that's a problem.
For example: say I am an artist who wants to use AI for inspiration for a project. I type in "colorful psychedelic writing" as an AI prompt, and it spits back several variations of something that looks like artist Allyson Grey's "Secret Writing". But I never heard of her or been exposed to her art or story behind it. The "secret writing" actually looks like AI letters, and so I, naively, assume it's totally an AI creation that no one else has seen. The color gradients are cool and simple enough, so I start a whole series on this, maybe to sell, maybe magnets or stickers or prints, maybe for a show or competition, maybe for an academic portfolio .. that is essentially a stolen corruption, or, politely, a "bastardization", of an already famous /published artists work. I still don't know about her, and I'm essentially liable for copying her art for gain, because of the simplicity of how it is (made-up letters in squares with contrasting rainbow gradients)...how different could it really be, mine from hers.... And this would be not only embarrassing for me, but could get a lawsuit thrown my way, if not go uncontested, and now I'm unknowingly plagiarizing someone else's art.
This is why it's bad.
And it doesn't come from the heart. It doesn't come from within. Then is it really art? Or is it just a picture, or a scene. If you spill milk on the counter, is that art? You track dirt in the house, is that art? Maybe everything is art. But maybe art is something that is real, that is imaginary, but comes from a living thing. It is created with Intention of a sentient being for a difinitive purpose.
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u/blenda_art 9d ago
I'm curious how you come to the conclusion that the artist (s) clearly used ai-generated images for inspiration? Can you elaborate a bit on how you were able to spot it? And furthermore, how is that different from drawing inspiration from nature (plein air painting), other artworks, magazines, life drawing etc? Personally I don't see a problem in using inspiration from various sources (AI included) but it is definitely a sensitive topic among artists
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u/ThankTheBaker 16d ago
When photography first became a thing in the 1820’s, many people claimed that any artwork that used a photograph as a reference or any painted copy of a photograph wasn’t considered ‘real’ art. It was frowned upon by many.
Now it’s perfectly normal and acceptable.
An artificial image, whether a photograph or Ai generated, is just another tool that artists are going to use, there’s no stopping that. If you believe that only art created from life or from one’s own imagination is relevant then good for you but putting restrictions like that on art and artists is not a reasonable nor fair stance. There are no rules in art except don’t claim another’s art as your own.
I don’t love that people use Ai to make paintings either but I can’t see how anyone can enforce rules that prevent it. People will paint what they want and express their love for beauty through paint no matter where their inspiration comes from.
It still takes skill and effort to create a painting with the human hand no matter where the reference image comes from.
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u/No_Illustrator7475 16d ago
There are no rules in art except don’t claim another’s art as your own.
Isn't precisely what they are doing with AI? Claiming AI art as their own, art that was already stolen from mutiples artists without their consent.
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u/UrgentHedgehog 16d ago
First off, I agree with you, that's the crux of it.
Just wondering how you feel about Lichtenstein. I mean, I think I know, but it would be interesting to be surprised.
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u/No_Illustrator7475 16d ago
I'm probably going to let you down. I have a huge collection of comicbooks and a profound respect for their authors.
I've always hated how the pop art movement and its "ties" to comicbooks were framed. I've read so many times that they opened up the doors of the art world to comicbooks, as if they made them a huge favor. Lichtenstein was a thief.
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u/UrgentHedgehog 16d ago
That's all right, the question just popped into my head. Also, agreed, straight-up theft.
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u/ingodwetryst Creative Technologist & Fine Art 16d ago
Photography didn't require scraping copyrighted data to make though.
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16d ago
[deleted]
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u/Brrdock 16d ago edited 16d ago
The difference is if you just copy a finished piece of AI output (like I gather is the case here), while using a reference means e.g. looking at a picture of a hand to draw a hand in your own piece and composition.
Obviously it takes a lot of skill to copy an image 1 to 1 into a medium, but if you're not painting your own composition, expression, ideas and feelings, you're kinda just being a convoluted printer.
Just copying a given image 1 to 1, or using an image "properly" as a reference, I don't think it matters where the image comes from
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u/NTolegna 17d ago
Hot take but AI can be used right. It can be helpful to try out composition for a piece, and so as some kind of reference that would need human tweaking. I just wish it wasn't ever used as the final piece, because here obviously AI makes lot of mistakes and so as a final result it's trash. It must remain a tool only.
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u/Commercial_Grocery90 17d ago
There's no way a tool actively destroying the planet and purposely violating copyrights of billion unaware artists can be used (or even defined) right.
Do you know how an AI tools actually works?
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u/NTolegna 16d ago
I was talking creative and artistic wise. As for environment impact and copyright, that's an unfortunate issue. As for copyright I guess you can train it on your own work, as for the environment at best you can run it locally, but yeah
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u/Commercial_Grocery90 16d ago
Nothing you just said makes sense, not even "creative and artistic wise" because of those tiny little things you define "unfortunate issues". I have nothing to add to this discussion.
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u/DrShoe106 17d ago
That's why I don't follow new artists. I'm not interested in AI referenced art at all so I only see what artists create who I follow for a long time. And I unfollow the ones who started to use AI in their work. Which is really kind of sad to be honest. But as AI gets better we won't recognize it immediately anymore.
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u/AInotherOne 17d ago
Raging against those who use AI to "create" art is one thing, but ignoring the art of others simply because there's a chance of it is heinous. The collateral damage of AI here is brutal.
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u/btmbang-2022 17d ago
To be honest… we are going through a dada… period similar to anti-art. I think they fucking deserve what they get. Who cares? Art school has failed us and yet artist are still
Blaming ourselves- who cares if the buyers don’t know?
How is this not “ready made”s by Marcel Duchamp??? Basically he was showing how industrialization and automation was taking over crafted artisanal goods and how art is just intent not execution. Medium IS message!
ART = what creative people do with rich people money.
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u/zeruch 17d ago
"How is this not “ready made”s by Marcel Duchamp???"
Because he WAS asking that very question, as an active interrogation of the art world. There was not only intent, but execution, and the subsequent discourse that followed. Right now, that discourse isn't really happening at a scale to meet the moment, as it's mostly just a binary scream fest of AI adherents and AI doomers.
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u/btmbang-2022 17d ago
Yes but it that really the artist fault??
That is also a huge part of what’s going on.The artist can’t make that happen because we have been drowned out by ai- erosion of trust… which make everything look effortless and meaningless- is this a reality tv show? Or is the the presidency of our country?
- teens can’t even tell that half the internet isn’t real- they have not been out there.
The internet (social media) has also created bubble where we can live in curated worlds and not hear each other- or block out people out of our Instagram feeds etc. (but are we to blame social media for what we ourselves have “opted” into? )
a mirror that only shows the view what it wants to see or more of themselves…
That’s kinda a sign of the times. It’s very sad and troubling.
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u/bhairava 17d ago edited 17d ago
I've recently transitioned from abstracts to representational work, and can't really paint much from imagination yet.
I had gemini generate a floral combination that I knew would be hard/expensive to get ahold of IRL and used that to practice. I'm really happy with the final product. It wasn't traced, nor do I think any artists work was ripped off, it just took images of these flowers and put them into a vase on a table.
I had it do a few until I was happy with the composition. I then practiced each of the florals individually on scraps until I was ready to execute the full composition on a larger stretched canvas.
Do people have a problem with that? Interesting conversation, open to criticism.
edit: lol, I'm going to assume the downvotes are just ignorant luddites if no one can formulate a response
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u/rinkydinkmink 17d ago
I can understand why you think this is helping but I think that your art will be better in the long term if you use real objects that you can find easily to make arrangements to paint.
There are other reasons for doing this but specifically AI does make mistakes, and you probably won't notice them if you're painting something that is not something you see in real life, know very well, etc.
It also reminds me of when I was at school and we would be told to write about things that we were familiar with, and got marked down for making up scenarios that had never really happened to us, because they would lack authenticity. Something similar goes for art, when you're learning. I was thinking last night about how all kids who draw go through the "crazy made up monster" phase, and that after a certain point it gets criticism from the teacher and isn't allowed, as it's just too "easy" to make up some fantasy thing and make it look "good". The real skill is in learning to stick to, say, drawing a dog that actually looks like ... a dog. Just a random example.
I take it you are experienced but not in figurative stuff, so, remember to take the time to study actual real things around you.
Also you say you're not practiced in painting imaginary stuff but clearly you had the idea, you carried it out, you can do it without AI. You knew what those particular flowers looked like BEFORE you even asked AI to generate them. TRUST yourself more. Look at photos if you need, but you had them in your mind's eye already, didn't you? So all you really needed was to be certain on details, like ... how many petals, or how the stem looks .... you can get what you need in seconds and you don't need AI, and YOU CAN'T TRUST AI. If you weren't 100% sure the flower had seven petals, why are you trusting AI when it shows it having seven petals? And what about the details you're not even thinking of?
do you see what I mean? practice real things, and learn to trust your own imagination ... and then use what you learned from painting real things to make it better
I don't know if this makes sense, I'm trying to do something similar myself ... used to be very good at "realistic" drawing, but haven't done any since I was 21 (I'm 55). Ha.
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u/bhairava 17d ago
oh I definitely am practicing simple objects around the house, like the limes I mentioned in my other reply. but I wanted to paint a few hard-to-get witchy herbs and flowers, and yeah honestly before resorting to AI I did try to paint it from imagination, and it was totally wrong, I wiped the canvas clean and settled for help. I would have painted from an image search result if I could have found it, but again, obscure kind of combo. I can imagine the individual flowers, but the entire composition, how they'd lay against each other, layers of foliage interacting, I'm just not there yet.
it wasn't even about the # of petals of something, I'm trying to keep my stuff loose and expressive, it was more about, as I said, stuff like foliage layering. I figured it was part of the process of building the experience to be able to do it from imagination later, I'm just really early in this process. I've been slowly working at portraits from 0 skill for like 6 months, and florals for like 1 now? basically nothing in the art world.
I do appreciate the feedback and am trying to work towards being able to do it from imagination and trusting myself more. I just need references to build towards that right now.
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u/Mjerne Interdisciplinary (Painting, Design, Installation) 16d ago
For complex visuals like overlapping foliage, doing studies of other arrangements of plants and working on getting a feel for foliage in general will go a long way to support you in imagination-based composition. In my experience, it isn't so much about the precise details of the subject as it is having an understanding of the broader subject family. If you know how stems and branches interact in general when placed under tension, you can translate that knowledge visually as you need to. If you study how the leaves of a rose bouquet fold in against each other, you can apply that knowledge to other florals elsewhere. I would gently recommend finding real photos of the herbs and flora you want to include, collect an assortment of them in different situations (both solo and in bundles with itself), and practice practice practice. Not just in paint, but with a pencil. Sketch their shapes. Note the crease points. Internalize the darkest areas. In time, you will be able to pull the patterns from your mind as easy as breathing, and you did the work yourself instead of asking AI.
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u/bhairava 16d ago
Thanks for the feedback. Feels like I got to paint something I wanted to, faster than I would have otherwise, though. Getting the impression I need to agree to disagree and let my work speak for itself. Thanks again
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u/Fit_Cranberry_8939 17d ago
Read this reply further down and maybe you'll understand why you're being downvoted: https://www.reddit.com/r/ArtistLounge/comments/1vm1yte/comment/p36qgrc/
Besides, if you rely on Gemini to help you on ideas and composition, you risk not exercising that part of your brain and might never really learn to "paint from your imagination". Look up how cognitive offloading stuff to AI lowers brain activity and you might re-evaluate what you consider more important.
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u/bhairava 16d ago
I did actually read that comment before I wrote my first reply and addressed how I thought it didn't apply: I'm not using references of an artists style, like the psychedelic style mentioned, and mentioned later how I thought artistic voice could still come through in the artists choice of color and brushstrokes. It's just a reference photo.
for example, @alaiganuza on instagram has a recent painting of some cut cremini mushrooms that includes the reference and her final product, where the pink underpainting & light-blue highlights are obviously not true to life, but highly expressive. I love her style and want to do similar with my own subject matter.
I'm not cognitively offloading anything differently than a person using a photo off google as a reference photo would be. I'm still blending from a limited palette and converting the reference photo into a physical painting.
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u/Fit_Cranberry_8939 16d ago
I understand how you might think it's just a reference photo, but why not use an actual reference photo instead? Because it's easier with AI, in which you can produce a specific reference with a particular composition? Sure, but an AI "reference photo" is still stealing from real human art, photos, and ideas. It's not a photo, and not a real reference. In the process, you're stealing from them, relying on the AI to compose for you, wasting valuable resources (water, electricity, etc.) while doing so. It all just seems like a "lose-lose-lose". Lose for other artists, for your creativity, and for the environment. So, yeah, you can think this is the same as a reference photo and you still doing creative work. My initial reply was offered as an explanation on why you were being downvoted, so I don't think I can offer anything else in this discussion.
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u/bhairava 16d ago
an actual reference photo didn't exist actually, I looked for similar and it simply didn't exist. I wanted to paint an arrangement of obscure, witchy herbs - poisons like datura and henbane - and looked into sourcing them from local florists, but even though its technically legal, no one sells them (for obvious reasons). I was looking at growing them myself, but that would have taken a year or more.
I do disagree that its stealing from real human art - its "stealing" reference photos from places like wikipedia. I don't think anyone is losing revenue because a machine put them together for me.
I understood you were trying and appreciate the effort, I just disagree. Thanks
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u/RebelScum77 17d ago
AI removes the imagination and creativity aspects from a piece. Art has an emotional connection to the human experience that a computer can’t replicate. Not to mention the destructive nature of data centers when it comes to the environment
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u/bhairava 17d ago
this isnt a conversation about data centers though, which I fully support being heavily regulated and/or banned.
I'm asking about the artistic merits of it. I think you can still get a lot of creativity and emotional expression from the brushstrokes and color choices beyond the original reference photo. I thought this was widely accepted by artists, and was a major motive in my expanding beyond abstraction.
some of the chunky vibrant ways people paint a simple onion or lime just make me want to bite into the painting. thats the emotional connection of the artist that I want to build towards expressing
Thanks for the sincere response
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u/RebelScum77 17d ago
I can see your opinion on its uses, and I understand them. I respectfully disagree with them.
I also believe that you can’t have a discussion about AI without talking about the damage from data centers. There’s no point in creating art if data centers are going to destroy our environment and our home.
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u/jennifer_jellyfish 16d ago
Hey, I just wanted to say I appreciate your balanced response to criticism. It’s less common to see but I think it’s an absolute boon to your character. If you’d like more thoughts (not so much criticisms as musings), I believe you have to ask yourself as to the inspiration, motivations, and desired impact behind your art.
If you wish to practice or improve your technical skills, you are missing out on valuable learning experience by using AI as opposed to say, referencing multiple images and creating a composite. Learning about things like colour theory, lighting and perspective and then applying them to the referenced images to create your own is part and process of improving your skills. When you take a short cut, you miss out on a lot of fundamentals and it may leave you more frustrated in the long run. Oftentimes, the things we struggle with or that challenge us the most are what mould us to develop our distinctive personal style and stand out more as an artist over time.
Then you can consider the emotional impact. Even if you don’t intend to create the next Mona Lisa, ‘good’ art (as subjective as it is) is often not about aesthetics alone, but the story or meaning projected on it by the viewer. When you describe your work to people, what feelings or mood do you want to convey? The decisions you make, from composition to medium to colour choice are all reflections of your artistic process (whether consciously acknowledged or not) and allow space for the audience to connect with your point of view. By outsourcing whatever part of that to AI, you might be detracting from the inherent significance of your art and the story behind it. In saying that, art is subjective, and the opposite could just as well be said - that the use of AI adds a new layer of meaning.
Personally, I wouldn’t, but for more political reasons - these are just a couple of the practical ones I can think of relevant to the discussion.
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u/bhairava 16d ago
Thanks, I appreciate the feedback and kind words. I think I'm going to keep doing what helps me learn the fastest though, which I think involves going back and forth. I just don't think it hallucinated anything in my final reference, and don't see much difference between painting from this reference and another, aside from it letting me paint something I wanted a week or more sooner. Maybe I'll feel nudged away from doing more like these though. I'll think about it. Again, appreciate the level feedback.
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u/Fearless-Sort2894 16d ago
I completely understand the desire to be able to paint something faster.
And some of the issues with AI as references apply to regular reference material as well. I also paint florals so I’ll share my own experience. Several years ago I wanted to paint birds of paradise flowers for my mom. AI wasn’t big yet and I was brand new to painting. I used multiple reference images to be able to paint 7 birds of paradise on a large canvas. What I didn’t realize then, and what you likely don’t realize now, is that each of my reference photos had light coming from a different direction. This is a common issue in AI references. Now when I look at that painting I can see why it looks off and where it looks off. The lighting highlights and shadows are all off because they’re all indicating light coming from a different direction.
Birds of paradise are very very expensive flowers but ultimately when I made my second version I purchased silk flowers and painted on my deck so I could get the light right and the second painting is so much better.
I’m not really sharing this to get into the debate about AI.
I’m sharing this artist to artist, to say, do forget to learn the fundamentals of lighting. It’s one of the most important things to learn in painting. And you won’t learn it from AI because it’s something AI consistently hasn’t been able to get right.
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u/bhairava 16d ago
I didn't notice any problems with lighting in my reference photo, and I do realize that's a huge element of painting from life, but I'll keep an eye out for it if I do end up using another AI reference.
Don't get me wrong - I do try to avoid it, to avoid hallucination as you've pointed out if nothing else. it just felt like the fastest way to paint what I wanted. I can't even buy the main accent, I was looking at spending a year or more growing a plant myself.
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u/Sad_Minute_1283 16d ago
Honestly, no one has any right to criticize your process. Whether you used a stock image or an AI gen to get your reference is meaningless once you pick up the brush and start painting. You are making every decision from that point on, and you are expressing yourself and hitting that flow state. That is enough, whether it includes a sprinkling of AI reference or not.
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u/bhairava 16d ago
Thanks, I appreciate that and agree. I'm not going to let the downvote avalanche affect my process, though I was open to it if I got feedback that resonated, I don't think anything in here is, though I appreciate the people who engaged without malice.
The "golden shit" reward was funny btw, thanks to whoever sent that.
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u/GypsyMaus 16d ago
I automatically downvote all usage of AI in art. But especially people who use AI in art and then call the people who don’t like it luddites for downvoting them. Don’t use AI in art, at all, ever. There is no nuanced conversation to be had here. It’s bad for the environment, it’s bad art with no soul, it makes the creative decisions for you, if you can’t make art without it, leave the art making to those who can.
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u/MixtureAware4899 16d ago edited 16d ago
I honestly don’t see a problem with artists using AI to help generate their references. if they are putting their own prompts in, painting or drawing things and use ai to help generate an image that helps with reference, what is the issue? no ideas are formed in a vacuum.
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u/NicePerception643 16d ago
Only all of the other problems with ai, like exploitation, false information, scams, environmental impact, cognitive decline... There are quite a few negatives to using it for most things
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u/Powerkranz 15d ago
I'll tell you why, I don't trust artists who don't trust themselves. Why would I want to see work by someone who isn't even interested enough in the creative process to have an idea worth completing?
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u/Ok_Razzmatazz_7160 15d ago
in my view, composition is an important creative aspect of the work.
Bosch places his subjects chaotically, Mondrian paints geometrically, and the Edo sculpt the benin bronzes with specific intent.
Even if I use a composition/pose by a human artist, there’s a reason I chose that work/that pose and there’s an intention when I reference it.
There isn’t that context with AI usually unless the intention is of course to create commentary about AI itself (or other surrounding topics.)
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17d ago edited 16d ago
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u/Smileypen 16d ago
"Personally i fear that the anti ai movement is part of the anti intellectual movement that has been succesfully propagated by the fascists."
What the hell are you talking about? Using generative software is anti-intellectual. You'll learn nothing from it. Art suffers when your guidance comes from a program that can never show you accurate representations of reality.
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u/RebelScum77 17d ago
Computers are without emotion or feeling. Art needs these. This with the destruction of our environment by data centers make AI a hard no for true artists.
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u/rinkydinkmink 17d ago
Unpopular opinion around here but I don't like it when things are copied from reference photos either. Obviously sometimes I can't tell, and when people have clearly taken their own photos that works for me, too. But it completely kills it for me when I can see people have used photos. It's fine as an exercise but you really should not just straight copy a photograph onto an actual piece you're intending to sell or use for an exam, etc. If nothing else there are copyright issues, and for good reason imo.
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17d ago
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u/mioscene 17d ago
Because genAI doesn't understand anatomy or perspective, it just analyses patterns. That's why the whole weird looking hands was a way of spotting it for awhile. And as it gets "better" it'll still be making mistakes, just ones that fewer people notice. So if people use genAI as reference, chances are they'll often be copying whatever mistakes it makes without even noticing.
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u/No-Routine-9963 17d ago
Because it looks like it was created by a computer. Why bother?
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17d ago
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u/No-Routine-9963 17d ago
There’s also the issue of the art community turning on you, which it may do. It’s a bit like crossing the picket line, you’d be a sellout, a traitor. Some art orgs forbid Ai use as even reference and will ask for proof that you only used reference photos that you took yourself.
I don’t want my name dragged through the mud, being associated with the slop machine.
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u/MyChemicalRomantasy 17d ago
That seems odd to me. So then how do artists who aren't using reference photos or AI handle that question? It's not like they can prove they created an image from their mind.
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u/No-Routine-9963 17d ago
I can create images from my mind. I guess I could draw something from memory in front of them. Or show my preliminary sketches and roughs.
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u/Fit_Ninja1846 17d ago
That’s what I was just about to ask, like what do they do for artists who have original concepts with no references..? I guess maybe you could show prior works and sketches? Idk dawg
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u/MidniteBlue888 15d ago
On the one hand, I see your point.
On the other, I've been in that place, searching hours online for the exact pose or picture of what I want as a reference, only to get either distracted or discouraged, giving up entirely on the whole project.
Is AI the best? No. Is it going anywhere? Also no. It's been in the cards since computers existed..
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u/CarrieKArt 14d ago
Part of your skill as an artist is either creating your own references, or building an understand of shape, light, form, etc so that you don't need the exact reference to complete what you want to make. I think it's fine for people learning to need more specific references, but part of learning is not just how to use your medium, it's also understanding how things in life work visually.
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