2000 AD Online Forum

Very good and I'm assuming that you punched in the parameters for the desired image - it will be interesting if others take up the challenge and what images are produced.

I'd just like to note that there are still ethical concerns with Bing's image generator. Artists can ask to have their work excluded from the AI's image scraping, but they have to 1) know it's happening, and 2) actually submit a request to be excluded.

Of course, it's not clear how MS can tell their AI to exclude the work of specific artists with complete reliability, nor how they can prevent unattributed/stolen examples of an artist's work getting scraped anyway.

At this time, I don't believe there is any way to use a general purpose image generator without serious ethical problems. The only ethical use of an AI image generator that I've come across so far is the handful of artists who've started with a 'clean' version of an image generation application and trained it exclusively on their own art. All the general purpose ones are hoovering up copyrighted material from across the web and regurgitating mash-ups of that material in response to user prompts.

I'd also like to note that this stuff is very upsetting to a significant number of artists, some of whom may visit this forum.

Adobe went about things in a better way, training its system only on the content it already owned. The thing is, that also tends to produce better results. I'm hearing about LLMs trained only on a single publication's copyrighted work, and the resulting automated copy is more likely to have the 'voice' down, rather than sounding like a generic and bored low-level US marketing account manager.

Quote from: IndigoPrime on 24 January, 2024, 11:21:14 AMAdobe went about things in a better way, training its system only on the content it already owned. The thing is, that also tends to produce better results. I'm hearing about LLMs trained only on a single publication's copyrighted work, and the resulting automated copy is more likely to have the 'voice' down, rather than sounding like a generic and bored low-level US marketing account manager.

Not so sure about Adobe, TBH — people sold their work to Adobe pre-AI and had no idea that Adobe would then be training AI on it... which is still pretty iffy, IMO.

Like I said, the only ethical use of AI image generation I've come across is artists who've trained the generator solely using their own art.

In the long ago, before the interweb, I was a member of a local Star Trek fan club run by a lady in Southport. It was great, we held Trek-themed garden parties and gathered together to watch All Good Things. There was a monthly newsletter and I wrote stories and drew pictures for it. My first artistic submission was a fineliner drawing of the Enterprise from Wrath of Khan crashed into the Moon. The saucer section was about 1/3 buried in the ground with the body and nacelles pointing straight up and a few panels and shuttlecraft scattered about.The caption was the same as in the image above. It was probably only the second time I'd ever had anything "published"* and it actually graced the cover instead of the usual grainy photocopy of something Trekky. I wish I still had a copy, or the original.

I'm sure that from my description above you can all imagine the image and, fundamentally poor humour notwithstanding, get the joke. The a.i. didn't and, no matter how I tweaked the prompt, the above was the best it came up with out of around thirty attempts.

I understand the ethical and economic concerns, but my views on copyright and patents (which I have described elsewhere) differ from the received wisdom. The printing press put countless artists out of work as the demand for hand-produced documents waned, but now artists love the printing press as a means of publishing their work. I remember a time when "proper artists" eschewed the upstart Photoshop, now they see it as just another medium. This is how I regard a.i. In time, artists will figure out how to best use this medium in their own work - and that is just what I am trying to do. The results so far have been primitive but I intend to continue until I can find a way to bend this new medium to my will. I'm going to start by trying to reproduce a few of my old one panel "Trektoons" to see how they come out. As to what's next, who knows?

It is not my intention to upset anyone - especially artists. I write comic scripts, which are nothing without collaborators. My dream is to form a loose collaboration of amateurs to produce comic strips just for the love of it. A kind of Spirit of Zarjaz thing just for the forum. In these divisive times, anything that brings us together is vital, and the collaborative nature of comics makes it an ideal vehicle for that - as does the friendly nature of this forum and our shared love for 2000AD. But I need to convince people to climb aboard, and maybe I can get my ideas across better with a.i., even if it's only to say, "this is the idea, but you can do better." Sign up now!  :lol:

The ethics of the a.i. situation will evolve over time but at present I intend to explore its capabilities to see how I can use it to help me on my own artistic journey. You're welcome to explore with me.





*The first being a picture shown on Rainbow, for which I won a badge. This is the point where it all started to go wrong...

Quote from: The Legendary Shark on 24 January, 2024, 02:43:14 PMIt is not my intention to upset anyone - especially artists.

Whether it's your intention or not, I'm telling you that many artists are very upset by it. What you choose to do with that information is up to you.

Quote from: The Legendary Shark on 24 January, 2024, 02:43:14 PMI write comic scripts, which are nothing without collaborators.

Ah, now. If you're going to use AI for your art needs (thus eliminating human art from the equation) it would hardly be fair for you to write anything when an AI could do it for you. Jump in with *both* feet.

(Or - and this may be controversial - write it yourself and then draw it yourself. Or come to an arrangement with a human artist. Jump *up* with both feet.)

[The real message: a comic's message board is probably not the place to engage in a human-art-replacement experiment. For details, re-read the Kenny Who? tales.]

The a.i. is more of a helper, really. The pictures to draw people in and the LLM for other stuff. For example, I asked for a list of Russian names, male and female, with a wide regional mix for some characters I'm writing. It gave me back some perfectly sound names and a few corkers, such as the wonderful Elvira Gorbacheva. For such things as this, and creating colourful Russian expletives, it's a fast alternative to trawling through duckduckgo.com or finding a list of Russians somewhere.

On the other hand, I have another story in mind set on a moon with a specific orbital dynamic. I spent the better part of a day trying to explain the orbital set-up to the machine in order to generate a basic calendar but it just couldn't grasp what I was after - although it sometimes came tantalisingly close.

I can't draw. Oh, I can a bit, but everyone can draw a bit. Comic illustration is an art all on its own with all the panel arrangements, angles, accurately rendered hands and characters who have the same face all the way through. I can't do that without a lot of study and practice - and I'm still studying and practising writing, which is my preferred medium. For me to illustrate my own stuff would be futile, woeful, and arrogant - though I'm not above providing the odd concept sketch (as can be seen in the recent Bludd & Xandi book, a few copies of which Mr. Candlish may have remaining...), I think my aphantasia prevents me from ever getting the idea properly into an image but a.i. affords me the opportunity to more accurately express concepts I cannot myself envision.

I would never replace a human artist with a.i. In an unlikely dream scenario, Colin MacNeil might pop into the forum and decide he'd like to draw Zanda Claws & Mrs. Snow. No more a.i. required. Any of the amateurs on this board, some of whom I've collaborated with in the past, who have a go at anything I've written automatically kicks a.i. into touch.

Gene Loganberry turns in his grave.

Quote from: The Legendary Shark on 24 January, 2024, 05:03:32 PMThe a.i. is more of a helper, really. The pictures to draw people in

No gonnae happen. The AI will put off the majority of genuinely artistic types from having anything to do with you whatsoever.

Quote from: The Legendary Shark on 24 January, 2024, 02:43:14 PMThe printing press put countless artists out of work as the demand for hand-produced documents waned, but now artists love the printing press as a means of publishing their work. I remember a time when "proper artists" eschewed the upstart Photoshop, now they see it as just another medium. This is how I regard a.i. In time, artists will figure out how to best use this medium in their own work - and that is just what I am trying to do.

I would suggest that photoshop is more of a tool than a medium and there was nothing approaching the, (absolutely effin' justified in my opinion), levels of hatred for the far more obviously morally questionable AI "art". Also, were that many actual artists put out of work by the printing press? I would've thought scribes were the main ones done out of a job there. Citation needed.

Regardless, AI is unlike the printing press or photoshop as it produces a "finished" piece of work in literal seconds, negating any need for an artist/photographer altogether. There are already countless examples of large companies using it instead of employing an actual person, in spite of the glaring aberrations in scale and anatomy and architecture and real world effin' physics, and social media would suggest that the majority of the general public are completely incapable of telling the difference between the crap it produces and genuine art and photography, no matter how rubbery the face of the granny who's knitted a giant cat is, or how terrifyingly elongated her Rob Bottiny fingers are.

There may be something to be said for using generated images as references/inspiration for your own work if your end results differ enough from them, but non-generated images are just as good, (or better), for that purpose

Most tech revolutions are met with some degree of suspicion and some do put people out of work, or at least cut people out of the chain. Think about music creation. This is now hugely accessible, with people being able to create an entire album right through to mastering, all on a single piece of hardware. But that didn't erode creativity. That for me is the threat of AI. It's that it is primed to do everything, rather than just streamline a process.

Mind you, I'll admit to prizing immediacy and convenience myself elsewhere. I use transcription software often. Although that hasn't in my case robbed anyone of work (I never used transcription services), it has more broadly. And the thing is, in this case the automation actually is as good as a typical transcription service (as per when I used to work for a corporate that sent recordings to be dealt with in 24 hours).

Quote from: The Legendary Shark on 24 January, 2024, 05:03:32 PMFor me to illustrate my own stuff would be futile, woeful, and arrogant - though I'm not above providing the odd concept sketch (as can be seen in the recent Bludd & Xandi book, a few copies of which Mr. Candlish may have remaining...)

Only a few copies left. Without wanting to spoil the plot, here's a few pages by artdroid Tom Newell - no A.I. art in this book, I promise you!

(https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhE-oH4O6gYHIP3OhWQ9J-_HD2lNhqBlLsbDx4OvJ1v7UH3ZtUIVzVI0xxju44WefJ3FQ1WJBOAFhgEzQWcL72N0R0dFzdYbSftpnG_azWJAJd8Idq1AxvO_Tjij3SZHlLL_suTwZ6nbEmYeJGF4l2JJtSZfoWeTzCg2StqntM6AuxjP0QHRKT6qz8WxBk/s320/400443538_936953961151365_5325179314305099776_n.jpg)

(https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeHgornpDmjmIKFEAX0Ue2dT1vJRqjvyRyHqSTrGKgnw8NSYQhrTWx0Tx54mGnXJiLero1iIsUh1Cj8X071FucOs-MzTIFppeBTTvmQFC4fqOek2wudMgJ7LHKppfTvU1wd6Xc5ALJmorz2k3aLRL3HztuwXuHAMv6pVs6xITMA6kL-lKRayUhB7gqvIY/s320/13.jpg)

(https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaWgki7gQWPabq0Ti3Dz-fSz_4L82Q_kzcBwM-ejbCZdqLKVr658F-Rk4LmcKQWjx6joUx_6szuCgYQ10Byh8mUz5B-RUrlG78aNDHv2BNumX5pBqKnxV_w00mZ1PG6nQBBp7JU03ql_kpTYP2jwRBiPiiiXVFHmBUrNowhs_33LaAb_StpL4B_-2ZkiM/s320/31.jpg)

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tried to get dredd having a bath, but really had to fight bing to not keep generating nudes. best i could do:

https://imgur.com/a/KSl9DSt (https://imgur.com/a/KSl9DSt)

(https://i.imgur.com/0FTrMqO.jpeg)

I feel honour-bound to mention that Jim B-AI-kie already drew Dredd in the bath.

(https://2000ad.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/judge-dredd-in-the-bath.jpg)

'Drew' being the operative word here.
Not f*cking 'typed'.

[pedantry alert] I bet the initial script was typed... [/pedantry alert]

Yeah though, I agree that human artists are always better, but not all of us have access to such luxuries as properly talented artists like yourself or personal artistic talent.

I appreciate it! Love a good tub moment

I'm having a real hard time with how AI is being pushed right now. See new Samsung advert where they say they are investing in 'you', then say use our AI and your imagination. But we all know that the AI is trained from human creations. Is a person's creativity coming up with what to ask the AI to do?

Quote from: Tomwe on 13 February, 2024, 11:39:02 AMBut we all know that the AI is trained from human creations. Is a person's creativity coming up with what to ask the AI to do?

Basically: get a shit version of what you would have got if you paid an artist to do it, but you don't have to pay an artist, and the artists' whose work this shit version has been derived from don't get a penny.

Kenny Who?

AI art is basically digital inbreeding.

It's entertaining for the layman to have a chuckle at for now, but with learning-models learning from the pool of art that's available, and generating art that's itself being fed back into that pool, that pool will become polluted.

Then there's the near-inevitability of human art becoming influenced by AI art.

It will eventually stagnate into a single pretty, but generic sloppy turd.

If AI can be trained to reproduce assistance-tasks to help a human, then that'll be useful. But if AI continues to produce the finished product, it'll pollute culture hideously. Possibly irreparably.

Pop is eating itself.

Quote from: Jim_Campbell on 24 January, 2024, 07:46:25 AMI'd just like to note that there are still ethical concerns with Bing's image generator. Artists can ask to have their work excluded from the AI's image scraping, but they have to 1) know it's happening, and 2) actually submit a request to be excluded.

This reminds me of the wide scale book scanning Meta engaged in years ago (before they were Meta).  They went to libraries around the world and scanned every book they could, just as they managed to drive up almost every street in the world and photograph it.  The purpose was to build a huge searchable library.  They claimed it wasn't breaking copyright because of fair use, and they would only ever return a fraction of any book in answer to a search query.  They weren't handing out free copies of entire books.

A lot of authors were very unhappy.  They had to actively take steps to be excluded, and the one-sided deal meant that if they stayed in they may get a paltry royalty payment.  It went to court and the authors lost.

I don't know if anything further happened, but as far as I kept up with the story in the news, my mind boggled that they were not in trouble for scanning whole books.  It shouldn't matter what they're doing with that content, or how they limit giving it to others, the fact is they made complete copies for themselves, without permission in advance or any equal contractual negotiation.  That alone should have been enough breach of copyright to stop them.

Interesting, isn't it, how corporations can get away with this crap, but individuals cannot? And the law is so slow. Inconsistent too. Apple may well have made a fortune on 'rip - mix - burn', which flirted with fair use in the USA. But even today, it is in all but a tiny handful of exceptional use cases illegal in the UK to format shift music. If you rip a CD to your computer (assuming you still have a CD drive), that is copyright infringement. Police won't be smashing down your door, but you're still committing an illegal act.

As for AI, I agree with Fortnight. There are excellent use cases when it comes to iteration and editing. A lot of that work is happening right now in mobile photography (and specifically mobile, because I'm sure when pro retouchers look at the results, they'll see the joins) and LLMs. The latter of those things are genuinely useful if twinned with a seasoned writer/editor. But there's relatively little value in AI doing anything from scratch, and you can almost always tell when someone's tried to do so.

Two examples I recall recently. One was someone attempting to do a music track but with a different singer over the top. It sounded stilted and the pop equivalent of uncanny valley. And then dialogue on an event, which was seemingly AI-written and auto-generated in terms of the voice itself. The script was terrible. The voice sounded robotic. Most of those things could have been better using AI within a creative/iteration loop, but when it's the final product, you have problems.

(Obviously, that might not be the case in years to come. But given that AI is now being trained on AI content, I don't hold out much hope for things getting better. And when you've used some of these systems a lot, you rapidly start noticing that they look far better on a surface glance than they really happen to be.)

A.I. "art" is for people who can't be bothered to learn how to draw.

It's the absence of art.

I was looking for a face-on Dredd image for a 3D art project and shit AI versions of Dredd are becoming more and more common in Google results:

(https://i.imgur.com/b9FQoFB.png)

I would much prefer to see a scrappy amateurish scrawl with your joke strips above than the highly polished ai efforts.

Personal effort always engages me more regardless of the level of artistic "professionalism".

Often single panel joke comics work better with crude art. Look at how popular Modern Toss is or David Shrigley. Their newspaper comics wouldnt work at all if they were rendered by Alex Ross or Glenn Fabry,nevermind an AI.

Or closer to home here I loved Dash Decents advent calender strips and his "simple" art work actually added a lot to them rather than detract.

At the same time, I know you are just having a bit of fun with these, so if you're enjoying yourself, have at it.  :D

But AI must be good for something for an aphantasic artist like me, so next I'm going to try using it for something else.

Stay tuned!

Quote from: The Legendary Shark on 14 February, 2024, 01:01:45 PMBut AI must be good for something for an aphantasic artist like me, so next I'm going to try using it for something else.

I don't think AI art is ever going to give you what you want. Unless you want 150 pictures of Power Girl with 6 fingers. Then you're massively in luck!

I'm not saying aphantasia isn't a drawback for visual artists, ('cos it stands to reason it would be), but there's a surprising amount of really quite accomplished artists with the condition, including the bloke who designed Disney's Little Mermaid and Beast from Beauty and The Beast.

Inversely, there's a lot of folk with a very vivid mind's eye who can't draw for toffee, (or any other confectionery of their choice), in the same way that you can't just stick most folk down in front of a landscape with a bunch of paints and expect them to produce a masterpiece.

Quote from: Jimmy Baker's Assistant on 14 February, 2024, 04:19:11 PM

Quote from: The Legendary Shark on 14 February, 2024, 01:01:45 PMBut AI must be good for something for an aphantasic artist like me, so next I'm going to try using it for something else.

I don't think AI art is ever going to give you what you want. Unless you want 150 pictures of Power Girl with 6 fingers. Then you're massively in luck!

The worry for me, is that in the not so distant future AI art will have developed so it gives people exactly what they want.
And it will be impossible to distinguish from real art.

I dunno. Maybe it will force real art back into the real world, onto paper, canvas, and clay - driving up the value. Digital art, I feel, is most at risk - but I also feel that digital artists will find a way to use AI (as does the speaker in M.I.K.'s "A.I. Art book Scam" post on the Implications thread). Artists are imaginative and will find ways to use this freed genie. Unfortunately, scammers, cheats, and general ne'er-do-wells are also imaginative. The world will adjust, as it always has.

The artists known as scribes who copied out volume after volume may have been eventually rendered obsolete by the printing press, but it also ushered in new artists like wood-carvers for illustrated volumes and later cartoonists and photographers. That process took centuries, but this A.I. thing won't take long at all, I expect. From now until the dust settles might take less than a decade, maybe two. By then, artists and scammers will have found the best ways to use A.I. - as did the artistic or scammy scribes, printers, wood-carvers, cartoonists, photographers, Photoshoppers...

The genie's out of the bottle, so how should we use its power?

AI is still far too much in its infancy to be properly intelligent enough to do most creative things decently, and the one thing that's lacking in order for it to create art is less to do with intelligence and more to do with other aspects of humanity, and that's opinion, preference, taste.

It's all fine and well AI being "I" enough to do smart stuff, but when will it know what it likes? That's a whole other ball game. Your taste is fashioned from personal experience over your lifetime, the things that were around you at various stages of your life, the limitations of what you could do, see and find in your locality, and the other 'intelligences' around you at those times and what they were experiencing. Your taste is formed from what you couldn't experience just as much as what you could. AI going to struggle at that for a long while yet.

Until then, this half-arsed AI we've got now is just going to get in the way. Intelligence without humanity is just not going to cut it with art.

To continue my previous analogy of digital inbreeding, society needs to regard it as being as distasteful as actual inbreeding in order to halt it in its tracks. Once the novelty wears off.

I don't think A.I. will ever be truly intelligent because it lacks the biological component that gives rise to the chemically induced emotions that lead to intuition, empathy, creativity, etc. All it will ever have is the cold, emotionless, logical side. 

The way I understand it, when I am writing a sentence, I have an innate feel for what word comes next and many sentences arrive fully formed in my head with the correct words already in the correct order. An A.I. constructs its sentences one word at a time, knowing only which word probably comes next. I presume the art works in the same way, the A.I. "artist" knowing only which pixel probably comes next, so small errors degenerate into extra digits or missing limbs. The A.I. doesn't have the intelligence to step back and examine its own work or notice obvious flaws. 

I'm thinking it might be very good for generating textures and such.

In my attempts to find a use for a.i. I decided to try and reproduce an image I've shared here before; first as a crappy sketch in an old challenge and then as a crappy digital painting based on it, like so...

Tweaked...

Speaking as someone who makes a living out of drawing and painting, AI art is deeply worrying .  Fortunately mass-produced AI systems can't climb ladders and paint murals yet.  They can, terrifyingly, make massive stickers with similar content within minutes.

What you might see as a fun and whimsical way to illustrate throwaway jokes, Sharky, I see as another step towards the complete redundancy of all the skills and techniques I've spend decades trying to learn and hone, not to mention potential unemployment.  That's how technological progress works, I suppose, but I don't have to like it.

I understand your concerns, JBC. Because I've spent a significant portion of my working life as a professional driver I view a.i. self-driving vehicles in a similar way. Fortunately, in my case that doesn't matter much as I don't do that job any more (though it's a skill I have in reserve) but if I was just starting out again I'd be worried too.

Furthermore, the a.i. glitch causing figures with too many limbs or distorted faces in art might lead to rather more significant mistakes on a motorway or high street. Driving, just like painting, is at least as much about the human factor as the technology. There is art in everything we do; and a.i. will not be able to simulate that for a long time yet. But it is coming. Indeed, the hundred-years-hence version of you might own a couple of second hand art robots, each one programmed with the unique owner's style, which do jobs for him all over the place while he reserves his own work for customers willing to pay a premium for the human touch. Similarly, that future version of me might own a couple of a.i. vehicles and reserve his own skills for similar higher-paying clients.

For the present, I find this technology to be a great boon to my creativity. Take the image above as an example and compare it to its predecessors. It's still not very good but it's far better than the originals and closer to my initial intent. The a.i. technology helped me to do this in three major ways; firstly as a mood board, secondly for throwing up ideas, and lastly to generate elements.

As I've droned on about before, I have aphantasia. This means that I can't conjure up images in my head. My mind's eye is blind. Now, I obviously don't know how you do it, JBC, but I have gleaned that some artists see the images they want to create in their heads and "copy" those mental images onto paper. In my head, there's nothing to copy - only a concept; in this case, the wreck of a massive war machine rotting away in the noxious atmosphere of Nu-Earth. The first image I see is the first image I draw. The a.i. I use allows me to generate loads of images of futuristic battlefields, for example, allowing me to explore the mood and composition of the piece. It's a time-consuming and enthralling process because few of the generated images are worth saving for reference.

The above process also throws up bits and pieces of interesting ideas - things that would fit into the concept or suggest elements I'd missed or not thought of. It's also good for fleshing out more abstract ideas. Even in the first image I had some vague notion about how the light from the wormhole in the sky would work, scribbling it out with red ink. In the second, I made the light around the wormhole fiercer and experimented with sunbeams. In the third image, I used a.i. to explore different kinds of wormhole and waded through all sorts of generic and mundane sci-fi t.v. clones before hitting on the idea of a rainbow corona. This is when the concept of Nu-Earth lighting crystallised somewhat in my mind; if the wormhole gave off rainbow light, then the surface of Nu-Earth must glisten with rainbows. I haven't been able to properly express that in the above but I think it's close enough to give the gist and I like it, though it's something I could never have envisioned in my own mind.

Finally, I used the a.i. to generate the major elements for my masterpiece; machinery, wormhole, figures, buildings, wreckage, textures, etc., and used them as I would photographs in previous digital work, cutting and pasting and stitching them all together.

Lastly I started painting and smudging over the elements, just as I would with photographs, and drawing it all together with layers and filters and all the Gimpy tricks I've learned over the years. I am fairly pleased with the result.

So, for me a.i. art is like a prosthetic mind's eye - it still can't do everything yours can but for me it opens up a door to worlds of invention - if not for producing pictures of Nu-Earth for my own entertainment then at least as a tool for exploring visual ideas for my writing projects, where the a.i. images are entirely behind the scenes like the rest of the research.

Quote from: The Legendary Shark on 12 April, 2024, 12:43:22 PMNow, I obviously don't know how you do it, JBC, but I have gleaned that some artists see the images they want to create in their heads and "copy" those mental images onto paper.

Not me, I'm afraid - how comic book artists do that is beyond me.  For a supposed professional artist I'm not particularly creative.  When I'm commissioned, I have a very, very sparse and vague picture of the whole scene in my head, then for the components I turn to Google for similar images to copy.  And even then the scene rarely ends up as I imagine it. Maybe I have a small dose of aphantasia too, who knows.

Well, it is a spectrum. At the far end is hyperphantasia, when people can't distinguish real from imagined images - which must be terrifying.

It is terrifying.

(https://www.pluggedin.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/garfield-the-movie-1200x720.jpg)

Quote from: JayzusB.Christ on 12 April, 2024, 10:41:06 AMWhat you might see as a fun and whimsical way to illustrate throwaway jokes, Sharky, I see as another step towards the complete redundancy of all the skills and techniques I've spend decades trying to learn and hone, not to mention potential unemployment.

This may have been mentioned before.

Aye, you did say that, and you weren't far wrong. I've very recently left a part time English teaching job too- it's not the main reason I left, but a part of it was that my classes on CVs and cover letters used to be hugely valuable to my students, whereas now that can be done instantly without any classes at all.

It's definitely changed things. I recently had to do an emergency takeover of a game development class, and they're using a game engine I'm not overly familiar with. I've been leaning on AI to get to potential solutions quickly without having to ramp-learn a game engine's code interface.

The only saving grace is that you have to know the right question to ask, and when you're getting a sensible answer. So, I'm still fairly useful.

(My colleague's childish attempt to make their first game in the early 90s by typing "a really good boxing game" into a text file and hoping for magic to happen is still, I think, not here. It is closer, though.)

Quote from: JayzusB.Christ on 12 April, 2024, 10:41:06 AMSpeaking as someone who makes a living out of drawing and painting, AI art is deeply worrying .

Six years ago, I delivered an educational lecture to a group of TV production students at a local university about the (contemporary) nascent use of AI/ML in the media production sector, highlighting examples in video editing and vocal & music production.  What really rammed it home was when one student -- who shot live match footage/highlights for a local League One football club -- realised with unpleasant shock (and quite a few expletives) that already-available, off-the-shelf software could do most of his job.

We've known for a long time that this was inevitable.  Heck, Kenny Who? was published nearly 40 years ago!  Many people had just presumed it was further away, so have ignored the doom-mongering this last decade.

Much as we might moan, we all have to adapt to this new world.  After all, there are not many jobs nowadays for knocker-uppers, telegram messengers or VCR repairers these days.

Quote from: A.Cow on 13 April, 2024, 01:31:04 AMMuch as we might moan, we all have to adapt to this new world.  After all, there are not many jobs nowadays for knocker-uppers, telegram messengers or VCR repairers these days.

I'd like to argue that artistic expression is rather different, in that the intention of the artist seems rather to be a part of the piece (alongside the reaction of the audience).

I'm never going to be able to express this feeling as well as this person: How to Replace the Sky (https://www.theverge.com/c/23339391/comic-photoshop-sky-replacement-digital-art)

Quote from: Funt Solo on 12 April, 2024, 10:21:54 PM(My colleague's childish attempt to make their first game in the early 90s by typing "a really good boxing game" into a text file and hoping for magic to happen is still, I think, not here. It is closer, though.)

This is unrelated, but when I got my first computer - an Amstrad CPC464 in 1984 our neighbour came round and said and wanting to be impressed by what computers could do, she said "Ask it where my Victor[her husband] is" we all laughed because it was a preposterous, don't be silly. But of course, I am frequently asking my phone where my kids are.

Another thought I had was about a person's involvement in a highly-skilled pursuit. The example "knocker-upper", one assumes, would not feel bereft at the invention of alarm clocks. They may feel a loss of income and wonder what other avenues to explore, but the knocking-up (*ahem*) was presumably a bit of a trudge, as employment goes.

On the other hand, when someone is in love with their work to the extent that it is a core aspect of their lives...

Bristol tailor's 'heart crying' as he retires after 54 years (https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-bristol-68788005)

Quote from: JayzusB.Christ on 12 April, 2024, 10:41:06 AMFortunately mass-produced AI systems can't climb ladders and paint murals yet. 

It looks like it's a race against time for you to produce your magnum opus so, Jayzus.
You know: the self portrait on the west face of Liberty Hall.
You, firm-jawed but avuncular, surrounded by happy workers, soldiers, peasants, and children in traditional costume, with a backdrop of wheat fields and hydroelectric power stations stretching to the horizon.
It's the mural that Dublin needs.

Well, now you say it...

Not art.

Quote from: pauljholden on 13 April, 2024, 02:03:01 PMshe said "Ask it where my Victor[her husband] is"

A good question! (https://youtu.be/kUUA0Fdw_6Q?feature=shared)