I tried AI... Again... It was as suspected.

If you haven't noticed, A.I. is all the rage these days when it comes to content creation. Art, Writing, and Music are all being flooded with A.I. driven works. And very few of them are quality. They are usually ugly things that muddy the art pool or clever mimicries of existing masters. Some people are easy to fool however- you've all seen those posts on Facebook, you know the ones, where something is just off. Then you read the comments and sure enough, it's A.I. generated. Some of the music is quite funny, some of it is a little to close to the real thing. 

I have written about this before, and I am still struggling with it. I have always wanted my work to be completely original, after all I cultivated the works and the skill for years and years. It doesn't seem right that Someone can screen-cap my work then stick it into an app, craft a prompt and poof! My works originality is out there for anyone who can barely type.

That being said, many wise people have said that it is foolish to fight progress and technology. I agree with this in part, but I am old and have reached that point in my life where the older ways are starting to look more and more appealing, mainly because I am used to them and they take time, something every feels as they age- the slipping of time. Us older Gen-X'ers can feel it slipping, so we fill our time with things we love before we disappear. A.I. is a short cut, I think we can all agree with that, there is no other way to put it. 

So, not wanting to be that guy who hangs on to the past too much, I decided to give A.I. another whirl. The last time I tried it, there were a lot of creepy anomalies in the work I generated. Good news people! There still are. This means all of us artists haven't been replaced just yet, although the process is light years from where it was just a couple of years ago. It did spit out some images that I found intriguing, especially when I trained it with some of my existing artwork. Nothing usable, but some of it was good enough to give me some ideas. 

I know what you are thinking, you have seen some pretty good A.I., and you would be right, you most likely have seen some really good A.I. work. The problem is, the longer you look at it, the more it falls apart. Backwards hands, cleverly tucked in third legs, colors that blend the wrong direction, little things that at a glance would look normal until a closer look gives them the "uncanny valley" effect. The real terror in A.I. is that it makes most art seem like an eldritch horror strapped on the skin of something beautiful. 

Even though I am trying to embrace this as a tool, it's so hard to digest it. I worked my whole life at the craft, hours and hours honing my work and style. Now, someone can plug and play their way to the same place with out ever having lifted a pencil to draw. The shame is that there are profiteers who will use other people's carefully cultivated styles to profit from them.

So, this week, I am going to review the picture it generated for me. 

First let me establish the prompt: (A giant black snake), (long coils extend back out of sight), (fighting hundreds of armed men on an open plain), stunning landscape, misty atmosphere, dingy and gritty tones, inspired by Lord of the rings, mystical ambiance, epic fantasy scene, enchanting details, vivid textures, ultra-detailed, captivating composition. 

Full disclosure, the A.I. wrote part of that prompt, because it's sure as shit not the way I describe things.

Then I uploaded some of my existing art to train the model. I will not upload that here because it is not complete and not published. 

It spit out the following:

Not the art you were looking for? Nope, not even close.

I am not sure what is happening here. It took the elements of my art and forced them to breed with the prompt, and then had the A.I. rear their idiot man-child. They left it in the attic and force fed it fish heads and Kraft macaroni and cheese. This is the eldritch horror that came from the art I uploaded. That thing that crawled out of the bottom of a tin of bad kippered snacks.  

There are a couple of really big questions I have. For starters, what the hell is that snake thing with whiskers? Why does it have arms? Why is it not fighting the mages? Speaking of the mages, is this a collage, or is that larger one just a giant. Why does his robe turn into the black snake he is supposed to be fighting with? There are just too many questions to answer. 

It did do a good job on the border and the background though. That is almost exactly what I had in mind for the setting. Almost. Good enough. 

Now, lets modify the prompt and put a photo in there. The prompt is basically the same except for the first descriptors, it reads: (A long road into the woods), (it is spring and the road is muddy),  (inspired by Lord of the Rings), (J.R.R. Tolkien style), vibrant watercolor, intricate details, lush colors, enchanting atmosphere, high-quality illustration, captivating fantasy elements, dynamic composition, rich texture, magical essence, shimmering hues, masterpiece design, vivid contrasts.

Here's the photo, it's one of my favorites. I took it on the way down my drive way one morning. 

And her is what the A.I.  came up with:

Okay, now this is pretty cool. However, I don't know where the bridge came from. It doesn't quite get it right. This is a vast improvement on the body-horror art from before. This could be used for something, not sure what, but it's not a bad pic, no tenacles here, no siree. 

As you can see, it gets somethings right with the prompts. Other things, not so much. At this moment, I guess it all depends on what you are using with the prompt and how you are writing it. 

Even though I have feelings about the art, I know that it's going to be a huge part of the future. I figured I could get used to using it, get familiar, know thy enemy, and continue to make art the old fashioned way. Lets see what happens. 

I will most likely revisit this tool, but I can't say when. Knowing the way A.I. advances, it will most likely be sooner rather than later. As of now it is a great way to explore art and come up with cool mash-ups, but I am not so sure it nails it even half the time.

Cheers for now!