AI and Art
ChatGPT's image generation update took the internet by storm with its seemingly endless possibilities. While it may be a novelty, I struggle to consider it anything nearly resembling art. Art is still a human effort.
After ChatGPT’s recent image generation update, AI-generated art has been centerstage on my social media feeds. First came the Studio Ghibli trend, then the action figure starter pack followed. I’m sure there will be yet another trend before I even publish this post.
Is AI Art an Insult to Life?
Due to the Studio Ghibli trend, a video of Hayao Miyazaki, a co-founder of the studio, has also been making its rounds. In it, he calls the AI software being demoed “an insult to life itself.”
It’s not entirely clear if he’s referencing AI in general or just the software at hand, which is crudely attempting to demonstrate how a body moves. Regardless, Miyazaki feels passionate about an AI element taking over the artist’s job.
Now, I may not be the founder of a critically acclaimed international animation studio, but recent events have had me considering AI’s role in art.
Using AI to Supplement Work
In my opinion, AI should supplement the creator. AI as a tool for accessibility and the enablement of more people to do what they want to do is a wonderful thing.
John August and Craig Mazin, co-hosts of the Scriptnotes podcast, think of it like this: if the AI is helping someone do their job, it’s a good thing; conversely, if it’s replacing someone’s job, it’s a bad thing. I tend to agree with this stance.
Sure, it’s fun to play around with the image creation at first, but it doesn’t creep much beyond novelty to me.
What does one accomplish by Studio Ghibli-ifying a cute photo with their significant other?
One could argue that the original photo, taken by a person with a varying degree of photography experience, is truer. With the photo, all experiences in that person’s life factor into the photo at hand no matter how good or bad it is.
AI image generation involves none of that - at least not in addition to what was before. The copyright concerns over being able to create something that so closely resembles IP is yet another worry. I also don’t know how thrilled I am at the thought of feeding an LLM pictures from my personal life.
Art As a Journey
Art is about the creation. If I wanted to give my girlfriend a Studio Ghibli-ified photo of us as a present, I certainly would not go the route of using ChatGPT. I can’t imagine that would go over well.
If instead, I created that drawing myself, that might qualify as a good gift. My work likely wouldn’t be as high quality as something AI could do (I’ll admit it has gotten quite good), but my experiences, my soul would go into it. The stylistic parts that call out to me would be highlighted, and the source material would be an inspiration instead of purely imitation. Any errors I make would become part of the art.
This blog is another example.
Yes, I could ask ChatGPT to spit out an article on any given topic, edit it, and publish that each week, but that defeats the whole purpose of the blog. I’m not making this solely to churn out soulless articles.
The writing and the progression are the art. Each week, I take time to think about what I want to write and grapple with that topic. That’s where I grow (or try to). Ideally, my posts improve over time. Maybe they don’t. Maybe AI could write better than I can. Regardless, the doing is the art.
I guess to me that’s what art is – a journey. Great art is an artist grappling with a subject. That’s clear to me in the paintings of Van Gogh. It’s present too in the writings of J. R. R. Tolkien. Artists inherently must care at least a little about their creation.
Create, Create, Create
I don’t think AI image creation is inherently evil. There are considerable copywrite concerns, but I can’t knock anyone for playing around with it. It can be fun. I can’t call it art, though. It is a non-artistic output.
Maybe one day if the Singularity is achieved and AI is conscience, this topic will grow incredibly more nuanced, but for now, create something. We as humans are still responsible for art. That hasn’t been taken away from us.
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Bonus!
As part of my musings on this topic, I challenged myself to create one new drawing a week through June. The image below is my first one from last week. I created it by following a tutorial by Art with Flo, a wonderful YouTube channel for anyone interested.
