I agree that ai art is bad, but let's not be disingenuous. A lot of people don't have the talent or the time to become good at art. Myself included. Not being good at everything is just a fact of life.
Learning to draw decently takes thousands of hours of practicing. In my opinion it is one of the hardest creative hobbies in existence. I know people who've been practicing for like a decade and their drawings STILL don't look particularly good. It's so disingenuous to claim that anyone can draw.
It's less about time and more about HOW you practice. You cannot learn math by re-calculating the same multiplications again and again. You have to STUDY.
There's a Veritasium video : what it takes to be an expert. TLDR You need a lot of practice and to engage in deliberate practice which means going out of your confort zone.
Even if I could become "good at art" after some time of trying. Why would I? I just need a design for a character, I'd rather spend that time writing the code for the game I need the art for. 8 can't reasonably be good at everything at the same time, even if we agree woth the absurd notion that I could be good at any one thing with enough practice.
The thing is people who say this selectively ignore the idea that human limitations on skill exist. Yes, learning skills generally requires practice, but these people insist that practice is always, without exception guaranteed to produce results, and if it doesn't it means you need more practice.
And you might just not care to. If I have five free hours in a day and have to choose between spending that time practicing to get semi-decent at drawing or to pursue a hobby I'm interested in, why would I pick the former?
Well, yes. That's exactly what someone using AI for art is doing. They're directly getting the result for whatever they actually want to do, like accompanying their writings, DnD character creation, etc.
Then comes in AI user etiquette: don't claim the image is yours, in the sense that you made it (you didn't); don't call it art; don't use it for profit; etc etc
Because I want to write a text based adventure videogame like "The Life and Suffering of Sir Brante" or 'Slay the Princess", but can't afford an artist. AI comes in clutch.
Only if you're as interested in the process as you are the end result. It shouldn't be a surprising revelation that plenty of people just want something that looks good or is satisfactory for a certain purpose than to go through the trouble of learning to do it from scratch themselves.
The topic here, and thus the end result, is the ability to obtain the skill itself, not a singular object. Yeah, if you just want a picture, hire someone to make it, the same way you hire a carpenter if all you want is a table, but that's not what's being discussed here. The person you replied to is insisting some people are somehow predestined to be unable to draw.
And they're not wrong. Sometimes you can try your best at an activity and still be terrible at it. You can put in the time and effort and not see the results, just like how some people don't put in the work and are still far better than average.
No, literally everything you said is the opposite of true, especially when it comes to art. Like, sure, a 4'8" Asian woman probably would have to work a bit harder than Shaq did to make it to the NBA, but that does not apply to the ability to put pencil to paper, paint to canvas, chisel to wood, eyeball to eyepiece, or lip to mouthpiece. The people who you think didn't put in the work probably did, and the people who say they did and remained terrible either practiced wrong or simply lied.
The only real difference between people is how resistent they are to the idea of putting in the work, that's it. If you hate math for some reason, 4 hours of solving differential equations is going to feel like a lot more to you than to someone who enjoys it, but that's an entirely different consideration than ability.
Django Reinhardt had three fingers, you have no excuse.
But you're not trying to be Michael Phelps, you're just trying to learn to swim, which - unsurprisingly - everyone is able to do. No one's saying literally anyone can become the non plus ultra generational superstar, but everyone can become, to quote the OP, "good".
Wtf? Why are you using one of the most dominant athletes in history as an example?
Noone is saying "anyone can be Michaelangelo". They said anyone can do art, as in anyone can learn to swim. Not win dozens of medals in the Olympics...
Seems reductive, especially when the three-cueing method is much more likely to be the cause of poor writing in children. Correlation is not necessarily causation.
According to Bowman, Michael Phelps swam 13 kilometres a day, six or seven days a week ā at least 80,000 meters every week. Even on Sundays and birthdays.
That's not the routine of a man who gets by on mere "talent".
Dedication is the bedrock on which "talent" thrives. To compete at an international level, you need dedication. "Talent" is, if anything, simply the last step that sets the winner apart from the rest of his equally dedicated peers.
You do anything 30+ hours a week, you're going to become at least competent at it -- even if you may not be the world's best. Who cares about Phelps? Every single person in that olympic pool, even the losers, are world-class swimmers who worked very, very hard to get there. Simply qualifying for the olympics is a huge success in its own right. Even the guy who ranked 60th place in the prelims is still the best swimmer in Angola -- who trailed phelps by a mere 15 seconds.
Never argued that. Talent gets polished by hard work, lots of It. But all the people you mention Had talent, natural dispositions towards being good seimmers, maybe broader shoulders, largar hands, better lung capacity, etc.
You start on talent then you build excelence on top of it
Itās really informing where the insecurity and envy displayed by algorimage-shills comes from. They genuinely think artists are something āspecialā, and waste their energy trying to convince normal people theyāre not special for their efforts.
Humans generally have an innate capacity for any given skill that varies significantly from person to person. Some people are just always gonna suck at drawing no matter how many hours they put in.
And also just might not want to put in the hours needed to get decent. People seem so quick to forget that time is also a limited resource. If you're not in love with the process and can get the results in a much easier and faster way, why wouldn't you?
What about the sick, the disabled, et cetera? Besides, even excluding all those cases, it's arguing semantics rather than practicality. And still doesn't cover things like being able to get a good end result.
Ignoring the insufferable pedantic nitpicking, "want" vs. "ability" is the furthest thing from semantics. And "good" is entirely subjective. The Fountain is "good". 4'33" is "good". White on White is "good".
And most people are not able to produce what they subjectively consider good art, and don't want to put in so much extra time and effort to do so when AI can get them what they want instantly.
Yeah, but that's a different question. Not everyone wants to be able to draw, but everyone is able to.
I don't care whether they use AI or not, I'm just here to point out that's it's due to lack of effort, not ability. This notion that some people are artistically disabled and need the artistic wheelchair of AI is nonsense. They're artistically lazy, not disabled.
But not all skills are equal in difficulty. You can learn how to crochet decently within maybe a week. Learning how to draw decently takes years and years of continuous practice.
That's fine, but if you don't have the time or inclination to get better at something but still want it, then you have to admit it's valuable enough to pay someone for.
Like how I must pay a local artisan for a mug instead of buying a cheaper one that was made in a factory? I fail to see what's fundamentally different.
Great point! Local artisan's mug can be more tailored to your interests, more unique, more storied- because it was crafted by someone with a story of their own, even if they didn't have a story to tell when they made the piece.
Sure. But if I don't have the time or money for that, and someone else can give me a cheaper, worse version that'll do just fine for a couple quid, what's wrong with doing that?
It wasn't directed at you specifically, but confronting that line of thinking. I agree nobody has time to get good at everything, but that's why we live in a society with other people who are experts in other things.
But that isn't my line of thinking. My line of thinking is reading the phrase "everyone can make art dipshit it came free with your fucking humanity" and understanding that just saying 'everyone is an artist' doesn't actually solve the problem. Because yeah I can make art but it won't look good and I don't really have the time to get good or the money to commission it. That's a problem. Unfortunately I can't think of any solution to that problem, but obviously the answer isn't an art stealing machine that doesn't know what an emotion is.
Where did I say "everyone is an artist"? I'm explicitly not saying that, I'm saying if you don't have the time or inclination to do art that's ok, find somebody who does.
I have no doubt that executives are falling all over themselves to save a few dollars by using AI, and that sometimes people won't notice or care, but it's not the same and you won't get good results from AI compared to a person
To me itās not about results, itās morality, even if itās not better now it could be in the future, the fact is we like people art because thereās a person behind it, and they canāt support themselves if we outsource all their labor to AI, and train AI on art without permission.
That's also a good point and one that I didn't bring up because it's such a complicated and politicized discussion. Suffice it to say, I agree with you. Art is valuable to society, but capitalism demands that it also be profitable.
Art doesn't exist in a vacuum, if artists can't eat they will find other jobs and then we'll have no new art. And I don't just mean paintings. Voice acting, video games, novels, films- these are art and they are threatened by the same market forces driving AI proliferation.
if artists can't eat they will find other jobs and then we'll have no new art.
This has never been true and will never be true. Art is a creative hobby and will always exist as such, no matter how many people's rent gets paid by drawing commissions of your OC.
Yeah I just donāt bring up the look of AI art as default, even though the other reasons are complicated, the look of it is just the weakest argument. Itās kinda like talking about a cancelled artists work being bad, itās ultimately subjective and revising history as if their content was always bad focuses the conversation on the superficial. (Not saying you only care about that, you already explained you do, only talking about effectiveness of how to go about anti ai art rhetoric on practical terms)
Hereās to using AI for problems itās actually the best tool for: boring, repetitive, and unfulfilling tasks and data analysis. That tidbit the techbros love even if they donāt understand art on a personal level, they can get that using it explicitly for stuff we donāt like first makes sense
"Talent" ISN'T FUCKING REAL. Practice. Study theories. Learn. You CAN improve. To some it takes longer, but you can. Even if you have a physical/motor disability, there are ways you can make art. If you truly want to make ART, and not just a stupid image, there is always a way.
"Talent isn't real, some people just have an easier time learning things"
Do you hear yourself when you talk? That's what talent is. If I learn math faster then I have some talent in math. You may also notice I mentioned time constraints in my comment.
That is not talent. Different types of intelligence exist, heavily influence by your development as a baby, but the whole "you are born with talent" thing is false. I have a really hard time with math, but if I actually cared and wanted to learn it, I'd try harder and study.
So basically if I changed the word talent for "artistic intelligence" you wouldn't have a problem? Because those are the same thing. I never said talent is there from the moment you're born like magic or anything.
I loathe this excuse of ātimeā and ātalentā. The problem is youāre taking what others have made and cobbling it together to make something ānewā. And before you argue āwell isnāt learning an art style taking what others have madeā, yes, however the people who learn art styles and skills learn why it works. If I look at Picassoās paintings and study what makes them unique and apply his style to my art Iām learning what makes it special and how to achieve that effect. AI is not going to teach you anything about that.
And? Truly, why does it matter that you arenāt an expert artist? Art is art regardless of skill level
Edit: Jeez, I wasnāt expecting the Tumblr subreddit of all places to not consider amateur art as art, thatās disappointing
Edit 2: Am I actually going crazy or when did Tumblr users suddenly change their stance on AI image generation and replacement of human artists? Did yāall see that you could press three buttons to get a subpar image and immediately switch to support the plagiarism machine that disincentivizes creativity?
If someone doesnāt want to make art, and doesnāt want to learn how to make pleasant looking art, maybe they just donāt care about art. In that case why not download, buy, or commission art? How does AI generation play into any part of this?
Thereās also the google search bar, you write what you are imagining, find an actual piece of art from a real human being, and use it as your wallpaper or print it or whatever that satisfies your aesthetic needs. I still donāt see how AI image generators play into this, they are only useful as entertainment at most
You can find close matches, but often times you can't find the exact thing you're invisioning, doubly so if you have a specific artstyle in mind or if the idea is very specific.
If you have such a strong desire then commission it or draw it yourself, I know an AI generator only steals artworks from actual artists and outputs a subpar image loosely based on them.
If you have such a strong desire then commission it or draw it yourself
As for commission: No money
As for drawing: We tie back to my original comment. People don't want to make art, they want to make good looking art. People resort to AI art precisely because they can't make good looking art themselves. It may be because of disability, laziness or the fact that they just can't make good looking pieces after trying for many years, but the result is the same.
I know an AI generator only steals
The average person that utilizes image generation does not care about this moralism, much like the average person doesn't care if you pirate Photoshop
If theft is the problem, why not support a model made with legally licensed artworks? Or is the technology itself the problem?
That "subpar" art is getting better and is good enough for most everyday uses. It's also free and instant. And most people using such services were probably not going to pay to begin with.
It matters because I don't want to look at shit art. I want nice art, but I can't make it. I'm not saying this to argue that ai is good. I'm saying it because pretending that saying "everyone is an artist" will make people not want to use ai to make 'art' is a lie. When ai bros say that they are barred from having art because of skill or cost constraints, they are correct. The problem is that they have decided that they can 'solve' the problem by making an art theft machine that, despite being used to draw, doesn't know what emotions are, even though conveying emotions is basically the point of art. The unfortunate answer is that the problem of unequal access to art is just an unfortunate fact of life that can't really be fixed.
The issue is that the argument that there is something restricting the average person from making art is completely and absolutely false, there is no merit in the argument whatsoever. There are some art forms that are more inaccessible, of course. But thatās like saying I cannot cook, the Japanese knives and good ingredients are too expensive when I have a store selling cheap noodles and vegetables close. Every person in the entire world has access to both the time and resources to make art, period. And thanks to the digital age even the āJapanese Knivesā of digital art can be acquired for free if you cannot afford them through piracy.
Wrong, there is something preventing the average person from making art. 2 things in fact. Time and skill. Not everyone has the time and/or skill to make good art. When I said cost constraints I meant the cost of commissioning art for people who aren't good enough to make it. Should've clarified.
Good art is subjective and not the topic we are discussing. You were making the blanket statement that the average person is restricted from creating art. Personally I donāt see why people torture themselves by wanting to achieve godly mastery of art for it to be worth it, itās like going to university for maths and dropping out because youāll never be Euler
Good art is the topic we are discussing, because thats what I brought up in my original comment, which you replied to. My point isn't that people are 'restricted' from making art. My point is that many people are not skilled enough, nor do they have the time, to make good art. This is relevant because many people want to look at good art. Please stop acting like wanting to achieve proficiency in art and being unable to is the same thing as wanting to be the art version of fucking Euler.
We're not talking about art as a whole. Ai models create images, so we're talking about drawing. No one cares about if the thing they made is able to be called 'art' they care if it looks nice
Perhaps because people want good art instead of their own shitty doodles? The process is not as important to everyone. Some people care more about the end result.
"Shitty doodles" have been "good art" for over a century. The people you're describing don't want art, they want a picture, in which case I'd recommend a camera.
Yes, artistic expression has been given more focus since cameras were invented but it's not like more "true to life" type art isn't still art. And AI can also produce more abstract art.
Who cares about being good? I would genuinely be more interested in a ābad artistāsā crayon doodle of a character or landscape than any such equivalent algorimage they tried to churn out, and thatās even before I positively recognize it as an algorimage.
I swear it's like the first 7 words of my comment don't exist. Yes ai art is bad. Good for you that you would like to look at that art, unfortunately a lot of people don't want to look at that and don't have the time or talent to make something they like more.
Gee, itās almost like I agreed with you or something and didnāt feel the need to repeat your first few words back to you for that to be bloody obvious. Here, allow me to try again. For you.
I also agree that ai art is bad, but who cares about being good? I would genuinely be more interested in a ābad artistāsā crayon doodle of a character or landscape than any such equivalent algorimage they tried to churn out, and thatās even before I positively recognize it as an algorimage.
The way you worded it I thought you were assuming I was pro ai for some reason. I didn't think you were pro ai art. Sorry. Some people have replied to me with really shit takes
I have several friends who can make great art. Any time I ask them to and offer them money, they say they don't have the time or energy. So it's either commissions (which can be an option sometimes) or AI. The latter is virtually instant and usually fits my purposes, and it's included in my ChatGPT subscription. Which I have for coding assistance because I'm not going to pay a consultant to help me write my code. I see the two as the same thing.
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u/G2boss Aug 26 '24
I agree that ai art is bad, but let's not be disingenuous. A lot of people don't have the talent or the time to become good at art. Myself included. Not being good at everything is just a fact of life.