Item — HN Reader

> Putting some prompts into an image generator and choosing which one you like is hardly the same thing.

At a base level, "putting some prompts [..] and choosing" sounds like intent to me. A user is choosing what they want to capture and making a choice, much like I, as a photographer, look for a particular scene (or happen across one!) and choose how I want to capture it.

Of course, you can do much more in terms of control of image synthesis these days. ControlNet and friends make it feasible to control every aspect of the resulting image.

2 comments

> A user is choosing what they want to capture and making a choice, much like I, as a photographer, look for a particular scene (or happen across one!) and choose how I want to capture it.

The only similarities between these is the fact that they’re making a choice. The act of making a choice does very little to indicate that the underlying process are similar enough to be compared to each other.

The choice made by the photographer is made based on a myriad of factors and intuitions. The result is a snapshot of a real moment in time, modulated by the photographer’s artistic ability, technical prowess and unique perspective of the world based on a lifetime of experience.

Choosing what I make for breakfast is also a form of choosing.

Why do those things not apply to someone using AI? I hate making this kind of argument, but:

The choice made by the AI artist is made based on a myriad of factors and intuitions. The result is a snapshot of the latent space, modulated by the artist's artistic girl [grit?], technical prowess and unique perspective of the world based on a lifetime of experience.

You still need those things in order to make a compelling image with AI, especially if you're getting into the more advanced uses.

> Why do those things not apply to someone using AI? I hate making this kind of argument, but:

I'm glad you made this argument, because I think it helps illustrate the point. When we talk about photography vs. AI vs. other forms of artwork in highly abstract terms, they all sound superficially similar.

The moment you start to dive into the details behind each process, it's clear that they are entirely unlike each other. So yes, the AI "artist" is drawing on a myriad of factors and intuitions, but the nature of those factors and intuitions and the effect they have on the output are drastically different to the point that they don't resemble photography even a little bit.

For example, the photographer who wants to take a stunning photograph of a snowy mountain vista at sunrise often has to:

- Use their knowledge of basic astronomy and sun movement to plan the timing and location of the photo

- Use their body to physically hike to the location that will give them this stunning view

- Use their knowledge of survival to stay safe while they hike

- Once on location, use their knowledge of perspective, depth, camera angle, and composition to find a pleasing place to take the photo from (composition is one of the single most impactful choices and only comes from practice/skill)

- While under time pressure from the rising sun, dial in the correct depth of field and exposure

- When things go wrong (which they often do), quickly re-assess all of the above and try shots from new location

- When done, understand the properties of light and color to a degree that enables them to develop the photo so that it matches the original scene

- The wildlife photographer draws on yet another deep and potentially vast skillset

The AI "artist" types "a stunning photograph of a snowy mountain vista at sunrise" into a box and clicks the Generate button.

It may be that knowing how to formulate a sentence that describes the desired scene relies on a myriad of factors and intuitions, but to compare those factors and intuitions to those the photographer is using seems deeply problematic.

Which leads us to reason people find stunning photographs enjoyable to look at in the first place. Encoded in that photograph is the story of the person who took it. In every piece of traditional art (using the word traditional here to mean not AI), the artist's life experiences, thoughts, emotions, and personal investment are baked into the result. This is why many/most people find art compelling. Not just for its beauty, but for the humanity encoded into it.

AI imagery is its own form of deeply fascinating when you think of it as a distillation of the skills of millions of people baked into a single model. But when you see a piece of AI imagery, it cannot evoke the same kind of emotional connection to the source, because it's far removed from the original artistic process. It's something, but it's not compelling.

> You still need those things in order to make a compelling image with AI, especially if you're getting into the more advanced uses.

You need very little, relatively speaking, to make a compelling image with AI when compared to the life experiences of the people who made the imagery that powers current AI models. That's not to say you need nothing, but I don't think they can be compared.

Once you move beyond these abstract comparisons, the underlying processes show themselves to be entirely unlike each other.

I should also mention that I'm not saying AI imagery has no place. I think it's tremendously useful for the creation of educational content, to help people communicate ideas they previously didn't have the skills to communicate, etc. But I think it sits in a very different category.

One could say much the same comparing photography to painting. Photography allows people to communicate in ways that previously they didn't have the skill to with paint. AI is just a tool, the art will be in learning how to best use it.

One could say many things about the difference between photography and painting of course, but I don't think the things said about these differences are "much the same". In the abstract, they appear superficially similar. When you consider the underlying details, they are worlds apart, and I think it's a category error to compare them directly.

Painting is painting. Photography is photography. AI images are AI images (a category that will be further subdivided as the technology matures, much like painting and photography make up a spectrum of skills and approaches).

They all sit in their own spaces, each with characteristics that make them more or less interesting. I'm personally far more interested in the kind of art that requires investment of human capital: mental, emotional, talent, skill, time, effort. I care about quality paintings and photos not just because of what they look like, but because of what it took to create them. Because of the emotions intrinsic to every brush stroke. Or the immersion of the photographer's consciousness in a real location that was difficult to reach. That human investment is core to the expression of the work, and to the interest it garners.

I do think AI tools will be transformative for traditional artists and will unlock new possibilities. They'll also enable a new generation of artists to turn their imaginations into visual artifacts they were previously not capable of creating. I think the same is true for LLMs and writing. But at the core of it all, these are all forms of human-to-human communication, and the process itself carries much of the message. Much of that message is lost to the medium when we abstract more and more of the process away.

As a thought experiment, consider food replicators in Star Trek. I can tell it what I want, and food appears. This is entirely unlike the process of making a high quality meal from scratch, and I wouldn't call myself a chef for having the ability to describe to a machine what I'd like it to do. This isn't to say there is no value in knowing how to instruct the machine well, but it's just a very different category of human activity.

Art is art. The argument is just a pile of shifting sands. But artists make choices! But artists require knowledge! But artists need to communicate!

A good artist will be able to use AI tools to create compelling art that communicates through decisive choices of their design. Other artists will get lucky and let the computer do most of the work.

Art is a word that humans made up to categorize a form of human expression.

Whatever art is, it is because of the value that humans have chosen to ascribe to it, which they do for countless reasons. Many of those reasons are simply not present in AI output, and AI will bring new reasons that will be compelling for some, but entirely uninteresting for others.

Clinging to an abstract three letter word as the ultimate definition of something nearly undefinable ignores both the richness of the form and the sociological factors that make the word hold any meaning.

Again, I’m not saying that artists won’t do great things with AI. I’m saying that the work done with AI will not hold the same kind of value that is intrinsic to other forms. Some people won’t care about the underlying process and it sounds like you may be in that category. Some people will continue to care, and I’d count myself in that category.

Many people point out that Photography is to Painting what AI is to Photography. And while I think the analogy is a bit stretched, the primary reason this comparison comes up is because photography is thought of as a “lesser skilled” method of producing images. And I think that’s a fair assessment. It is not debatable that producing a photorealistic or highly skilled representation of a scene with a paintbrush requires far more skill and far more effort than operating a camera, especially in the 2020s. If your enjoyment of a thing comes from appreciating a particular kind of process, e.g. you are fascinated by and enjoy the output of skilled painters, not just for the result, but for the entire process, then AI (or Photography) isn’t going to hold your interest.

Coffee is coffee. But there sure is a large spectrum of possible ways to experience coffee. Many people are happy with the Folgers instant stuff. Connoisseurs have a palate that knows that there’s more to coffee than caffeine and brown water, but not everyone is a connoisseur and some people are more interested in the utility of coffee (caffeine/energy).

That isn’t to say that instant coffee is not coffee, and people are welcome to enjoy it if they can. But it sure isn’t the same as a cup of recently roasted, freshly ground single origin beans carefully brewed at a temperature calibrated to the properties of the bean and roast. Foljers will wake me up. That carefully brewed cup will wake me up and produce a highly pleasurable taste experience that can alter my emotional state in a positive direction.

My point is that nuance abounds, and trying to reduce something like art of all things to a one dimensional description seems not very useful.

And of course, for every user that used to be an artist before AI, there are now 10,000 such users wielding their new-found artistic intent via prompting.