Yeah, I know there's definitely a... scale of quality, and I've certainly seen some fanart or promo art that is well below the threshold I'd be comfortable sharing or attaching my name to. But even so... I'd genuinely rather have wonky but heartfelt fanart than smooth AI-generated nonsense in just about every case. But yes - having the visual literacy and the knowledge to make art also makes you a better consumer of it, even if you don't create at a "professional" level or with professional aspirations.
And oof. I know what you mean. Trying to get someone to understand that "the brightest and most saturated version of a color is not always the best one to use" is an uphill battle, lol. Or "hey, sliding that "sharpen image" bar aaaaaaaall the way to 100 every time *may not* actually make the image look clean and crisp."
I'm personally glad that not everyone has the same idea of what "good art" is... yet we do have an awful lot of good art to choose from! Whether visual or written. I find it weirdly frustrating every time I see the take that AI won't ever touch "good" art or writing, that it's only replacing "regular/popular/amateur/disposable" art, as if there's agreement about where those categories begin and end.
And idk, I also feel like it's fair to point out that a lot of our really amazing artists... didn't start amazing. Maybe some of them were born producing the unique unreplicatable fully-formed masterpieces that are lauded now... but I'm going to guess that most of them weren't. Plenty of them - including Neil Gaiman, given as an example by this particular "AI won't replace good writing" guy - have talked a lot about how their careers started, and how continually they had to work at it to get to the point they're at.
So okay, the highest-paying short genre fiction magazine that allowed unsolicited submissions just had to close those submissions down because they were flooded with (bad) AI submissions. And to be honest, I feel like comic book plots would be *ripe* for AI writing (and art!) - Marvel and DC, already fairly notorious for exploiting writing staff who aren't well-known, plus a tight schedule to churn out issues for multiple characters... The plots are already fairly formulaic in a lot of ways, and feature a mostly-unchanging cast of big characters. (There are exceptions, I'm being intentionally reductive.) So how soon will at least some issues start being produced either entirely by AI or having AI do the "first drafts", with actual people only editing the final product?
The avenues by which a lot of deservedly well-regarded authors or artists got their starts have already been closing. The handful of places that still offer something similar - short story magazines, comics writing, contracted to-spec work, etc. - are the types of things people like this are claiming *deserves* be taken over by AI. Same with art - cover and promo art, comics work, illustrations to go with short stories in these genre magazines. All of that is fair game for AI, because that's not "great art." So where do you expect the next Great Writer or Great Artist is going to come from, with no entry points left?
Self-pub also seems like it's likely to require trying to wade through AI garbage, the same way short story submissions are. Those stories aren't good, but people are trying it as a "get rich quick and easy" scheme, and you could wind up drowned out by sheer quantity. Traditional publishing has continued being an utter nightmare, and now you ("AI *should* replace things" assholes, you) want to ensure that there's nowhere left that someone could possibly build a portfolio of work to show an agent/publisher.
But somehow, it will all suddenly be a meritocracy and the good writers and artists (even if they never have a way to get started) will just rise to the top and produce the kind of Unique Good Art that guys like this claim to still want and appreciate.
Sorry, apparently I've got quite a lot of feelings still built up over this!
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chiming
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Date: 2023-02-22 01:45 am (UTC)From:And oof. I know what you mean. Trying to get someone to understand that "the brightest and most saturated version of a color is not always the best one to use" is an uphill battle, lol. Or "hey, sliding that "sharpen image" bar aaaaaaaall the way to 100 every time *may not* actually make the image look clean and crisp."
I'm personally glad that not everyone has the same idea of what "good art" is... yet we do have an awful lot of good art to choose from! Whether visual or written. I find it weirdly frustrating every time I see the take that AI won't ever touch "good" art or writing, that it's only replacing "regular/popular/amateur/disposable" art, as if there's agreement about where those categories begin and end.
And idk, I also feel like it's fair to point out that a lot of our really amazing artists... didn't start amazing. Maybe some of them were born producing the unique unreplicatable fully-formed masterpieces that are lauded now... but I'm going to guess that most of them weren't. Plenty of them - including Neil Gaiman, given as an example by this particular "AI won't replace good writing" guy - have talked a lot about how their careers started, and how continually they had to work at it to get to the point they're at.
So okay, the highest-paying short genre fiction magazine that allowed unsolicited submissions just had to close those submissions down because they were flooded with (bad) AI submissions.
And to be honest, I feel like comic book plots would be *ripe* for AI writing (and art!) - Marvel and DC, already fairly notorious for exploiting writing staff who aren't well-known, plus a tight schedule to churn out issues for multiple characters... The plots are already fairly formulaic in a lot of ways, and feature a mostly-unchanging cast of big characters. (There are exceptions, I'm being intentionally reductive.) So how soon will at least some issues start being produced either entirely by AI or having AI do the "first drafts", with actual people only editing the final product?
The avenues by which a lot of deservedly well-regarded authors or artists got their starts have already been closing. The handful of places that still offer something similar - short story magazines, comics writing, contracted to-spec work, etc. - are the types of things people like this are claiming *deserves* be taken over by AI. Same with art - cover and promo art, comics work, illustrations to go with short stories in these genre magazines. All of that is fair game for AI, because that's not "great art." So where do you expect the next Great Writer or Great Artist is going to come from, with no entry points left?
Self-pub also seems like it's likely to require trying to wade through AI garbage, the same way short story submissions are. Those stories aren't good, but people are trying it as a "get rich quick and easy" scheme, and you could wind up drowned out by sheer quantity.
Traditional publishing has continued being an utter nightmare, and now you ("AI *should* replace things" assholes, you) want to ensure that there's nowhere left that someone could possibly build a portfolio of work to show an agent/publisher.
But somehow, it will all suddenly be a meritocracy and the good writers and artists (even if they never have a way to get started) will just rise to the top and produce the kind of Unique Good Art that guys like this claim to still want and appreciate.
Sorry, apparently I've got quite a lot of feelings still built up over this!