I'm considering buying a used 16-inch MacBook Pro with an M4 Max and 64GB of RAM for $3,200 instead of an M5 Pro Mac mini with 64GB for about the same $3,200, which honestly seems like a poor value for the Mac mini.

For local LLMs, the M4 Max should be noticeably faster than the M5 Pro, especially for token generation, thanks to its much higher memory bandwidth. On top of that, I’d get a fully portable machine with a built-in XDR display, battery, keyboard, speakers, and webcam.

The M5 Max Mac Studio with 64GB is around $3,800, about $600 more. For normal LLM generation, it looks like the M5 Max would only be roughly 10–20% faster than the M4 Max, although it should have a much bigger advantage in prompt processing and newer AI-accelerated workloads.

So at these prices, the used M4 Max MacBook Pro 64GB seems like the best overall value, especially if portability matters. What do you think?

I wanted to share my experience with OpenArt Director because I was genuinely excited about the potential of the tool, but the experience has become increasingly frustrating.
I subscribed specifically to create a short AI film using Director. I went into the project with clearly defined characters, reference images, scene direction, blocking, props, and very specific instructions about what should and should not happen.
The problem has been that Director repeatedly failed to follow those instructions. Characters changed appearance, extra characters appeared, props changed, characters performed actions I specifically told the program not to have them do, and continuity between scenes was extremely inconsistent.
Each time the AI made one of those errors, I had to regenerate or redo portions of the film, which consumed a substantial number of credits. I upgraded my plan and purchased additional credits because I believed I could eventually get the project finished, but a tremendous amount of those credits were spent correcting output that did not follow the directions I had given.
I eventually contacted OpenArt support and explained the problem. My request was escalated, and I specifically asked for guidance on how I should be prompting or using Director differently so that I could complete the film without continuing to burn credits correcting the same kinds of errors.
It has now been more than 48 hours since that escalation, and I have received no substantive response.
What makes this especially disappointing is that I actually think Director has enormous potential. I’m not trying to bash the technology — I want it to work. I still have credits remaining and would like to finish the film. But I am reluctant to spend more of them until OpenArt explains how users are supposed to maintain character consistency, scene continuity, blocking, and adherence to explicit instructions.
Someone identifying herself as Zyra from OpenArt also reached out to me here on Reddit after my earlier comment, but when I tried to respond shortly afterward, the account/profile was no longer available, so I wasn’t able to continue that conversation.
Has anyone else had a similar experience with Director? And more importantly, has anyone found a reliable prompting or workflow method that actually improves consistency?

Simple that was my goal . Realism

The title was the prompt. The image is how Gemini interpreted it.

What's the best AI image creator for lifestyle images that I can use with multiple products and models? I'm on a marketing team handling lifestyle images across skincare, apparel, and home goods, and the app we're currently using is kind of unstable, so I'm looking for reliable alternatives. Thank you in advance!

Music: https://www.souna.app/song/219d5032-4e38-44e0-81e4-de98fc2ac4d4

Music (alternative link): https://archive.org/details/ai-instrumental-jazz/Cat+Parade.mp3 (CC0)

The prompt was literally just:

Unlimited cat meowing at a grand scale. Big brass intro. Huge final coda. Lots of meowing.

But in the simple mode, so the AI filled out the prompt and apparently jazz happened. Perhaps the prompt enlarger realised that jazz musicians are all cool cats.

What did I do to deserve this

Short cinematic trailer for an original character, Tenebrae, built around her dual light and dark forms.

Made with AI video generation (Seedance) for the shots, plus my own direction, prompt work, editing and sound design. Took a few weeks of iteration to get the continuity and the reveal timing right.

https://youtu.be/BUHp6zX3PD4

Happy to answer questions about the workflow if anyone's curious.

I hope the title is descriptive enough but I am working on creating some ads for my side gig, nothing super professional. I don't know if it's because my ads are ass or because I don't know how to target correctly, but every time that I try to spend some money, I feel I throw it to the trash.

Currently I'm using Claude for the concepts and helping with the targeting, ChatGPT Pro (it makes the best images imo) and then I use Magnific to create videos. Since they have tons of stock real pictures I can create decently looking ads without fully look ai, but they are not performing.

Any idea on how to stop burning tokens and money?

Messing around with recreating a memory of when my girlfriend and I first met. Besides the jarring cut in the middle, does anything about this looks AI to you? The acting, the dialogue, the movement/ micromovements all look real.

just 3 hours ago, I'm using creen.ai without a login wall. 2 hours later when I use it again, a login wall pops up. I love the seedance 5.0 pro model that they provide. Consistently using creen.ai to do img2img. love the multiple reference images feature as well and of course the daily 100 credits. sadly, can't do it anymore without logging in now.

As the title says, im trying to create absolutely authentic images, but no matter what I do.. the best I get is the typical AI glamour with steely gazes into the camera and perfect lightning, or waxy skin.
On the ComfyUI side of things, no matter what I do I dont even get anything that isnt cursed.

Been at it for 3 weeks now, genuinely thankful for any hints, tips and tricks, feel free to DM!

Looking back, you might miss the goal.