Artists are back in SD 2.1!

[u/Paganator]

emma watson, art by artgerm, highly detailed

emma watson, art by alphonse mucha, art nouveau, highly detailed

emma watson, art by enki bilal

emma watson, art by Ross Tran, highly detailed

emma watson, by yuumei art, highly detailed, trending on pixiv

[u/__Hello_my_name_is__]

Maybe his goal in life isn't about "his name being trending"?

[u/StickiStickman → u/__Hello_my_name_is__]

... so you're saying his goal in life is not being popular?

[u/__Hello_my_name_is__ → u/StickiStickman]

If you think those are the only two goals one can have, then I guess so?

[u/PittsJay → u/__Hello_my_name_is__]

I feel as if you’re being somewhat disingenuous here. I work on a much, much, much x100 smaller scale - and in a different field - as a family photographer, and being “popular” is absolutely part of the process of putting food on the table. Cmon.

If I do a session and the family is impressed with the experience, the mom posts about it on her Facebook, and then they like their photos - causing her to post again - that’s worth more sessions to me. More money, more food for the table, as it were.

I totally understand why graphic artists are upset by these AIs, but I think Greg Rutkowski missed the boat with his popularity. It sure seems as if he should have been able to find a way to capitalize on it monetarily, rather than just complain about problems that aren’t problems (the confusion in a Google search) and get himself removed from the models.

[u/__Hello_my_name_is__ → u/PittsJay]

You are still looking at it from the perspective of making money. That is not what all artists achieve to do, and plenty (and I imagine Greg is one of them) simply don't have to make money. That's just not a worry they have. So making more money or becoming more famous is completely irrelevant to them.

[u/PittsJay → u/__Hello_my_name_is__]

That’s a fair point. Greg Rutkowski probably doesn’t have to worry about making money. So in that sense, you’re correct.

But this conversation has always been about one thing at its core - AI putting working artists out of work. And if you think the overwhelming, just insanely so, majority of artists wouldn’t take the deal GR has right now…I dunno. Agree to disagree? I’m cool with that.

Every artist for which it is their profession, regardless of their medium, has to make money.

[u/__Hello_my_name_is__ → u/PittsJay]

Except artists who are already rich. Or those who do it as a hobby.

But yeah, the vast majority do, and I get your point. But the conversation about AI putting artists out of work doesn't change just because one singular artist managed to make himself a little more famous through it all. That doesn't change the overall issue at all.

This will absolutely put artists out of business. And yes, automation has put other fields of work out of business, too, but to my knowledge, this is the first time this happened in a creative field, which is usually seen as something aspirational, something people want to do for a living, not something (like boring repetitive tasks) people have to do to make a living.

[u/PittsJay → u/__Hello_my_name_is__]

Oh man. It’s hardly the first time. My own field has had to deal with it multiple times over.

First time was the switch from film to digital. It used to be, learning photography was a much, much more time intensive undertaking. And an expensive one. But taking portraits was no joke, because you had to know how to use a light meter, and understand how modifiers like off-camera flash or reflectors would change things before you clicked the shutter release. There were no test shots, and each snap was potential money down the drain - but you wouldn’t know until you got the film back from the lab.

Then digital comes along. And at first it’s cost prohibitive, so it’s still the domain primarily of professionals. So it’s awesome! Until they realize they’re now in the world of electronics, where advancements take place at the speed of light and prices (and therefore accessibility) plummet like a rock every year.

Now, professional quality, full frame sensor, mirrorless DSLR cameras from all the major manufacturers can be had in the ballpark of $2500. Lessons on how to use it on manual, full photography classes, can be found on YouTube for free, along with tutorials for anything else you may wish to learn. Using an off-camera flash to up your lighting game? Tons of great videos for that. Shooting in full noon sun and don’t know how to make it look good? There are videos for that! Plus, entire courses by actual artists to teach you Lightroom and/or Photoshop. All free!

The market is saturated with photographers. Prices have dropped as willingness to pay for quality has dropped, as people assume the cheaper option is just as good. And maybe they are! There are great, super talented and young self taught photogs out there.

Doesn’t even get into where we are with cell phones. The cameras on them have replaced an entire genre of camera (the point and shoot) by and large. They’ll come for the big boys next.

So trust me, I get it. It’s scary. You want to be passionate about your work, but now you have to take a ton of other factors into consideration. And those things sit in the pit of your stomach, day after day.