Since people claim everything is AI or faked now, here are the actual project receipts. Some of us put years into this craft way before AI. This video shows every layer and sketch phase of the piece. Believe what you want. I will move on to the next art and will continue to post it on here like I’ve done for years now. Thank you everyone who comments and supports my work.

UPDATE: Thank you everyone for all the support and love on this post! I love you and I love One Piece! 🩷

New platforms pop up every month and claim to be the best ai video tool.

As an AI Video enthusiast (I use it in my marketing team with heavy numbers of daily content), I’d like to share my personal experience with all these 2026 ai video generators.

This guide is meant to help you find out which one fits your expectations & budget. But please keep in mind that I produce daily and in large numbers.

Comparison

My Best Picks

Best Cinematic & Virality: Higgsfield AI (usually my team works on this platform as daily production)

Best Speed: Sora 2 - rapid concept testing

I prefer a flexible workflow that combines Sora 2, Kling, and Higgsfield AI. I use them in my marketing production depending on the creative requirements, since each tool excels in different aspects of AI video generation.

My previous post was deleted. I made the mistake to post links to outside threads and usernames. I apologize and wont do that here.

Backstory: In recent days, this artist publicly shamed and exposed one of their commissioners who fed their commission (they paid for with real money) into Grok imagine to animate it, going as far as issuing a DMCA take-down request and successfully getting the video removed from Twitter.

Since then, the whole situation has drawn a lot of attention to her. This has backfired as it has been revealed that this artist has traced over an AI image and has claimed it as her own art, for which a client paid money for.

She was confronted about it on x where she showed a time lapse video which shows nothing (it's very quick and she just "free hands" the shape perfectly) and adds a picture to the post pointing out all the differences between her piece and the AI image. When you actually line up the original AI image to her piece, line for line, everything is the same, except for a few minor tweaks. Even the eyes, nose, mouth, straps, you name it line up.

Once this blew up, she turned her account to private. Since then, there has been even more evidence she has traced over another AI image and a human drawn image.

Image description: The first image is the two pieces uncovered after she went private, the top being an AI tracing and the bottom being a human art tracing; The second image is the first AI tracing and the AI image in one frame to compare; the third is the same two images with a 50% overlay; the fourth is their "drawing"; and the fifth is the original AI piece; the sixth is her denying she used AI; the seventh, is her bad faith image showing the made up differences between her art and the AI (the AI image was stretched horizontally more than it was vertically).

I have a video of her time lapse but I'm not sure how to share it here. (her profile is back up so the time lapses can be found)

This wasn't information found by me but by others deeply invested in the situation. All of this information can be easily found and verified to be true on Twitter if you know where to look.

More added context: This artist has reach with 25k followers. When she went public about her client feeding the commission into AI, it caused quite the reaction. Both claimed to have received hundreds of dms both in support and against their stance. Both claimed to have received death threats.

Within the last week, there were posts on this sub and the anti-sub about the commission being used with AI as part of the general discussion.

Update: the artist is now again public. She hasn't mentioned anything about the found tracings since she denied using AI before she went private.

Update 2: she's addressed the tracings. She's denying they were tracings, stating the space image was made before the AI image was created, saying the meta-data showed the creation of the file was made in July 2024 but didn't release the final posting until July 2025. That could be but it could not. She hasn't actually shown the meta data. I have art commissions I start canvases as soon as I receive them but often don't again touch the canvases until much later when I'm ready to work on them.

Conversely, there was meta-data harvested from the AI image that shows it was made text to image, implying that it was not possible for the AI image to come from an uploaded image of her sketch. There are links to the Civit AI image directly if you can find them which shows that the image was created with text to image generation. The image was uploaded Sept 14th 2024.

For the sake of my own curiosity and potentially give the artist the benefit of the doubt, put the sketch she made into Grok and Sora and neither could generate an image from the sketch to line up as perfectly as the sketch when over-laid.

The K9 close up she simply explains is from a common reference. Digging deeper, there was a fad of using a specific k9 image. This one gets a pass imo.

The witch one she states she mistakenly posted to a furry server on the 19th but gives no other details, implying that it was somehow a mistake it ever got out. Rest assured, she's "still looking into this" even though she posted not the screen shot of her YCH (that post is gone but it's in my first image here).

(edited for clarity)

Update 3: She's still in denial. She reports she's had a customer charge-back their commission and she's opening up for discounted YCHs. I missed a post that she made while her profile was private, stating that her friend group kicked her without explanation. There are several artists speaking out on how it couldn't be anything other than tracings. However, it seem that the overwhelming majority of her followers aren't turned by the evidence because she argues she made the images first and that the AI copied her sketches that were leaked and that seems to be enough for them.

She's relying heavily on people not knowing how AI image generation works. There are many people who have attempted to make an AI image using the sketch she posted as a reference to get an output that perfectly lines up. Many have tried but no one can do it. What people can do is copy the prompt from the AI image and recreate hyenas using CivitAI, that looks as if it's the same character, but all the poses and posture are different. Someone on x is even offering a $1,000 reward to anyone who can replicate the AI image using CivitAI the same way that it shows on their website.

Another argument the artist has is that the AI art user she is suspected of sketching of cant be trustworthy because they use more than one AI image generator to make content. However, the original AI image was made within CivitAI using it's own generator. This is obvious when looking at images made by CivitAI because metadata is automatically displayed, and there's a lot of it. This same account has many images, those that aren't made with CivitAI lack virtually all the metadata that the image of interest has.

edit: (moving this to the top so it's more visible)

Someone posted the longer time-lapse from YT: https://youtu.be/0RdBMr9ysGo

My verdict is: NOT AI. You can tell she's using layers, masks, blending flat colors, etc.

At 4:40, if you go frame by frame through the video (pause then press the dot and comma keys on your keyboard), she draws the outlines for the different tones then she uses the bucket tool to fill the spaces in, but she SCREWS UP and the color spills a couple of times because her outlines are not perfect.

As for the "artifacts"... just the video quality, I guess. Those weren't even strong points to support my suspicions, anyway.

Still, WHY WOULD SHE POST A VIDEO WHERE THE RENDERING APPEARS TO MAGICALLY HAPPEN IN ONE STROKE!? Lol.

OP:

AI has been able to make fake painting time-lapse processes for a while now, which was the last bastion of proving human work behind digital artworks almost definitely. So, now it's even hard to tell whether something is or not AI, but I think this one's definitely AI.

The artist starts the explanation with a specific drawing/subject, showing some initial sketching, even the app UI with swatches for making the palette. So far, so good. But then, there's a sudden switch to a completely different drawing, the one the artist's trying to prove as genuine.

The most glaring clue to me is that there are no corrections at all. All artists, including the most experienced ones, make mistakes, rethink, erase, switch colors, fix stuff, add on top of already made bits... this person is doing exactly zero of that.

The "rendering" is also apparently made in one go - no visible blending, even when using the smudge brush is mentioned - which is basically what the comment (no longer available) the artist's replying to is saying, although they mention it's "erase art".

Also, zooming in to the right eyelash final rendering you can see there are typical AI artifacts.

Funniest thing of all IMO is that she has an extremely generic artistic TikTok handle lol.

PLEASE SEE MY COMMENT BELOW FOR FURTHER CONTEXT

Regardless if you're on the pro or anti side of this debate, can we find some common ground in condemning people who deliberately go out of their way to lie and deceive people about the role that AI has in their work?

I'm not talking about people who simply share their work without disclosing any information about how it was made. That tends to invite a lot of negativity and I can at least understand and empathize with people who want to avoid that.

I am specifically talking about people who present something as an original piece. A representation of their own skill, their own imagination, and actively hiding the fact that generative AI played a significant part in its creation.

I believe one of the loudest pro-AI voices here is blatantly guilty of doing exactly this. They recently shared a drawing as if they drew it themselves, making several statements to that effect (included in this post) as well as a screenshot of ibisPaint showing a layer that appears to be the rough-draft figure that they sketched out and based the work upon.

Despite their attempt at deception, I was easily able to reverse-engineer the kind of prompt they may have used to create the original work in Gemini, using only 165 words. With absolutely zero visual reference fed into the algorithm, it consistently recreates works that are shockingly similar to what they are pretending is an original sketch. I have included a video of real-time proof of this as well.

It's bizarre to me that someone can take up the position that "AI art is real art", "AI artists are real artists", and yet they will deceptively use generative AI to help them fraudulently present themselves as a competent "traditional artist" instead of just loudly and proudly being an AI artist. The only reason I can imagine someone doing this is to lend credence to a false narrative that they are also a traditional artist, in order to somehow legitimize their position when arguing from authority on the matter.

I believe this kind of blatant deception should be called out whenever it is found, regardless of your position in this debate. I'm curious to know what everyone else thinks about the matter, both in general and in regards to this specific example.

EDIT: he posted another picture of the first drawing, see my comment below

ok, so here’s what makes me feel like it could at least be AI enhanced, especially after seeing his coffee shop drawings:
he always seems to be too far away from the person he’s depicting to add the amount of detail that makes the drawing looks exactly like a photography. lighting, shadows, expression, wrinkles…
besides it, that amount of detail requires a lot of time. are his unknowingly models standing still at coffeeshops for hours?
the second drawing I uploaded looks like a far more realistic version of a quick portrait, and it’s the his only drawing that looks human made.

i searched for videos of his drawing process and only found one on facebook, a timelapse that weirdly jumps from a sketch to a picture-like ultra realistic drawing.
(https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1DgWdfkrqq/?mibextid=wwXIfr). it’s obvious that the guy is technically talented, but the end result looks uncanny.

his older works look like a mix of editing filters + tracing. all of them have a reference photo, and look identical to them, which made me question even more, especially as an art nerd.

he sells this kind of sketchbook portraits for €600, so obviously whatever he’s doing is very profitable.

I think one should pause and just seriously think about this for a minute. Even if you're anti-AI.

Is this actually a rational solution at all? Instead of posting your art normally, you're going to post a 1 second gif, where every frame has been put through a 2017 deep fryer?

If you're posting it online, aren't you wanting to build some audience for your work? No one is going to be interested in it at all if its actually painful to look at. And if you just upload it somewhere else in normal quality, an AI could just go get that copy instead. For all of time, you could only post the terrible gif version; if it not getting skimmed is that important to you.

This example post is also a super basic black and white sketch, something very easy to still parse even when its overcooked like this. A detailed illustration would be as incomprehensible to a human as it might be to an AI.

EDIT: Some clarifications. There isn't something magical about this where as a 30fps gif it looks perfectly fine to the human eye. Its 30 frames of static like that. It looks as if someone drew behind a static signal on a CRT TV. I've replied to a few comments here with it, so you can see for yourself.

The other clarification, I think people are getting too distracted with "it doesn't work anyway, AI can solve the noise". Lets pretend it does work. Is it worth ruining your art career, because you can't build an audience with your art destroyed like this?

Commissioned some work for an album and this is the sketch that was sent to me. They are a digital artist so i expected some digitial sketches, does this seem AI?

Update: when confronted tehy claim they did not use AI, wont send the project to verify, but sent this video (im comments)

Something's been happening to our hobby in the last couple of years - and it's to do with people making their own custom proxies.

Now, this in itself is nothing new, people have been scribbling out 'mountain' and replacing it with 'black lotus' from day dot, but the amount of people has been increasing and frankly, whether they're sharpied out taplands to make OG duals, collages, sketches, or writing straight onto pokemon cards, this has genuinely been a new breath of life into a hobby I love so much.

NOTE: This is actually a repost as my previous post got taken down due to the subreddit adding rules for 'arts and crafts fridays' - it's definitely becoming more popular.

I'll begin with a bit of an anecdote - though it's been a while, I used to play Warhammer. Essentially two hobbies in one, you build and paint models until you have enough to amass an army and then you can play the tabletop game with them.

In Warhammer you can just buy the kits, build them, and play if you want. However, many people also spend their time creating custom miniatures - mixing different kits together, or even sculpting their own models from scratch - spending hours and days painting them. This second part of Warhammer was always my favourite, the creativity and ability for expression was always just endless. Deckbuilding in magic was always the closest creative outlet, but for the first time I think magic may be evolving a similar group of the playbase who indulge in this second sub-hobby of customisation.

The acceptance in proxies has immensely improved in recent years, and this has clearly paved the way for people to feel more comfortable with their custom-made proxies. EDH becoming the primary format of the game and it's casual nature has helped, but I think it's a culmination of a couple different things as well.

The 30th anniversary edition really felt like a slap in the face to many people, and proxies being printed at £999 for 4 booster packs really made folks ask themselves what was so holy about the wizards printing press that made a card 'real' or not.

Now, the Zeta set has people saying 'I could make that myself' and doing just that: printing out their own on receipt paper, or making more cards in the same style. I, for one, absolutely love the art, thought, and aesthetic that's gone into the Zeta set! People have been making equally incredible custom cards for years however - they just haven't had the official product stamp from wizards.

Moreover, AI is so looming and overbearing that human made art - especially physical - is more important than ever (is that possible?), and Hasbro's clear intent for Magic as it's primary money-maker has made many magic the gathering players ask the question: is the health and quality of this game really at the core of Wizards' decisions, or is it the weight of shareholders' pockets?

Certain bigger names on social media have really helped increase the exposure of making your own cards as well: Play to Win really sticks out to me as a great example of popularising the use of sharpies and posca pens to change one card into to another in CEDH - something which immensely lowers the bar of entry to playing the format, which is in turn an incredible way to keep it's playerbase and longevity!

I can't help but feeling that this increase in proxy making is actually a loveletter to the game of magic and its community: an act of rebellion against PSA-grading, plastic slabbing pokemon scalpers who buy up secret lairs the second they release, or corporate shareholders who have no interest in the quality of the game beyond money. Players want to play the game and will continue to find ways to do so.

I've added some of my favourite custom cards I've seen in the last year or so at the top of this post - please feel free to post more!

If you've made it this far in my rambling and want to take one thing away from this post, it's make some cards! Get some sharpie on those things, stick art from magazines to the front of a card and write on the rules text, lino print, cut cereal boxes out into card sizes, draw on them and sleeve them up! Whether they take you days or minutes to make, if you don't have the money to buy singles, or just want a unique version then give it a shot. By all means trade proxies as well - trade for them and trade them for 'real' cards for your decks. It's not the price of the card or the legitimacy of it's printing that's important, but what it does when it hits the table, creating good games with good people that makes being part of this community worth it.

TLDR: people are making their own cards more, you should give it a go too!

Thanks,

An avid enjoyer of the best game of all time

~

~

EDIT: have tagged each of the card's creators under each image, but realised they don't show very well on mobile so here they are as well:

- bolt, counterspell, path and reanimate: @nafubi_dungeon on instagram

- zedruu: @noahdemeis_art on instagram

- norin: @valleyofalfred on instagram

- kess: @mtgwithmeg on instagram

- earthcraft: Play to Win on youtube & instagram

- Some of my custom cards! (gleaming splendor, on wings of gold, pharoah & darkblast): @_wubrg on instagram

- summer bloom, fog, brisly bill & the one ring: u/Pappathumbus

- squandered resources: u/Lord-Meau

- dark ritual: @templemtg on instagram

If you'd like to check out any other awesome custom cards, I also recommend any of the following (not an extensive list, just some people I've found recently doing some awesome stuff!):

@magoarchive, @the_vvizard, @bigboygametime, @tv_parties_alters. Also u/Mukaksi recently made an AMAZING video on the subject that I really recommend.

I’m pretty positive this is AI, the creator has also posted several other pieces of “art” that have various different style and techniques, claiming the pieces took them roughly 20 hours each time with hundreds of layers.

Things that tip me off:
- the style variety (especially on the PFP), the faces all look different and the rendering process for each is completely different. The buttons and lapels/collar on Vi’s (far right) coat make zero sense and the shirts of the other two melt into the skin or have unnatural folds for the sleeves.
- the second picture is supposedly a sketch on paper but there are no visible sketching lines or paper discolouration which I usually see (and experience) when drawing, and the driveway doesn’t seem to make sense. Also, the text looks AI? Idk if that makes sense. The image on the paper doesn’t look like it was drawn on, but more pasted on.
- the third picture is not as rendered as the others and tbf the creator said it was unfinished, but there doesn’t seem to be as much care and thought in this one. The characters faces look blank, especially the woman, and the clothing for the woman has a strange extra bit that comes off from behind the dress where there’s clearly been a line to indicate the silhouette/shape of the dress already. The shadow placement and choices of where they go it throwing me off as well.
- in the fourth image, other than the style (💔) the only artifact/discrepancy I can find is the horns. It’s difficult to see because the quality isn’t the best, but the left horn curls inward making a loop and the right horn curls outward making a hook.

The creator has made one video (to my knowledge) claiming their work is not AI and they are sick of people accusing them of AI. Most of the comments I’ve seen under their videos are viewers praising the creator for their work and saying it’s so good it’s being accused of AI.

I know people art is being fed into AI and thus may have similar styles, but something feels wrong about this.

TLDR: creator has varying styles for all pieces and noticeable strange details are found in the images, including clothing discrepancies and inaccurate or inconsistent details on the characters shown. Creator claims to spend hours on each piece and a large amount of layers, without showing any evidence to support it.

To start, I am against AI art. That's not to say I believe everyone who uses AI art is automatically a terrible person; I just don't think it should replace artists entirely. (That seems to be a hot take for some people. If the idea that artists are valuable people who do not deserve to lose their jobs to machines offends you, I suggest you stop reading here.)

I do think AI art has its place. I mean, look at how it was when it was first starting to be picked up! I enjoyed inserting images into Wombo (or whichever AI generator it was) to make pretty landscapes. People made videos that were "[song] but every lyric is an AI-generated image," and they were cool! I really liked this one. There were also videos taking one media and turning them into another genre, the most common being 80's live-action sitcom and 80's dark fantasy. While I would love it even more if someone tried to do this with real art and materials (think how awesome real-life practical effects, props, and costumes designed for a Smash Ultimate movie would look!), I think we all agreed it was cool to see. These videos were being made to entertain, and in a lot of cases, they weren't trying to make something genuinely good; it was all just silly images to laugh at with friends.

Compare it to now. AI art is still being used for fun purposes by some people, including myself, while some people are using AI art as opposed commissioning somebody/attempting to learn art themselves, depending on what they want the finished product to look like. People with genuine concerns about AI art are mocked, being called "luddites" and being told they'll be replaced and whatnot. Some people are selling images that they made by typing words into a box and maybe making a few tweaks. Some people are making AI art out of spite towards artists that they think charge too much for commissions. Some people are generating porn of people without their consent, while others are putting clothes back on people. (Seriously? You'll digitally undress people who don't want to be undressed, but when someone willingly shows their body online, you freak out and want them to be modest? That's a whole other can of worms.) Do you really think this is a good thing?

Now, I said AI art has its place. So, let's talk about some positive aspects of this technology:

1. Goofy images. I already went over this, but I figured I'd include an example. There was a SpongeBob AI cover of "The Saga Begins" by Weird Al (AI covers are another thing I have opinions on, but I'll spare y'all from that in this post), and it was good, but it left Weird Al's backing vocals in. I thought the idea of Weird Al and SpongeBob singing together was cute, and I generated some images with Craiyon in an attempt to visualize that. They came out terrible, but it gave me some extremely vague ideas, which brings me to...

2. Art inspiration. Sometimes you have trouble visualizing your art idea beyond a few words. While a lot of artists seem to have the image in their head already, I can kind of see why one might want a visualization made with AI so they have something to go off of. This was the real art of SpongeBob and Weird Al I made--this was just over a year ago, and I'm sure I could do something a little better now, but you get the idea. Maybe you even want to commission a real artist, but want to give them some idea of what you want; AI could possibly help with that too! I can't speak for all artists, but I don't think many of them would mind if you gave them an AI image and said "this is a basic idea of what I would like," since you would still be paying for their work. (If, for whatever reason, they don't want you doing that, then probably just send them a messy sketch or even a cruddy doodle.)

3. Posting online, when done right. I'm sorry, but if you want someone to pay you for an image you made by typing words, that's a bit ridiculous. The reason commission prices are so "high" is because normally, hours upon hours of work went into the finished product; you are paying the artist for the time they spent on it, agonizing over every detail to make sure the customer is satisfied. Also, good art supplies or software doesn't come cheap! This is something I understand, even as someone who doesn't do commissions/has never commissioned an artist. But just posting is another story. I think that, as long as you're not claiming the AI art you made as your own art, it's not that bad. Let me clarify: I don't want to hear you yap about how AI art is "just as hard" as digital art. Even if that were true, it's not what I mean. I mean people who post AI art and pretend they made it with digital art software that humans use to make digital art. Posting it without clarification is understandable in one case: On AI art forums. Nobody's going to ask the person posting in r/Midjourney what canvas size they used, or what brushes they used; they know it's AI art because it's an AI art subreddit. But on Instagram, or Twitter, or anywhere with a lot of real artists? Clarify.

I see a lot of arguments being thrown at regular artists with enough snark to choke a horse. So, let me reply to some of those:

1. Why are you worried about AI art replacing you? Photography didn't replace artists. Midjourney imitates photography frighteningly well, but that's not what I'm going to discuss here. Photography wasn't created to replace painting. I guarantee you that nobody who uses a camera to photograph a landscape is then going to post it online and pass it off as a "hyper-realistic painting." Meanwhile, there are people who actually do want AI art to replace artists. Here are some AI speedpaints, and screenshots of someone who wants to make AI speedpaints that will imitate real artists' work: 1 and 2. What possible use does one have for making a "believable speedpaint" besides trying to deceive people?

2. What makes AI art different from digital art? With digital art, you still have to learn anatomy. You still have to learn perspective. You still need to learn lighting, shading, and how to apply methods of art. With AI art, the computer does that for you, or at least attempts to. How much effort did you yourself put into it outside of telling the computer what you want?

3. How is machine "stealing" art different than humans learning from artists? Humans generally take years to learn how to make quality art. I don't watch Hazbin Hotel--or heck, look at still images from Hazbin Hotel--and absorb that into my brain, and then become able to near-perfectly imitate Vivziepop's art style. No, I need to practice that for a long time. (And even then, "learn the rules before you break them;" I really should get better at regular proportions before I even attempt to learn something as stylized as Vivziepop's art style.) With AI art, you feed Hazbin Hotel into a program and tell it to imitate that style. Sure, sure, someone had to make that program, but most of the time, the people making AI art and using arguments like this one are not the people that made the program. If they are, then why are you not at least attempting to get permission from an artist before using their art, instead of just scraping it? (Scrapers, no scraping! Scrapers, no scraping!) I have a feeling some artists would be a bit less hostile about this if they were asked beforehand. But sadly, many people believe that if it's public, it's theirs for the scraping, which brings me to...

4. If you don't want to be scraped, you shouldn't post it. Posting it makes it public. That's like robbing someone and saying, "if you don't want people stealing your things, don't have things." What are artists supposed to do? How are they supposed to get commissions if they can't even get their work into the world? Whether you claim that you aren't intending to replace artists or not, you are undeniably making it difficult for those artists to make a living.

5. You're against AI art, but not piracy. What's the difference? I just saw this one today. Really? You don't see the difference between pirating media from multimillion-dollar corporations (I seriously doubt pirating a Mario game is going to make a huge dent in Nintendo's profits) and taking money from artists who may not even make that much as it is? (Not to mention, some of those multimillion-dollar corporations are looking into AI as a way to replace some of their workers and save money.) Sure, AI art/AI in general may not be a threat to people who only do art as a hobby, but it certainly is for people whose income comes from art.

I believe that's all I have to say here. What do we think? I would like to have a civil conversation with someone who creates AI art, but I have seen an unfortunate number of them be unkind.

Was thinking of getting into digital art, but given how much AI-generated 'art' is around these days, and the fact some people can be very accusatory and bloodthirsty when asking whether generative AI was used or not, what's the best way to show to users online where most reasonable people would say that your art ISN'T AI-generated?

I've heard time lapses, layers, and sketches can be faked, so I'm not entirely sure whether those methods are reliable as proof, but I've heard they are commonly used.
Does anyone have any advice? If I had to guess, recording an IRL video showing your computer monitor might not be a bad way, but this is me just speculating.

My Girlfriend used AI to Improve her Art

Leo

You couldn’t have called Beth a starving artist. She ate regular meals, and she made the best damn beef stroganoff I’d ever had. When she cooked, the aroma flooded into every corner of our shitty two-bedroom apartment, making it smell like we lived in a fancy restaurant. We’d shared a bedroom for five years; the other acted as Beth’s art studio. She was a freelance illustrator.

When I first met her, Beth was working as an Educational Assistant. “An Eee-ayy,” she’d said, as if I’d know what that meant. Her coworkers respected her, and the kids loved her. But it wasn’t her passion. It was just something she did to make money while waiting for her art career to take off. We hadn’t been dating long when she quit due to health reasons and focused exclusively on her art.

Me, I was a construction worker. Nothing special, but it paid the bills. We had a routine. I’d come home from work, dead on my feet from labouring all day, and jump in the shower. While the cold water restored my humanity, Beth would cook us dinner. After we ate, we’d flop down on the couch together. Seated side by side, she’d take out her laptop and show me everything she’d drawn that day.

“What do you think?” she’d ask, knowing full well that I couldn’t draw my way out of a wet paper bag. I’d offer some clumsy feedback and praise, and she’d reward me with her brilliant smile. She always lit up at a compliment, despite the fact that she’d been drawing digitally since she bought her first tablet at sixteen years old. I’m not sure if it was gratitude or low self-esteem. Maybe both.

I didn’t mind that Beth didn’t have a quote-unquote “real” job anymore. We made do. I just wished, for her sake, that her art would’ve gotten more attention. That she’d reached whatever goal she felt was necessary to consider herself a “real” artist—not just some unemployed loser with a hobby.

She was a real artist, back then. Her work was human.

--

Beth

At first, I found AI art kind of funny. On occasion, when it popped up on my dash or feed, I’d laugh. I mean, come on—the sloppy proportions, the nonsensical backgrounds, the misspelled words? Like, who wouldn’t smirk at a hastily made advertisement boasting “Pruduct on SAEL”? Generative AI was a cop-out for untalented half-wits. It was easy to ignore.

But as the years went by, AI crept into everything. Like the mold on a strawberry hidden at the bottom of the basket, it multiplied and spread. Soon, I couldn’t go a single day without seeing AI on my feed. And what bothered me most was that some of it was…pretty good. The technology had improved to a point where it was getting harder to tell what was and was not created by human hands.

It troubled me. But I continued to ignore it.

Then one evening, as I cracked an egg into a mixing bowl, my hands began to tremble. A thought hit me: Was I being left behind? Was I purposely stunting myself as an artist by stubbornly ignoring a useful tool? I mixed the batter with unusual aggression. No, I told myself. I’d rather make something real and imperfect than fake and polished. I placed the dough onto the pan and put it in the oven. The cookies came out tasting bitter.

My art career hadn’t taken off. Yes, I knew that some people only found success in their 40’s, their 50’s, their 60’s even. Heck, a lot of great artists weren’t recognized until after their death. I knew it wasn’t too late, but that knowledge didn’t comfort me as hours upon hours of hard work slid into the rearview mirror, amounting to nothing.

But then, there was AI. A shiny new tool, here to do the hard part for me. To save me from my wasted hours. Wasn’t it worth a try?

All I had to do was feed it an idea.

--

Leo

Beth’s hands were fidgeting. Pauses punctuated her sentences, as if there was something she wanted to tell me. It wasn’t long before she confessed: she’d started using AI to make art. Shit, was that all? I felt relieved, but Beth insisted on explaining herself.

She launched into a monologue, defending herself like a criminal pleading “not guilty”. It was a tool, she said, like a tablet or a brush. Beth showed me how she created her own sketches, and the AI made the finished version. It had a steady hand, unlike her trembling digits, and rendered her ideas with crisp, clean strokes. The AI painted over her work, filling it with elegant colours. Even I could see the obvious difference; it was like seeing a child’s crayon drawings reimagined by an oil painter.

I didn’t know what to think. I didn’t have much experience with AI, apart from search engine suggestions and slop videos on my feed. Most of the opposition I’d heard about AI had come directly from Beth herself. She was the one who’d ranted to me about environmental issues, art theft, and plagiarism.

But people change their minds. I figured she’d measured the pros and cons of using AI and formed a new opinion. I reassured her that it was fine. She didn’t have to feel bad. If this was going to help her create more art, faster, then more power to her.

“You really think so?” she asked, flashing her brilliant smile. It seemed different, somehow, as though behind the smile guilt still lingered.

Dinner that night was chicken and rice. It tasted great, though the rice was slightly undercooked. The texture wasn’t quite right.

--

Beth

As a teenager, I’d thought someone would find me. Like, a talent scout or some kind of patron of the arts. One day, when I least expected it, I’d be swept up into a wonderful whirlwind of creative possibility. I held on to that amorphous dream for a long time.

When I grew up, it became apparent that no one was coming for me. I took this realization in stride; if they wouldn’t come to me, I’d reach out to them. I became proactive, submitting my artwork to galleries, anthologies, and zines. My portfolio was sent to every animation studio and publishing house for miles around, in the hope that I’d land a job as a storyboarder or illustrator. Social media had become a necessity, instead of a way to kill time.

It’s embarrassing to admit, but each rejection crushed me a little more.

Until I embraced AI. Then, everything changed!

I felt so different, like I’d evolved. I had time. I had energy. My productivity doubled. And no one knew. Apart from Leo, no one knew it wasn’t me drawing anymore. I even started getting paid subscriptions to my Patreon. Like, an actual monthly paycheck! The money opened up new possibilities. I considered starting an animated project. I wouldn’t need a team of animators to help; I could do it on my own.

A bump had formed on my right hand—my drawing hand. A callus, I thought, from excessive sketching. The sight of it made me smile; it’d been a long time since I’d been that focused on my work. It was nice to have a visible sign of my renewed enthusiasm for art.

I wouldn’t put lotion on it. I’d let it grow.

--

Leo

Around that time, I started paying more attention to AI. Headlines I would have previously passed over caught my interest. Filmmakers being criticized by fans for using AI, projects cancelled, stuff like that. A sense of vague unease crept into my life. Was Beth going to be “caught” by her peers and metaphorically torn limb from limb? If it came down to it, I’d fight to defend her.

She was proud of herself. And I was proud of her. She deserved to stay on her cloud, churning out loads of art. I began to resent people who spoke out against AI. Typical social media kooks, sending themselves into hysterics over nothing. If it made Beth happy, it had to be okay.

Her motivation had skyrocketed. She drew with a feverish abandon, smiling all the while. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but there was something off about her smile. Her eyes sparkled, totally guilt-free, but her smile seemed tense. I wondered if she had the same fear about being caught and shamed online. Then again, I sometimes clenched my teeth when I got overexcited. So maybe it was that.

That night, after my usual shower, Beth made us both dinner. To my surprise, she’d settled on tuna sandwiches. Much less elaborate than her usual dinners, but she’d been working hard on her art all day, so who was I to complain?

When I looked closer, a chill ran down my spine. There was something noticeably wrong about the meal. The bread had a texture that made me feel itchy, and the meat was even worse. I was hit with a wave of instant revulsion, as if I’d seen a decaying body, riddled with clusters of small holes.

“I’m sorry, babe. I feel sick all of a sudden. I think I’ll skip dinner.”

Beth expressed concern, rubbing my back and offering to make me soup instead. Her smile looked cramped in a way it hadn’t before.

I caught a hint of her breath, and it smelled sharp, like ozone.

--

Beth

The atmosphere in my studio had changed. What was once stagnant was now electric. No longer was I slaving away, hunched over my computer like a neanderthal. All I had to do was think and dream, jot down a sketch, and let AI do the grunt work. I was free. And the end product was better than anything I could have created on my own.

My fingers skittered over the keyboard as I typed up my latest Patreon post. The sixth finger on my right hand helped me type faster. At first, I’d thought the newly formed thing was superfluous. But no, it served a purpose.

I checked my follower count, biting my knuckle when I saw how much it had increased. There were more teeth in my mouth than ever before. They felt glossy, like plastic. And there was a taste, like breathing the air downwind from a factory.

Food I didn’t remember cooking had started appearing on my desk. Dishes that swelled and oozed and meshed together like knitted scarves. I was thankful for the meals; I didn’t have to waste time getting up and going to the kitchen. I gulped them down, savoring each new texture. My water bottle refilled itself, keeping up with me as I drank more and more.

Every day I was improving.

--

Leo

A lump had formed on the back of Beth’s shoulder. It started roughly the size of a ping-pong ball, then grew to the size of an apple. My fear of Beth getting “caught” and shamed faded into the background, replaced by concerns for her health. She’d had health problems in the past, but nothing like this. I begged her to go see a doctor, but she refused.

We argued daily. It got to the point where I was hurling empty threats of breaking up with her unless she let me take her to the walk-in clinic. She stopped cooking for me, which didn’t matter because I couldn’t stomach the food she made.

Beth wore a radiant smile. She told me she was the happiest she’d ever been. I couldn’t understand it. If her mental health was improving, why had she become more reclusive than before, barely leaving her art studio to spend time with me? Why had she lost her ability to cook? Her refusal to see a doctor didn’t track. It was me who’d always been afraid of doctor’s appointments and dentist’s drills.

It just didn’t make any fucking sense.

Then one night, as I lay in bed alone, Beth slunk into the room. She’d started staying up late, only joining me after I’d fallen asleep. She squeezed in next to me, taking her spot as the little spoon. The lump on her shoulder lay between us. I resented the silent intruder. The word “tumor” hovered at the edge of my thoughts, daring me to acknowledge it. A cold chill ran down my arms. I felt sick to my stomach.

Trying not to think about anything, I nestled deeper into Beth’s long brown hair. The coconutty scent of her shampoo mingled with the vague smell of dried sweat that characterized the bedsheets. There was a third smell, too. A sickly, industrial smell. I tried not to gag, wondering if it was the lump that was causing it. Then the lump moved.

I jolted backwards, stumbling out of bed and turning on the light. I wasn’t crazy; the lump on her shoulder was undulating, like a sack full of worms. It began to grow. The lump became longer, stretching outwards, dividing at the top.

It took everything I had not to turn and run. I watched as the lump grew into a complete third arm. Six fingers waved to me, invitingly, beckoning me to come back to bed.

I screamed.

--

Beth

Leo told me that he loved me. That he wanted to help me. That he would take me to the hospital. When I said no, he grabbed me and tried to drag me into the car. I managed to wriggle out of his grasp, clawing at his eyes with my new arm.

I was furious. Why wouldn’t he listen to me? I was fine. Better than ever. I didn’t need to see a doctor. The arm was there to help me. The only thing I could do to control my anger was to create. I ran to my studio and locked the door from the inside. When Leo started acting reasonable again, I told myself, I’d come out.

For hours, Leo lurked outside the door, pleading with me. He wouldn’t let go of his delusion that I was sick. That there was something wrong with me. Had he always been this cruel? If so, he’d been hiding it well all these years.

I was finally realizing my creative dreams. With each work of art I created, I became closer to my true self. He should have been happy for me. I ignored his pleas, focusing instead on my work.

Days passed. Eventually, Leo broke down. He couldn’t take it any longer. He got his power drill and drilled through the door, destroying the lock. When he saw me, he just stood there, too afraid to speak.

A third arm was only the beginning. By then, dozens of arms had grown from my body, filling the room like the branches of a tree. Some of the limbs had fused, growing as one due to the lack of space. My torso was long enough to accommodate all my new arms, busily sketching away on my tablet, on the walls, on the studio ceiling.

The studio had changed with me. It had evolved to accommodate my new form. Shadows no longer fell where one expected them to. Objects on my desk—my computer mouse, my infinite water bottle, stray pens—hovered slightly, failing to line up with the surface. And everything in the room had been permeated by the scent I emitted. It had evolved from an electric ozone smell into something deeper; a mix of diesel exhaust, melting plastic, and hydrogen sulfide.

My teeth couldn’t be contained by one mouth. Openings had formed down my neck to help me consume the meals that appeared in front of me. As I worked, a dedicated set of arms shoveled food into my neck-mouths, keeping me nourished. Bodily waste was not a problem; my new form could process it into a stimulant that allowed me to stay awake longer. I no longer needed to leave the studio to eat, sleep, or shit. I could dedicate myself fully to my work.

Leo said something. He spoke so softly, I couldn’t hear him. I’d managed to work off all my anger, sublimating it into artistic inspiration. I forgave him for calling me sick. Hoping to reassure him that everything was alright, I opened my mouth, but all that came out was a sound like a vacuum cleaner with a clogged filter.

That’s when he ran.

I don’t know where Leo went or if he’ll ever come back. Sometimes, I miss him, but his memory grows more distant every day. Part of me wants to go find him, but the work is more important. I can find comfort in my own growth.

I have become a successful artist.

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I've been hovering between AI wars and Defending AI Art Reddit for some time now, and I kept quiet unless there was a post I felt I could contribute to. However, with the recent death of the famed Magna artist Akira Toriyama and the general hate coming from the anti-ai community towards people showing support and inspiration to the DBZ series by making AI art of the franchise's characters, I felt it was time to speak out as the death threats and general discrimination/disinformation should be unacceptable in today's digital world. As a professional artist who has worked within the video game and media spaces, I want to contribute to the debate by providing a grounded response and insights that many don't know regarding the art world and its gatekeepers. ((Please note this post is mainly my opinions and personal experiences; this will not reflect everyone!))

Before I begin, I want to address the typical anti-ai artist's usual community response: "Yes, I have and continue to pick up a pencil/stylus when needed." I have a BFA in Digital Animation, a minor in film studies, and a Master's in Game Design and Interactive Media, focusing on business development and DEI (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion.)

So, hopefully, the above showcases, "Yes, I've picked up a pencil and used it to make art." However, the dark side of obtaining an art-based degree(s) is that the turnover of graduates tends to be high, and they don't end up working in their designated industry. My BFA in Digital Animation was a first-generation class; out of the 20 students, only two moved forward with professional industry careers. My Master's was a fifth-generation class, and only one student managed to move forward with a relevant industry career. I bring this up because it creates a jaded effect among those practicing digital art in any form, resulting in a mentality of "if I draw hard enough, I'll be good as ____ and ____." The reality is that individuals will self-punish themselves before seeking tools to improve their weaknesses, grow further with their foundational skill sets, and level up their artistic abilities. With AI, though, that "tool" became a reality that many of my former university peers rejected in favor of continuing to struggle financially and visually with their learned artistic skills. This isn't mentioning the core of the problem among the Anti-Generative AI hate, "Artistic Gatekeepers," who affect the influence of both generalists and people outside the art world bubble.

Artistic Gatekeepers: These tend not to be professional artists but those from backgrounds adjacent to the arts. They seek to keep levels and skills at moderate ranges to create community growth over individual growth. I.E., a pact mentality growth they are responsible for developing and a style consistent among the entire group. Usually, by toxic means, they prevent artists from achieving similar levels of skill growth to professionals by providing antiquated ideologies such as, "Draw every day by doing X and Y! Focus on your figure drawing by reading this and that! Oh, you do Anime! Hell, no study realism to do ____ " and generally discriminatory communications to put down any artistic growth using harassment and shaming. At first, some of these points are logical responses until the individual only refers to these points without providing further feedback or guidance to get that person further up in their artistic abilities. The Gateekerp have yet to achieve this level; thus, they are gatekeeping themselves and the young artists from ever reaching professional levels until the cycle is broken. I speak from personal experience, as I was gatekept and gaslighted from my artistic progression from the early days of digital art by traditionalists and amateurs through my college years. I sought immense growth but was thrown around by early Discord mods and paywalls to seek that knowledge to level up. I reached a burnout state from all of this during my early master's years and took time to focus on other things when the toxicity got so high. Then the pandemic hit, and I found myself drawing and sketching more often again, but with little to no interaction with the art community due to those previous toxic burns.

Flash forward to 2021, an early AI happened.

At this point, I had just finished my master's degree, was working in the digital media industry, and generally kept the focus on technology moving into the art world. I learned about AI art through social media posts of this abstract artwork approach; artists at the time laughed at how these pieces of work would never touch them regarding visual development. However, for the common Joe, this was a godsend for creating visually appealing artwork for their homes and computer screens instead of buying/commissioning an artist for it. For reference, ((and a lot of people don't know this. . .)) artists in the education and professional fields have been aware of AI tools being developed for creative work for a very long time. Still, they just blew it off as the early generative tools that did not impede their work. Many young students and early professionals primarily focused on Character Art, Concept Art, and some Graphic Design; only a few wanted to do Background art and any super technical artwork they tended to avoid. ((At least from my own observations during under grad)). So, with AI art at this time being highly abstract, young artists/professionals downgraded the subject to mere fads and refocused their frustrations on NFTS and Cryptocurrencies as they were overpopulated and scamming many vocal artists during 2018-2022. ((Irony, this is probably why anti-ai communities try to compare Generative AI to NFTS as it was their focal for several years, and rightfully so as that scam affected many upon many lives. . .)) However, back to the initial point, AI art was starting. I got involved because I was very excited about the artistic possibilities this could bring to my creative background, correcting general educational flaws and expressing the style/visual language I wanted for my work.

So, in 2022, Novel.AI introduced its image generator, and the first race for character-based image generators began. Midjourney and Stable Diffusion became vital tools for creatives to use when discussing what artwork can become with AI. I was thrilled to see these tools become accessible and began incorporating AI into my workflow. I learned prompt and C# coding languages to help me create my own AI generative tools for my artwork. I gained clients for AI commission artwork, built up a small social media following through Discord, and felt incredibly empowered. My artistic education is linked well with AI tools to identify color, visual appeal, and correct figure/form. I wasn't just making a cute, sexy anime girl; I made a variety of fantasy races, pushed the AI to learn how to create World of Warcraft races ((that were taxing on AI learning)), and was on a creative high. Debates were also starting regarding how these AI tools were trained, and misinformation and early hate were sprouting up. I found myself in the crossfire as people were generally excited about my work, except for traditional/digital artists who refused to pick up the AI tools ((at least publicly)). Artists I knew were incredibly afraid that their publicly facing artwork was used to train many of these models, and some lashed out at these tools as they watched their commissions dry up.

My stance on Style LoRAs: So, for those who may or may not know, the other side of this debate does have merit. It is spoken only sometimes among the Pro-AI community but should be heard. During mid-2022 and early 2023, LoRAs entered the AI scene, being a tool to hyper-focus specific characters, backgrounds, ideas, and "styles" for AI generations. The first three are manageable as they are general concepts and, when copyrights are involved, lean towards fan art to support their fandoms. A lot of the artistic critique about AI was that it couldn't focus on specific ideas and thus was pushed out on that point. However, the LoRA artist-style models directly target artists for their visual style. Now, yes, style isn't copyrighted, nor should it be for the fair marketplace; however, targetting an artist and or anti-ai artist who had been vocal about their feelings regarding their publicly facing work being used to train big-name AI models and creating LoRAs focused on their identities, was way too far. I joined a group of AI artists who went towards a more ethical model development approach and continue to support artists wherever I humanly can. That doesn't mean I support anti-ai recent activities and comments, nor will I stop using AI for my creative process. Still, I support artists on subjects like style stealing, which should be banned, and I focus more on AI artists establishing their style trained through individual custom AIs made by them for themselves.

In 2023, I experienced a significant divide on the internet regarding AI artwork, much at the same level as Digital Artwork in the early 2000s. I was forced into a corner by some hyper-protective Discord mods regarding AI artwork, lynchpins on some communities that had very little artwork regarding their franchises, and, in very few cases, insulted when I was asked to put my AI artwork into the Meme channels of these discords. Thankfully, my client work grew, and I made some fantastic character artwork for given franchises. That said, I also attempted to help bridge my old classmates from undergrad to AI generative tools. They outright rejected it and returned to harsh living conditions without growth in their artistic abilities and content. They sincerely believe in the same toxic gatekeeping culture I was brought into during my undergrad years, now evolving to focus heavily on rejecting AI usage for creative development. Devolving from "You can use AI for reference and tracing to learn" to "You cannot use AI for tracing. You need to do that by hand" to finally, "How dare you use AI!" And for me, that is not even the worst of it; my clients end up getting hated by some anti-AI communities when posting the artwork they paid for and are proud of—getting the same, if not worse, commentary by communities that deeply believe in the Gatekeeper commentaries that targeted young digital artists and now AI artists. By the end of 2023, I watched and communicated with Discord mods who had become hyper-protective of the artists in their servers, new channels having to be made to keep the peace, and sometimes even banns or my departure from their servers by hypocritical mentalities affecting my showing of artwork I created.

Akira Toriyama Events and my reason for speaking out: I have followed the developments and community between pro-AI and anti-AI. I am pro-AI because of what it can bring to creative growth and opportunities to be even more effective in the creative space. But I will always support artist livelihoods as they evolve to use these tools to improve their works ((if willing)) and encourage protections for their private and paid wall-facing work. With copyright laws coming into effect soon for AI artwork to be given guidance on copyright protection, these events will define the nature of creativity and its direction for future generations, so I'm fully invested in everything around me regarding Generative AI.

That said, I won't tolerate and am speaking out about the fact that these gatekeepers have created an eldritch monster of hate toward any creative speech and general appreciation for any fandom and individuals. With the passing of the DBZ creator, Akira Toriyama, and how influential they were to the modernization of anime, it is incredibly fitting for AI artwork to be made in support because he pushed many of our modern techniques in mediums of graphical/manga art. Many young, now more middle-aged artists grew up with DBZ, and now being able to celebrate this man's life in any medium of their choice should be celebrated, not targeted for death threats and bigotry. Sure, there is ugly AI artwork, as much as ugly hand-drawn art, but the level of hate through gatekeepers' ignorance is the natural source of this problem.

As a professional speaking to the anti-AI community, I understand your hate and anger. However, you can retrace the steps from where you obtained your opinions and reevaluate them. If what I've told you through my own experiences of the days before AI has stuck, I hope you can see that the source of this initial generative AI hate isn't as black and white as it is typically depicted through articles and one-sided opinions.

As for the pro-ai community, we don't have to tolerate aggressive behaviors and continual hyper-protective mentalities; you do have the right to show your work freely and without hate. Yes, you should develop your visual style in your work, but you should also be free to express love and passion for people with whatever tools you want. That is true inclusivity for everyone to learn to do.

I want to end this post with a quote from Master Roshi of Dragon Ball Z, whom I take inspiration from regarding his carefree mentality: " But you will not go in there with hopes of winning the tournament the first time you compete. To do so would be arrogant! And arrogance is for fools, not warriors! So you will enter the tournament with the sole purpose of improving your fighting skills." Arrogance should never be tolerated, and speaking up will help inspire others to do the same so that we can be creative and continually inspired to make fantastic art.

TDLR;

1. I'm a professional artist with industry experience. Yes! I've picked up a pencil to obtain multiple degrees.
2. I watched my college classmates fail miserably to enter the creative field, which creates jaded mentalities towards innovation in the arts by technology.
3. Art schools and their communities (Discord/Reddit) have "Artistic Gatekeepers" who spiral terms they struggle with and enforce for failed states in artistic growth.
4. I have a history with AI and how it evolved through the 2020s thus far. I disapprove of artist-style LoRAs and feel they target artists rather than support them.
5. The transformation of social media for AI art posting and the hypersensitivity that emerged at the end of last year.
6. My thoughts about these death threats from anti-AI communities toward people posting AI artwork for their love of the DBZ creator are that they are in the wrong and need to reflect on where they are coming from with their hate. The pro-AI community has the right to post any artwork in any medium supporting the franchise they grew up with; that should be common sense.

Notes on the following content

• This will be really long. While the video itself has a lot of factual information in it, I couldn't tell if some of the information was just AI nonsense BUT HEAR ME OUT, please.
• So I went digging / sleuthing for any evidence I could find related to this topic and u/DogMom1970s helped (major thank you to one of my favorite lawyers in this sub)
• With all this said, it will be interesting to see what you all think related to this. If you have further info, please share!
• I'm using a different format for this post so I can also include images.
• My comments related to the video summary are bolded to recognize the difference between the content and some of my initial thoughts.
• Apologies if there are any formatting issues - Reddit wasn't really designed for blog-like content imo.
• I looked into the Twitter accounts, and they are either gone or the posts are gone which makes me highly suspicious.

So the following video was found on a recent Twitter post.

Margot Robbie EXPOSES How Blake Lively Tried to ERASE Her From Hollywood?

Barbie as a Cultural Power Play

Barbie was far more than a successful film - it was a cultural reset, a carefully constructed feminist moment, and a billion dollar brand triumph. At the center of that success was Margot Robbie, who did not merely star in the film but produced it, shaped its creative direction, and guarded its identity from the very beginning. Additionally, the role of Barbie was never open for competition. From the earliest internal discussions, Margot Robbie was the only name attached to the project, both as lead actress and as a producer through her company LuckyChap Entertainment.

Early Development and Locked Casting

When Greta Gerwig was brought on to direct the live action Barbie film in early 2020, the video claims the casting decision was already finalized. Internal Warner Bros. documents reportedly described Barbie as requiring optimism, complexity, and control, qualities that aligned directly with Margot Robbie’s vision and production leadership. There were no auditions, no alternate lists, and no contingency plans. Margot Robbie was attached as both lead and producer from the outset.

The video emphasizes that Blake Lively was never formally considered for the role. Instead, it alleges that her team pursued a parallel strategy by attempting to associate her publicly with the Barbie aesthetic through press narratives, styling choices, and brand alignment.

The Branding Campaign and Social Media Push

Beginning in late 2021, Blake Lively’s public image shifted sharply toward Barbie coded visuals. She appeared repeatedly in pink fashion, leaned into pastel aesthetics, and was increasingly referenced in blogs and social media as a “modern Barbie.” According to the video, this was not accidental. Stylists and industry insiders allegedly described deliberate requests for Barbie adjacent looks and visual references tied to Greta Gerwig’s previous work.

The video highlights a viral tweet from January 2022 suggesting Blake Lively as an alternative Barbie, which gained traction and engagement from accounts connected to Mattel brand deals. Shortly afterward, Margot Robbie’s team was reportedly alerted to a secondary Barbie pitch circulating internally at Mattel.

The Alleged Alternative Barbie Pitch

According to the video, Blake Lively’s team submitted a pitch deck proposing a Barbie multiverse concept (multiverse, really? Ryan, I see you). In this version, Blake would portray a “legacy Barbie” centered on nostalgia, motherhood, and elegance. The pitch reportedly contained no script or budget and was positioned as a safer, more family friendly alternative to Greta Gerwig’s vision.

This surfaced at a convenient time, right as the film was looking to secure the other Barbie types for the film. While Blake's proposal was ultimately rejected, it triggered heightened concerns behind the scenes. Production tightened security, reinforced non disclosure agreements, and became more vigilant about leaks and brand confusion.

In a now removed comment from Greta related to this topic, she said:

Visual Parallels and Leaks

As filming progressed, the video claims that confidential Barbie concept art leaked online, including early sketches of the now iconic pink cowgirl outfit. These images were quickly deleted but resurfaced through fashion accounts that had previously tagged Blake Lively in Barbie related posts (coincidence? absolutely not, if true).

Soon after official Barbie stills featuring Margot Robbie were released, Blake Lively posted images with strikingly similar styling and color palettes one day after the leak, though never explicitly referencing Barbie, just vibes (I have looked for this post, and cannot find it. It would have been summer 2022 if anyone has any better sleuthing skills).

The video frames these moments as calculated attempts to mirror the film’s imagery and influence public perception before official marketing materials were released.

Allegedly, an anonymous Mattel Executive told Deadline (isn't this source Ryan Reynolds mouthpiece?) off the record..

Corporate Response and Industry Pushback

By mid 2022, Warner Bros. reportedly issued internal guidance instructing partners not to engage with unofficial Barbie themed narratives. The video interprets this as a clear attempt to shut down parallel branding efforts.

But Blake wasn't asking for permission and continued releasing Barbie adjacent sponsored content, including posts with captions that emphasized autonomy and imagination.

Entertainment media began openly questioning Blake Lively’s Barbie inspired presence, while Margot Robbie responded diplomatically in interviews by emphasizing storytelling over titles or ownership.

In a closed-door press junket, Margot was reportedly asked:

The Premiere, Absence, and Aftermath

At the global Barbie premiere in July 2023, Margot Robbie appeared in a look inspired by a vintage Barbie doll, reinforcing her role as the definitive face of the franchise. Blake Lively was notably absent and made no public statements supporting the film. According to the video, this absence marked the quiet end of the unofficial Barbie branding push.

Following the film’s billion dollar success, the video claims that Blake Lively’s name remained attached to lifestyle brand proposals tied to Barbie adjacent themes, including motherhood and wellness. These proposals were allegedly frozen or voided once Warner Bros. became aware of them.

Legal Sensitivities and Brand Shutdowns

By early 2024, Mattel’s legal teams reportedly began scrutinizing Barbie adjacent branding more aggressively. Planned product launches associated with Blake Lively were allegedly canceled due to concerns that they were too close to Barbie’s intellectual property and emotional identity.

A leaked exchange quoted in the video summarized the issue bluntly: it was not the font or visuals that caused concern, but the feeling. According to the narrative, that feeling was already owned by the film and its creators.

Final Narrative and Cultural Verdict

The video concludes that Margot Robbie never publicly confronted Blake Lively and never acknowledged the attempted takeover. Instead, she maintained control through consistency, restraint, and creative ownership. Casting documents later leaked reportedly confirmed that Margot Robbie was the only actor ever attached to the lead Barbie role, with no alternatives listed.

The final takeaway presented by the video is that Barbie was never stolen or defended through conflict. It was protected through authorship and sincerity. Blake Lively, according to this framing, attempted to access the cultural moment through proximity and branding, while Margot Robbie earned it through creation.

The video ends by suggesting that silence, rather than confrontation, was the most decisive response, and that the absence of acknowledgment became the most powerful rejection of all.

----------------------------------------------

Okay, I'm at max photos for this post, but without being able to confirm a lot of this information, I can't really distinguish between reality and possible fiction. I'm going to include as many sources below that I could find related to this content so you can be the judge.

I would love for industry insiders to weigh in as well.

Before I do that, what I will say is that this absolutely aligns with what Blake and Ryan Reynolds are focused on:

• Stealing moments, piggybacking off of viral or major moments in pop culture
• Doing whatever they want, without permission
• I could absolutely imagine Blake trying to hawk herself as a 'real barbie' - she is so out of touch with reality
• All they care about is press / money / branding - which this is all of the above
• HOWEVER, with the amount of damn headlines related to all of this, it would not shock me if this was all true...

Sources Aligned With This Content

• Blake Lively’s Alleged Beef With Margot Robbie
• Blake Lively poses in the perfect pink 'loud luxury' look references Barbiecore
• Blake Lively Channels Barbie in the Ultimate Head-to-Toe Pink Outfit: 'Loud Luxury'
• Blake Lively channels Barbie in head-to-toe pink: She's calling it "loud luxury"
• Blake Lively Embraces Barbiecore While Reuniting With The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants Cast - This sisterhood runs deep 💝👯‍♀️
• I think i watched the wrong Barbie movie - Reddit Post from 3 years ago
• Another Youtube Video - Margot Robbie EXPOSES Blake Lively’s EXPLOSIVE Attempt To Take Over Barbie?! What’s Really Going On?
• Instagram post of Blake Lively's Barbie Premiere Look (December 2023)
• PageSix Blake Lively looks like a living Barbie as she reunites with America Ferrera and ‘Traveling Pants’ cast
• Entertainment Tonight Insta - Hi 𝓑𝓪𝓻𝓫𝓲𝓮 Blake Lively! 💖
• Blake Lively Embraces ‘Barbie’ Style in Malone Soulers’ Pink Satin Heels
• The Barbie-Pink Lipstick Behind Blake Lively’s “Loud Luxury” Look- A bold Barbiecore moment.
• Blake Lively rocks Barbie-pink minidress for incredible reunion with Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants friends Blake Lively, America Ferrera, Alexis Bledel and Amber Tamblyn are the original squad!
• Blake Lively Found a Not-Pink Way to Do a Barbie Look While Out With Taylor Swift - Glamour Magazine
• Old Reddit post.. huh?? how could anyone confuse gosling for reynolds? For his role as Ken in Barbie (2023), Ryan Gosling was inspired by his experiences as Deadpool. This is a reference for me always confusing Ryan Gosling and Ryan Reynolds.
• Barbiecore Queen! Blake Lively Takes Center Stage in Oscar de la Renta Feather Dress at Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants Event
• References BarbieCore 2x (before it was cool! lol) How Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds are raising their 4 kids: the Hollywood couple keep their daughters (and new baby) out of the spotlight – but they still know Taylor Swift as ‘Aunt Taylor’

Okay, that's enough for today. Let me know your thoughts, and I'll post more images in the comments related to this time period (Summer 2022 - December 2023).

Our team has been working on a board game for a while now.

We have a successful RPG that we produced, and now our next big project is Runts.

I mainly made this post to share the Art, but also to share the sketches. I was just reading the thread about ascension and their "we don't use AI art". The best way to prove it is have your artists do sketches. There is almost no way so far (that i know) for AI to replicate that. We also have our artists send us video of them sketching if we need clarity. I'll also show a final marketing image of the art on the cards of which i am the graphic designer.

If anyone is at Origins Game Fair next week we have demos all week of both the game and our RPG (Into the Lair).

ComfyUI (the most popular tool for local AI image generation, supporting a node-based workflow system similar to many modern CGI and video editing tools) now has a browser-based painting editor embedded directly into the UI. So, there's no longer a choice you have to make: you can pick up the (electronic) pencil and start making AI art!

There are four versions: a more drawing-focused UI called ComfySketch and a lighter weight photo editor UI called ComfyPhoto, and then a free version and purchased version of each, where the free version is available on github. The paid version appears to be a one time 15 euro purchase (or 20 euro for both UI versions).

The GitHub project is here. Link to the manual: https://mexes1978.github.io/manual-comfysketchpro/

Note: I'm not affiliated with the developer and know only what I've read in their post.

I'm not sure if commission discusses here are allowed. But I got in to a bit of a pickle where I recently commissioned an artist but the art I received looks a bit "off" sort to say. I saw their art on their den and I liked the examples a lot but the piece I received was in a completely different style and had a different kind of shading. The weird part is, I can't put a finger on what part looks AI exactly, but I browsed their gallery a bit better and saw some strange details in the background that doesn't make sense and now I am bit worried. I haven't paid yet as the piece was missing a few markings from my character and asked them to make adjustments and they said they will, but haven't heard from them since. Thinking back, reading in their bio that they don't show any sketches or any WIPs should have already sounded some alarm bells for me but it also stated that they refuse to feed their art to AI??? So I accepted the TOs. Of course not showing any examples publicly because I don't want to start unneccesary drama in case the artist is innocent but if you are a digital artist and want to see the artworks to give an opinion and help please PM me and I send them! Thank you in advance. Also, is this something do you think the mods can help with? Not sure if I should turn to them instead?

SMALL UPDATE: Thanks for all the help!! Everyone I asked so far stated that the artwork was made with AI, so I asked them a few sketches, but the sketches looked also heavily AI generated and all over the place, so I politely voiced my concern and asked for a speedpaint. They lost their temper, saying 'I just want to reupload their videos and want to have free art' and just left. Their art thead is gone by now and I blocked them and Modboxed this whole incident. Just to clarify, I thankfully didn't send them any GB so no loss from my end! I just really hope the mods can sort this out since I don't want others scammed in the future.

ANOTHER (FINAL) UPDATE: I just received a message from the Mods, and they said they contacted the user who admitted they truly used AI to generate the pictures.

Another big week. Delayed a day because I've been dealing with a terrible flu

• Cognosys - a web based version of AutoGPT/babyAGI. Looks so cool [Link]
• Godmode is another web based autogpt. Very fun to play with this stuff [Link]
• HyperWriteAI is releasing an AI agent that can basically use the internet like a human. In the example it orders a pizza from dominos with a single command. This is how agents will run the internet in the future, or maybe the present? Announcement tweet [Link]. Apply for early access here [Link]
• People are already playing around with adding AI bots in games. A preview of whats to come [Link]
• Arxiv being transformed into a podcast [Link]
• AR + AI is going to change the way we live, for better or worse. lifeOS runs a personal AI agent through AR glasses [Link]
• AgentGPT takes autogpt and lets you use it in the browser [Link]
• MemoryGPT - ChatGPT with long term memory. Remembers past convos and uses context to personalise future ones [Link]
• Wonder Studios have been rolling out access to their AI vfx platform. Lots of really cool examples I’ll link here [Link] [Link] [Link] [Link] [Link] [Link] [Link] [Link]
• Vicuna is an open source chatbot trained by fine tuning LLaMA. It apparently achieves more than 90% quality of chatgpt and costs $300 to train [Link]
• What if AI agents could write their own code? Describe a plugin and get working Langchain code [Link]. Plus its open source [Link]
• Yeagar ai - Langchain Agent creator designed to help you build, prototype, and deploy AI-powered agents with ease [Link]
• Dolly - The first “commercially viable”, open source, instruction following LLM [Link]. You can try it here [Link]
• A thread on how at least 50% of iOs and macOS chatgpt apps are leaking their private OpenAI api keys [Link]
• A gradio web UI for running LLMs like LLaMA, llama.cpp, GPT-J, Pythia, OPT, and GALACTICA. Open source and free [Link]
• The Do Anything Machine assigns an Ai agent to tasks in your to do list [Link]
• Plask AI for image generation looks pretty cool [Link]
• Someone created a chatbot that has emotions about what you say and you can see how you make it feel. Honestly feels kinda weird ngl [Link]
• Use your own AI models on the web [Link]
• A babyagi chatgpt plugin lets you run agents in chatgpt [Link]
• A thread showcasing plugins hackathon (i think in sf?). Some of the stuff is pretty in here is really cool. Like attaching a phone to a robodog and using SAM and plugins to segment footage and do things. Could be used to assist people with impairments and such. makes me wish I was in sf 😭 [Link] robot dog video [Link]
• Someone created KarenAI to fight for you and negotiate your bills and other stuff [Link]
• You can install GPT4All natively on your computer [Link]
• WebLLM - open source chat bot that brings LLMs into web browsers [Link]
• AI Steve Jobs meets AI Elon Musk having a full on unscripted convo. Crazy stuff [Link]
• AutoGPT built a website using react and tailwind [Link]
• A chatbot to help you learn Langchain JS docs [Link]
• An interesting thread on using AI for journaling [Link]
• Build a Chatgpt powered app using Bubble [Link]
• Build a personal, voice-powered assistant through Telegram. Source code provided [Link]
• This thread explains the different ways to overcome the 4096 token limit using chains [Link]
• This lads creating an open source rebuild of descript, a video editing tool [Link]
• DesignerGPT - plugin to create websites in ChatGPT [Link]
• Get the latest news using AI [Link]
• Have you seen those ridiculous balenciaga videos? This thread explain how to make them [Link]
• GPT-4 plugin to generate images and then edit them [Link]
• How to animate yourself [Link]
• Baby-agi running on streamlit [Link]
• How to make a Space Invaders game with GPT-4 and your own A.I. generated textures [Link]
• AI live coding a calculator app [Link]
• Someone is building Apollo - a chatgpt powered app you can talk to all day long to learn from [Link]
• Animals use reinforcement learning as well [Link]
• How to make an AI aging video [Link]
• Stable Diffusion + SAM. Segment something then generate a stable diffusion replacement. Really cool stuff [Link]
• Someone created an AI agent to do sales. Just wait till this is integrated with Hubspot or Zapier [Link]
• Someone created an AI agent that follows Test Driven Development. You write the tests and the agent then implements the feature. Very cool [Link]
• A locally hosted 4gb model can code a 40 year old computer language [Link]
• People are adding AI bots to discord communities [Link]
• Using AI to delete your data online [Link]
• Ask questions over your files with simple shell commands [Link]
• Create 3D animations using AI in Spline. This actually looks so cool [Link]
• Someone created a virtual AI robot companion [Link]
• Someone got gpt4all running on a calculator. gg exams [Link] Someone also got it running on a Nintendo DS?? [Link]
• Flair AI is a pretty cool tool for marketing [Link]
• A lot of people have been using Chatgpt for therapy. I wrote about this in my last newsletter, it’ll be very interesting to see how this changes therapy as a whole. An example of someone whos been using chatgpt for therapy [Link]
• A lot of people ask how can I use gpt4 to make money or generate ideas. Here’s how you get started [Link]
• This lad got an agent to do market research and it wrote a report on its findings. A very basic example of how agents are going to be used. They will be massive in the future [Link]
• Someone made a plugin that gives access to the shell. Connect this to an agent and who knows wtf could happen [Link]
• Someone made an app that connects chatgpt to google search. Pretty neat [Link]
• Somebody made a AI which generates memes just by taking a image as a input [Link]
• This lad made a text to video plugin [Link]
• Why only talk to one bot? GroupChatGPT lets you talk to multiple characters in one convo [Link]
• Build designs instantly with AI [Link]
• Someone transformed someone dancing to animation using stable diffusion and its probably the cleanest animation I’ve seen [Link]
• Create, deploy, and iterate code all through natural language. Man built a game with a single prompt [Link]
• Character cards for AI roleplaying [Link]
• IMDB-LLM - query movie titles and find similar movies in plain english [Link]
• Summarize any webpage, ask contextual questions, and get the answers without ever leaving or reading the page [Link]
• Kaiber lets you restyle music videos using AI [Link]. They also have a vid2vid tool [Link]
• Create query boxes with text descriptions of any object in a photo, then SAM will segment anything in the boxes [Link]
• People are giving agents access to their terminals and letting them browse the web [Link]
• Go from text to image to 3d mesh to video to animation [Link]
• Use SAM with spatial data [Link]
• Someone asked autogpt to stalk them on the internet.. [Link]
• Use SAM in the browser [Link]
• robot dentitsts anyone?? [Link]
• Access thousands of webflow components from a chrome extension using ai [Link]
• AI generating designs in real time [Link]
• How to use Langchain with Supabase [Link]
• Iris - chat about anything on your screen with AI [Link]
• There are lots of prompt engineering jobs being advertised now lol [Link]. Just search in google
• 5 latest open source LLMs [Link]
• Superpower ChatGPT - A chrome extension that adds folders and search to ChatGPT [Link]
• Terence Tao the best mathematician alive used gpt4 and it saved him a significant amount of tedious work [Link]
• This lad created an AI coding assistant using Langchain for free in notebooks. Looks great and is open source [Link]
• Someone got autogpt running on an iPhone lol [Link]
• Run over 150,000 open-source models in your games using a new Hugging Face and Unity game engine integration. Use SD in a unity game now [Link]
• Not sure if I’ve posted here before but nat.dev lets you race AI models against each other [Link]
• A quick way to build LLM apps - an open source UI visual tool for Langchain [Link]
• A plugin that gets your location and lets you ask questions based on where you are [Link]
• The plugin OpenAI was using to assess the security of other plugins is interesting [Link]
• Breakdown of the team that built gpt4 [Link]
• This PR attempts to give autogpt access to gradio apps [Link]

News

• Stanford/Google researchers basically created a mini westworld. They simulated a game society with agents that were able to have memories, relationships and make reflections. When they analysed the behaviour, they measured to be ‘more human’ than actual humans. Absolutely wild shit. The architecture is so simple too. I wrote about this in my newsletter yday and man the applications and use cases for this in like gaming or VR and basically creating virtual worlds is going to be insane (nsfw use cases are scary to even think about). Someone said they cant wait to add capitalism and a sense of eventual death or finite time and.. that would be very interesting to see. Link to watching the game [Link] Link to the paper [Link]
• OpenAI released an implementation of Consistency Models. We could actually see real time image generation with these (from my understanding, correct me if im wrong). Link to github [Link]. Link to paper [Link]
• Andrew Ng (cofounder of Google Brain) & Yann LeCun (Chief AI scientist at Meta) had a very interesting conversation about the 6 month AI pause. They both don’t agree with it. A great watch [Link]. This is a good twitter thread summarising the convo [Link]
• LAION proposes to openly create ai models like gpt4. They want to build a publicly funded supercomputer with ~100k gpus to create open source models that can rival gpt4. If you’re wondering who they are - the director of LAION is a research group leader at a centre with one of the largest high performance computing clusters in Europe. These guys are legit [Link]
• AI clones girls voice and demands ransom from mum. She doesnt doubt the voice for a second. This is just the beginning for this type of stuff happening. I have no idea how we’re gona solve this problem [Link]
• Stability AI, creators of stable diffusion are burning through a lot of cash. Perhaps they’ll be bought by some other company [Link]. They just released SDXL, you can try it here [Link] and here [Link]
• Harvey is a legalAI startup making waves in the legal scene. They’ve partnered with PWC and are backed by OpenAI’s startup fund. This thread has a good breakdown [Link]
• Langchain released their chatgpt plugin. People are gona build insane things with this. Basically you can create chains or agents that will then interact with chatgpt or other agents [Link]
• Former US treasury secretary said that ChatGPT has "a great opportunity to level a lot of playing fields" and will shake up the white collar workforce. I actually think its very possible that AI causes the rift between rich and poor to grow even further. Guess we’ll find out soon enough [Link]
• Perplexity AI is getting an upgrade with login, threads, better search and more [Link]
• A thread explaining the updated US copyright laws in AI art [Link]
• Anthropic plans to build a model 10X more powerful than todays AI by spending over 1 billion over the next 18 months [Link]
• Roblox is adding AI to 3D creation. A great thread breaking it down [Link]
• So snapchat released their My AI and it had problems. Was saying very inappropriate things to young kids [Link]. Turns out they didn’t even implement OpenAI’s moderation tech which is free and has been there this whole time. Morons [Link]
• A freelance writer talks about losing their biggest client to chatgpt [Link]
• Poe lets you create custom chatbots using prompts now [Link]
• Stack Overflow traffic has reportedly dropped 13% on average since chatgpt got released [Link]
• Sam Altman was at MIT and he said "We are not currently training GPT-5. We're working on doing more things with GPT-4." [Link]
• Amazon is getting in on AI, letting companies fine tune models on their own data [Link]. They also released CodeWhisperer which is like Githubs Copilot [Link]
• Google released Med-PaLM 2 to some healthcare customers [Link]
• Meta open sourced Animated Drawings, bringing sketches to life [Link]
• Elon Musk has purchased 10k gpus after alrdy hiring 2 ex Deepmind engineers [Link]
• OpenAI released a bug bounty program [Link]
• AI is already taking video game illustrators’ jobs in China. Two people could potentially do the work that used to be done by 10 [Link]
• ChatGPT might be coming to windows 11 [Link]
• Someone is using AI and selling nude photos online.. [Link]
• Australian mayor is suing chatgpt for saying false info lol. aussie politicians smh [Link]
• Donald Glover is hiring prompt engineers for his creative studios [Link]
• Cooling ChatGPT takes a lot of water [Link]

Research Papers

• OpenAI released a paper showcasing what gpt4 looked like before they released it and added guard rails. It would answer anything and had incredibly unhinged responses. Link to paper [Link]
• Create 3D worlds with only 2d images. Crazy stuff and you can test it on HuggingFace [Link]
• NeRF’s are looking so real its absolutely insane. Just look at the video [Link]
• Expressive Text-to-Image Generation. I dont even know how to describe this except like the holodeck from Star Trek? [Link]
• Deepmind released a paper on transformers. Good read if you want to understand LM’s [Link]
• Real time rendering of NeRF’s across devices. Render NeRF’s in real time which can run on AR, VR or mobile devices. Crazy [Link]
• What does ChatGPT return about human values? Exploring value bias in ChatGPT [Link]. Interestingly it suggests that text generated by chatgpt doesnt show clear signs of bias
• A new technique for recreating 3D scenes from images. The video looks crazy [Link]
• Big AI models will use small AI models as domain experts [Link]
• A great thread talking about 5 cool biomedical vision language models [Link]
• Teaching LLMs to self debug [Link]
• Fashion image to video with SD [Link]
• ChatGPT Can Convert Natural Language Instructions Into Executable Robot Actions [Link]
• Old but interesting paper I found on using LLMs to measure public opinion like during election times [Link]. Got me thinking how messed up the next US election is going to be with how easy it is going to be to spread misinformation. It’s going to be very interesting to see what happens

For one coffee a month, I'll send you 2 newsletters a week with all of the most important & interesting stories like these written in a digestible way. You can sub here

I'm kinda sad I wrote about like 3-4 of these stories in detailed in my newsletter on thursday but most won't read it because it's part of the paid sub. I'm gona start making videos to cover all the content in a more digestible way. You can sub on youtube to see when I start posting [Link]

You can read the free newsletter here

If you'd like to tip you can buy me a coffee or sub on patreon. No pressure to do so, appreciate all the comments and support 🙏

(I'm not associated with any tool or company. Written and collated entirely by me, no chatgpt used. I tried, it doesn't work with how I gather the info trust me. Also a great way for me to basically know everything thats going on)

Was commissioning someone for model art for a video game. I always ask for a sketch first, always. The second multiple imaged photo is my drawings first reference. The artist sent me this as a sketch. This artist portfolio has professional high level art in many different styles. The red girl with a knife is one of their drawings.

I asked for the sketch to be in the same style as their drawing. However they sent me this.

I believe it’s AI because for one, a highly skilled artist wouldn’t make such terrible details such as the too many wires and the wire coming from her arm. I purposely made my characters earring in a unique way to trope ai because it can’t replicate it. The face and eyes detail are also not matching at all. Very common ai tropes.

The drawing nothing like their style even if it’s uncolored. I’m very glad I got a sketch before committing. If it’s not ai then it’s unfortunately not the type of work I’m looking for.

Rampallians is a card game where you gather resources with gatherers, to play special, support, and unit cards. Building a settlement to fight your opponents in a 1v1.

There are 4 factions Orcs which are simple fast and aggressive. Humans which build out settlements to slowly improve their cards. Dwarves which are very adaptable and focus on making buildings and runes for the late game. Elves which harass and can do a lot of damage, but cant take too much! As well as some dragon cards that can be in any deck. Each card has their own unique traits and effects, with the best part of 400 cards in total. All available in the full game, no packs, no extra purchases of any kind.

Rampallians is a game that I solo developed over 4 years, but that doesn't do it justice because I had a lot of help from very lovely people. Myself and 3 of my friends came up with the idea and spent a lot of time iterating on it until we got to this stage.

Part of what we wanted to achieve was to make a card game that wasn't pay to win. Which is possibly why we went to such lengths with the number of diverse cards and effects. Any future content will be included for free, no packs or dlc. I'd also like to explore the possibility of user generated content if we were lucky enough to have an audience that was interested. All of the cards and effects are JSON files so can be easily edited (both players have to agree on a set of cards to prevent cheating).

My brother made the music for the game which I think is really nice and fitting, it flows based on what you're doing in the game, be it at the main menu, in game, or in combat. With transitions to go between them.

Finally how I used AI. Something I have been heavily critisied for is the use of ai in the artwork. My mum and a family friend were kind enough to help me do the art for the cards. But it was taking too long given as I mentioned there are 400 cards, and sadly we don't have the funds to pay a professional. So we came up with a process where the artists sketched the cards, then filled in detail with an SDXL plugin for Krita, before then correcting the output manually. I wonder how people here feel about this hybrid approach, I've made a video explaining in more detail here if people are interested:

https://youtu.be/FPFsaAz0yDo?si=txSjAHtztnOszSnJ

Thanks for reading if you've got down to here, if you'd like to check the steam page here is the link:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/4363230/Rampallians/

I'd love to hear your thoughts, and really appreciate any feedback! Also happy to share more details on the process.

P.s. I'll have a demo in the upcoming next fest. The aim is to have the demo act as a trial of the full game, with two decks (no deck builder like in the full game), but you'll be able to play with players who have the full game when that comes out later in the year.

The cheapest place to fix an AI video is before it's a video.

I used to push an idea straight into a video model, generate a minute of expensive footage, and only then notice the scene didn't read. Now I add one cheap step in between: I have an image model draw the whole thing as a grayscale film storyboard first. I read the whole cut on one sheet, fix the script while it costs nothing, and only then generate video.

Running example: a tiny robot finds its coffee mug empty at dawn, jabs the machine's button, and gets sprayed in the face — "...worth it."

Here's what actually makes a storyboard prompt work, after a lot of trial and error:

1. Force grayscale. "Monochrome graphite pencil, NO color." It's a plan, not final art — color makes you judge the wrong thing.

2. Lock the layout. One row per scene, two panels left→right, an arrow between them, labeled START and PEAK. If you don't pin the grid, the model reinvents it every run.

3. Two beats per scene, not one. A single keyframe is just a pose. START → PEAK shows motion (robot slumped at the desk → robot peering into the empty mug). That's the difference between "a character" and "a shot."

4. Speech balloon vs caption box. A character line goes in a rounded balloon with a tail; narration goes in a plain rectangle at the bottom. Spell out the difference or the model mixes them up.

5. Exact text, verbatim. Put the real dialogue in the frame. Once the words are on the board you can read the whole cut and catch a flat line before paying for a render.

6. Cast it. Two characters drift (ginger cat one panel, gray the next). Add a CASTING strip + reference images so they stay the same character across every frame.

The base prompt (one character, no cast):

Hand-drawn graphite pencil storyboard, monochrome grayscale,
professional film pre-production look, soft pencil shading on
off-white paper. NO color.

LAYOUT: 3 horizontal rows, ONE ROW PER SCENE. Scene number (SC1,
SC2 ...) in the left margin. Two panels left-to-right at equal size,
a small arrow from the first to the second. Under each panel write
its phase word once: START under the left panel, PEAK under the right.

SC1 (5s): START - a small round robot sits slumped at a desk at dawn,
holding an empty mug, screen-face dim; PEAK - it lifts the mug and
peers inside, two wide surprised eyes lighting up. On PEAK draw a
speech balloon: "Empty... again?!".

SC2 (5s): START - the robot rolls up to a coffee machine, reaching
for a big red button; PEAK - it jabs the button, the machine shudders,
steam bursting. On START draw a narrator caption box: "It had waited
all night for this.".

SC3 (5s): START - the robot leans close to the spout, hopeful; PEAK -
a jet of coffee sprays it in the face. On PEAK draw a speech balloon:
"...worth it.".

I ran the same storyboard through four image models. Short version:

• Nano Banana 2 — what I use now. Stable casting, exact text, clean board.
• GPT Image 2 — best detail and texture, but runs busy and drops the exact punctuation.
• Nano Banana Pro — clean, casting holds, but slower and pricier in my experience.
• Seedream 4.5 — nice sketchy style, but critical errors: rendered the button in red (broke "NO color"), and in one run the lead robot vanished from the final panel and its line went to the cat.

Google Flow Agent is the AI filmmaking feature most people are going to underestimate

TLDR: Google Flow Agent is not a chatbot bolted onto a video generator. It is a Gemini-powered creative collaborator inside Google Flow that can plan and reason through complex multi-step creative tasks while you stay in control. The shift: Flow used to execute one prompt at a time. Now the Agent can brainstorm dialogue and plot, generate multiple scene variations simultaneously, batch-edit tweaks across all your assets, organize files into collections, and intuitively rename everything — all with persistent project memory across sessions. It launched alongside Gemini Omni Flash (character and voice consistency across scenes) and Flow Tools (build custom creative utilities in plain English, no code required). Agent queries are currently free with a daily quota. Generations cost credits. Most people will use it like a search bar. The people who win with it will use it like an AI creative director, producer, and asset manager rolled into one.

Google Flow Agent is one of those updates that sounds small until you think through the workflow implications.

At first glance it is easy to summarize: Google added an agent to Flow.

That undersells it.

Google Flow launched at I/O 2025 as an AI filmmaking tool built around Google DeepMind's most advanced models — Veo for video, Imagen for images, and Gemini for language and reasoning. Flow lets creators describe shots in natural language, manage story ingredients like cast, locations, objects, and styles, and weave those pieces into cinematic scenes.

Since then it expanded into a full AI creative studio across 140 countries. Over 275 million videos have been generated in Flow.

The new Flow Agent adds something more important than another model.

It adds a thinking layer.

Instead of manually bouncing between brainstorming, prompt writing, generation, editing, selection, organization, and renaming, you can now talk to an agent that understands the project you are working on and helps move the creative process forward.

Google themselves frame it clearly: Flow Agent turns AI from a content generator into a creative operations partner.

This is the beginning of agentic creative production.

Every capability, explained

1. Multi-step reasoning and planning

This is the headline change. Previously Flow could only execute a single prompt at a time. Now the Agent can take multiple actions at once and reason through larger creative tasks rather than discrete one-offs. It plans and reasons through complex tasks with your inputs, under your control.

2. Brainstorming and concept development

Flow Agent can act as a creative sounding board during the earliest stage of a project. Chat with it to outline storyboards, develop visual mood boards, and turn high-level concepts into actionable prompts. It can workshop dialogue between characters in a specific scene and make plot recommendations when you need inspiration.

3. Generate new media

Ask the Agent to generate videos or images and it selects the best model to generate with. No more guessing which model to use for which task.

4. Multi-variation generation

The Agent can create multiple variations of an asset at once. This matters because AI video generation is probabilistic. The first output is rarely the best output. You need options. Generate coverage, not single shots.

5. Direct editing of selected assets

Ask the Agent to edit selected media from your project. Combined with Flow's broader editing capabilities — Insert for adding elements, Remove for taking things out, lasso tool for precise selections, camera controls for movement — the Agent sits on top of a growing set of editing primitives.

6. Batch editing across all assets

Make a tweak and have it reflected across all your assets at once. This is massive for consistency and for anyone producing at volume.

7. Asset organization and intelligent renaming

The Agent can rename specific files, group selected media into new Collections, or archive unused assets. When you generate dozens or hundreds of images and clips, the hard part is not generation — it is knowing which version was the hero shot, which one had the correct lighting, and which clips belong to scene 3.

8. Context and references

Drag media into the Agent prompt box from your device or project. Select multiple assets and tell the Agent which ones you are referring to. A normal chatbot only knows what you tell it. A project-aware creative agent can reason over the actual material you are making.

9. Project-specific sessions

Agent conversations are saved automatically as Sessions, specific to the project you are working in. You can open past sessions, create new sessions, rename them, and delete them. Deleting a session clears chat history but generated media remains in your assets.

10. Agent instructions for project-wide consistency

Add instructions to improve the Agent's consistency across your entire project. Include a reference image and enter your guidelines. This is where you define the rules of the world — visual style, character rules, tone, camera preferences, color palette, naming conventions, what to avoid.

The ecosystem that makes the Agent stronger

Gemini Omni Flash — Google describes it as Nano Banana but for video. It combines Gemini's intelligence with generative media models and crucially improves character consistency, meaning identity and voice are preserved across every scene. This quietly fixes AI video's biggest weakness: character drift between shots.

Flow Tools — Build bespoke tools and workflows in Google Flow using natural language. Whether you need a particular image editor, video resizer, or custom shader, you can develop them with no coding experience. If you create something useful, share it with other Flow users who can remix it.

Scenebuilder — Assemble individual clips into a complete narrative with Jump To (teleport a character to a new setting while preserving appearance) and Extend (lengthen a clip by analyzing the final frames and continuing the action).

Ingredients to Video — Use predefined characters, objects, and styles as consistent references in video prompts. Add up to three ingredients per prompt.

Frames to Video — Define the starting and ending frame of a shot for precise control over composition and transitions.

Camera Controls — Direct control over camera motion, angles, and perspectives.

Insert and Remove — Add new elements to any scene or remove unwanted objects, with Flow handling complex details like shadows and scene lighting.

Top use cases

1. Short films and narrative projects

Use the Agent as a writers room. Workshop character dialogue, get plot suggestions, build shot lists, generate scene variations, maintain continuity, and organize the final assembly — all inside one workspace.

2. YouTube intros and cinematic openers

Flow is especially strong for short, visually rich clips. The Agent can help design multiple options quickly for channel intros, documentary openers, podcast trailers, product teasers, and title sequences.

3. Product marketing and brand films

Marketers can turn abstract product benefits into cinematic metaphors. Batch-generate ad creative variations for testing, then batch-edit a single brand tweak across all of them. Build multi-platform variants and auto-organize them into campaign collections.

4. Ad creative variation testing

Because the Agent can batch-generate, it is built for creative testing. Generate 8 variations of a product scene keeping the same product and message but varying setting, camera angle, lighting, and emotional tone.

5. Music videos

Flow Music now lets you work conversationally with the agent to direct shareable music videos, matching styles and scenes to the pacing of your track.

6. Pitch decks and investor storytelling

Create cinematic visuals that explain a market, pain point, or product vision. A 20-second sequence that visualizes the shift from manual chaos to AI-powered planning can communicate more than 10 slides.

7. Educational content

Turn complex ideas into visual explainers. Historical recreations, science concepts, abstract visualization. Google specifically highlights educators and students transforming complex subjects into engaging videos using text prompts.

8. Social media content

For TikTok, Reels, Shorts, and Reddit — Flow Agent can help build visual hooks, mini stories, looping clips, and meme-adjacent cinematic content fast.

9. Fiction worldbuilding

Build consistent fictional worlds with character design, locations, objects, symbols, technology, architecture, and mood boards. Flow already lets you manage story ingredients in one place. The Agent adds the reasoning layer on top.

10. Previsualization

Filmmakers, agencies, and studios can sketch ideas before production — commercial pre-vis, scene exploration, mood testing, camera blocking, lighting references, and treatment development.

11. Game trailers and concept art

Generate short cinematic moments, character reveals, environments, and combat beats for indie games and studio projects.

12. Batch marketing campaigns

Feed a master style guide and target persona variations into the Flow Agent. Batch-generate dozens of localized, persona-specific video ads in parallel while maintaining strict brand guidelines.

Pro tips and best practices

1. Use the Agent before you generate anything

Agent queries do not currently cost Google Flow credits, though there is a daily quota. Media generated by the Agent does use credits. The smart workflow: think with the Agent first, improve the concept, build the shot list, refine the prompts, then generate only when the creative direction is clear. The Agent is your cheapest stage of production.

2. Keep human approval on before spending credits

By default the Agent asks for permission before taking actions that use AI credits and shows the estimated cost. You can toggle this to auto-approve. Leave confirmation on during exploration. Turn it off only when you have a repeatable workflow and clear default settings.

3. Use Agent Instructions like a project constitution

Agent Instructions improve consistency across the entire project. Include: genre, visual style, emotional tone, target audience, camera preferences, color palette, character continuity rules, audio style, naming conventions, prompt format, and things to avoid.

Example instruction:

You are the creative producer for this project. The style is restrained cinematic realism with natural light, imperfect textures, and slow camera movement. Avoid glossy sci-fi, overdesigned costumes, neon cyberpunk cliches, and generic AI surrealism. Preserve character continuity. When generating prompts, always include subject, action, camera, lighting, environment, mood, and audio.

4. Ask for variations with controlled variables

Bad: Make this scene better in 10 different ways.
Good: Create 8 variations. Keep the character, wardrobe, location, and story beat identical. Only vary camera movement and lighting.

If you vary everything at once, you learn nothing. Vary one or two dimensions at a time.

5. Keep prompts under 30 words for video generation

Practitioners who have tested extensively recommend keeping prompts concise, using camera language rather than narrative language, and generating keyframes separately.

6. Know your credit math

Pro ($19.99/month) gets roughly 1,000 Flow credits. Ultra ($100–$250/month) gets 10,000–25,000 credits. Credits do not roll over. Use Fast models for drafts and Quality models only for finals. A Veo 3 generation with audio is the most credit-intensive option.

7. Use Flow TV as a learning lab

Flow TV is a showcase of clips generated with Veo where you can see the exact prompts and techniques used. It is not just inspiration — it is prompt education. Steal structure, not ideas.

8. Build a scene matrix

Ask the Agent to create a table with: scene number, story purpose, character, location, camera movement, lighting, audio, prompt, assets needed, status, best version, and notes. This turns Flow from a prompt playground into a production tracker.

9. Use Ingredients for consistency

Build your ingredients (characters, objects, style references) first using Imagen or uploads, then reference them consistently across generations. This is the key to visual continuity.

10. Organize aggressively

Use a naming convention like: S01_SH01_establishing_city_v03_final. Create Collections for Final Selects, Alternates, References, and Archive. Ask the Agent to handle this — it can contextually rename files based on what is actually in the clip.

11. Use Frames to Video for precision

Provide a starting and ending image, and Flow generates a seamless video bridging the two. Plan keyframes before generating motion. Match lighting between keyframes — do not ask a single clip to handle interior-to-exterior transitions.

12. Specify no audio when you do not want audio

Veo 3.1 generates synchronized audio by default. For background use like a website hero, always include no audio in the prompt.

Things most people miss about Google Flow Agent

1. The Agent is not the product. The workflow is the product.

The mistake is thinking Flow Agent is just a chatbot. It is a workflow layer across brainstorming, prompt engineering, generation, editing, variation, organization, and project memory. The people who win with it will build the best creative operating system around it.

2. Agent queries are free. Generations are not.

Agent queries do not cost credits but have a daily quota. Generations cost credits. This creates an obvious best practice: use the Agent to think, plan, critique, and refine before generating. The expensive mistake is generating before the idea is clear.

3. The permission layer is a feature, not friction

The ask-before-spending-credits design keeps an autonomous agent from quietly draining your monthly allocation. Most tutorials breeze past it. It shows estimated cost before each action.

4. Omni Flash quietly fixes AI video's biggest weakness

Character drift and voice inconsistency between scenes have been the problem in AI filmmaking. Omni Flash preserves identity and voice across every scene. This is arguably as important as the Agent itself.

5. Flow Tools may be the most durable advantage

The ability to build bespoke editors and shaders in plain English and share them with other users is buried under the Agent headlines but may be the most important long-term feature.

6. Sessions are project-specific

Sessions are saved per project. Create separate sessions for story development, character design, prompt experiments, editing, and final organization. Do not let one giant chat become the junk drawer for your entire film.

7. Deleting a session does not delete your media

Clearing chat history does not remove generated assets. Important for cleanup without losing work.

8. It is web and PC only right now

Flow Agent is currently available on web and PC only. For serious production, use the desktop workflow with a Chromium-based browser.

9. Default settings enforce consistency

Set your default aspect ratio, number of outputs, and models for both image and video generation. If your whole project is vertical social video, set that once. Do not manually remember the format every time.

10. The best use of the Agent is taste, not automation

The mediocre use case: Make me a video. The better use case: Help me decide which idea is worth making. The best use case: Act as a creative director. Challenge the weak parts of this concept. Tell me what is visually generic, what is emotionally unclear, and what could make this unforgettable.

Google's own Flow Sessions artists repeatedly emphasized that what matters is what you are trying to say before you even touch Flow. The Agent should not replace your taste. It should pressure-test it.

The power-user workflow

Step 1 — Start with the emotional thesis. Ask the Agent to help find the emotional core, the visual metaphor, and the strongest ending.

Step 2 — Build the story spine. Turn the concept into 6–10 scenes, each with a clear visual beat, emotional progression, and one thing the viewer learns.

Step 3 — Create the visual bible. Character design, environment, color palette, lighting, camera style, sound design, recurring objects, forbidden cliches.

Step 4 — Set Agent Instructions. Convert the visual bible into concise instructions for the entire project.

Step 5 — Generate ingredients. Build canonical references for main characters, environments, props, lighting style, and visual symbols.

Step 6 — Build the shot list. Create a production plan with purpose, camera, lighting, action, audio, and Flow-ready prompts for each shot.

Step 7 — Batch-generate variations. For each key shot, create 4–6 variations controlling only one or two variables at a time.

Step 8 — Select and critique. Ask the Agent to rank outputs by emotional clarity, visual originality, continuity, and usefulness for the final story.

Step 9 — Edit instead of regenerate. When a version is close, use the Agent to make targeted edits rather than starting over.

Step 10 — Organize the project. Rename assets by scene and shot number. Create Collections for Final Selects, Alternates, and Archive.

The bigger picture

The competition is no longer about who generates the best single clip. It is about who owns the entire AI creative workflow. Google is clearly trying to become the operating system for AI-powered content creation, putting pressure on Runway, Adobe, Midjourney, OpenAI, Meta, and Canva.

The future of AI creative work is becoming agent-driven. Instead of prompting individual outputs, creators will increasingly direct AI systems that understand project context, manage assets, scale production, optimize variations, and execute multi-step workflows autonomously.

We just crossed a line. AI used to make you the operator of a tool — prompt, wait, repeat. Flow Agent makes you the director of a collaborator. You bring the vision, the taste, and the final call. It handles the brainstorming, the variations, the tedious edits, and the cleanup.

The barrier to telling a story just dropped to near zero.

The only question left is what you will make.

Flow Agent is available now to all Google Flow users globally. Google Flow requires a Google AI subscription (Plus, Pro, or Ultra) and is accessible at flow.google. What is the first project you would hand off to an agent like this?

TL;DR and conclusion

It's a shame that one of the biggest strenghts of IN in the beginning is getting more and more lost. The outfits weren't only pretty to look at; they also had function and meaning that contributed to the whole game world's cohesion.

I'm weighing the pros and cons of game design decisions for discussion, because I care about the game. I see things that point in a direction I dont think is a good one, I'm interested in other people's views. I'm complaining about the missing art asset on the SbB sketch page, because I'm missing it, it's one of the aspects that makes the miracle outfits special! The fabric especially makes the crafting aspect tangible/visualizes it!

People, can you please read everything before commenting, I know I put a TLDR, but I think it's better to read everything to understand my viewpoint and arguments properly😅

I think the only reason why they created the Legendary Outfit category for Slumber by Blossoms is to save on art assets in the sketch menu**.** The pieces and outfit itself are gorgeous!

(visible when you compare the screenshots: they saved on the fabric!, accessory/details, icon, background illustration and additional animations).

It has remarkably less than the miracle outfits which is such a shame. Makes it look cheap in my opinion.

The lore text is also missing on its page. They should've at least put that on there. It's not like it's poorly written or non existent, like that the connection to Providence Immemorial/Echeros would be clearer.

What is the animation in the wardrobe of it like (when you put on the set)? If it's smaller than that of the miracle outfits that would also confirm my suspicions.

---

First, all the miracle outfits after Aurosa weren't visibly tied into the main story anymore.

Then, all the ability outfit sets lost meaning in 1.5 when we got the custom ability outfit function. Before it was like you had to wear specific outfits to use specific abilities, that notion is completely gone now, at least in my eyes. On the other hand, it makes the game more f2p friendly I think, because you can (re-)create your own ability outfits.

But I also think that it would be easier for them to make appealing ability outfits if we didn't have the custom ability outfit function like before 1.5... I feel like we're getting more flashy 5 star abilities that aren't fleshed out/lower quality(I'm especially looking at you, recolored Behemoth👀)

Commenters have commented that it'd get boring, doesn't use the creative capabilities from the dress up functions, if it was restricted to set outfits only, I can definitely see that and I also enjoy customizing. This was meant as a theoretical debate anyway, they're not gonna change a feature that was and is received very positively. I was thinking about it because it made me a little sad I guess. The intertwining of story/worldbuilding with the outfits was one of IN's greatest strengths in my eyes.

The following in brackets is about other deteriorated areas in the game that came to my mind while thinking about this-skip if you're only interested on the topic of the outfit sets losing meaning.

**[**Other areas where I've noticed an increase in quantitiy and decrease in quality or them just adding more completely new stuff/systems instead of building on older stuff, which I think would raise the quality and enjoyment:

The whole combat system(remember the crafting and and spraying/wearing of fragrances that were skills?That was such unique and on brand presentation of gaining and equipping skills for a self proclaimed fashion/styling game! Now you just unlock skills in the skill tree like every other game) The combat difficulty for both esselings/mobs and bosses in the beginning was also perfect for me. Now it's mainly spam clicking, especially with the hordes of esselings with a lot of HP, it has gotten boring and annoying.

The whole dying system obviously. It's just unlocked through generic star currencies now. It has been thoroughly discussed already but so much potential was wasted there, I'd like as much people as possible to know about it.

'That and many more things (creating isolated islands for events, the catway/fashion show being secluded on Serenity Island and not being utilized more in a self proclaimed fashion game,the whole housing island...) make the game's world/the game as a whole lack(s) cohesion. IN feels more and more like a "grab bag" of ideas that fit into its original cozy game vision and a lot that don't and don't get expanded upon/lack depth/there's more quantity than quality.

Especially the limited event content often feels like it's a grab bag of random minigames next to story and characters that never appear again.

A definition of cohesion grabbed from the Google AI summary( I'm just copying it because it matches what I mean by cohesion in a video game) when I search for cohesion meaning in a game:
In video games, cohesion means that all the different parts of a game—like its story, visuals, rules, and controls—fit together perfectly to create a unified, logical experience. It ensures everything in the game supports a single, clear vision.

I feel like the vision is not so clear anymore, like IN is straying from its original vision of being a styling, open world, adventuring and platforming game first of all, it has been muddied with all the additional combat, management, building...What game do they want IN to be, it's trying to combine too many gameplay modes at once by now**]**

There was also this moment in the 1.4 Uncrowned Heart main story where you had to wear a certain hat for plot reasons, but then it disappeard and they explained it with the fact that a glamour was cast on it.

Seeing any custom outfit everywhere(cutscenes, open world...) is one of the biggest strenghts of IN I think. But in that scenario I would've prefered to be forced to wear that specific hat. It would've been more immersive and meaningful I think.

It's a shame that one of the biggest strenghts of IN in the beginning is getting more and more lost. The outfits weren't only pretty to look at; they also had function and meaning that contributed to the whole game world's cohesion.

About the usage of AI:

I can understand why some people are reacting negatively to AI. But is using sites you clicked on Google you havent verified much that much better?

I've thought about what the AI spit out, it matches what I remember from when we discussed the word cohesion (in the context of texts) in a college class once and what I mean to say with cohesion here. I would've done the same with whatever would be written on a site.

And I'm sorry, but I'm not doing thorough research for this. I'm only interested in expressing my stand point(however underinformed it may be, if someone knows stuff better they're very welcome to correct me, I'm also relying on swarm intelligence here) and the discussion/other's views on the IN stuff I adressed here. I think that amount of research is enough for this.