Is it wrong to use ai art?

[Corty]

Wait, artists don't do this when you commission them? I don't see anything unreasonable about that, it just sounds like common sense, the commissioner should be involved with the making of the commission as much as the artist.

I asked my friend to drew my cover photo for me and he just kept asking me questions, sending me sketches and I told him what to change until it looked how I wanted it to look like. But I just assumed all artists did this when you commission them. I mean, no matter how much detail and info you initially give them, they can't possibly do it exactly how you imagined it, unless they ask you questions while sending you sketches and receiving feedback on it.

Most commissions have a limit on how many reworks an artist is willing to do and anything after that is only available after paying more fees.

 

[Tyranomaster]

I'm going to go on a little rant here, so I apologize for that.

Copyright law is a modern invention (1710). It was designed to help allow authors to turn a profit. Essentially, with the printing press coming into existence, books were becoming cheaper to make, and so an author might pen a book, then someone would copy the book and sell it, making it hard for the author to make money.

Fast forward to today, and we have copyright on everything. Even nebulous concepts. Its absolutely ridiculous, and many countries don't respect copyright. Now, don't get me wrong, I think copyright in some degree is useful. I think direct copying, or minor changes to existing pieces rebranded is bad for everyone. In a world where mass production and reproduction is possible, some degree of direct copyright is the only way to incentivize creation of new ideas.

For example: The Harry Potter books in their entirety, in any language, should be under copyright protection. Any updates or basic grammatical changes should also fall under that copyright. In my opinion extended HP Universe (Same magic system, basic landmarks etc) should not fall under that copyright in my opinion, as long as the producer doesn't claim to be JK Rowling.

People should be able to make Micky Mouse fan fiction and sell it, in my opinion, as long as it doesn't directly involve existing portions of the copyright (it can't just be a few scenes inserted in an existing work).

Now, onto the actual crux of the AI discussion. AI artwork. Boy howdy does it make artists upset. I don't blame them, I heard recently that commission work is down something like 50%. The honest artists accept that this is part of life now, and argue rightfully that the quality and consistency of AI art doesn't beat an artist. I agree with them on that. If I'm producing a professional work, AI art won't cut it for repeated images of one character in different scenes (Don't get me wrong, AI art can actually do this, but it'll take you hundreds, if not thousands, of hours of work, so for the most part, just pay an artist. You'd have to generate about a hundred very high quality versions of your character that are all consistent, then go back and train a LoRA on that character, and you could maybe then generate consistent images to use throughout the novel.).

The other arguments against it are all flawed. Or at least all the ones I've seen are flawed. Here are a few.

"It was trained on my images without my consent!": Guess what? ALMOST ALL ARTISTS TRAINED ON OTHER ARTIST'S WORK WITHOUT THEIR CONCENT. If you, as an artist viewed other art, and to any degree liked some parts of it, you have now trained on another artists work without their express consent. That is how learning works. IF courts were to decide this was a problem from AI companies, I'd be willing to bet massive class action lawsuits would come up suing any artist that shares some degree of similarity with an older artist, because they also trained under the same rules.

"It'll make it impossible for artists to make money!": And? We didn't reopen coal mines, we shut down seamstresses, blacksmiths, the whaling industry, the horse and buggy industry, and countless others. We've settled this issue as society. We don't care if an industry disappears for convenience. However, if you look closely, all those industries do still exist, they're just much, much smaller.

"It sometimes produces almost exact duplicates of existing images!": First, everyone who argues this is disingenuous about it. They tried, very, VERY, hard to make it generate the near copy. Which, DUH, you can ask artists to do this too. Hell, we mass produce copies of images all the time. Either by just screenshotting a picture, or through an actual printer. We even have artists who specialize in making replicas of other artist's styles.

If anyone has others, feel free to throw them up so I can shoot them down, or maybe you'll change my mind. The genie is out of the bag, and I won't feel bad for using it when everyone else does.

 

[RepresentingWrath]

In a world where mass production and reproduction is possible, some degree of direct copyright is the only way to incentivize creation of new ideas.

 

[melchi]

Using AI art isn't a problem for a free story. The swampy part is when monetization comes into play.

Many of the arguments against AI art also could be used 100 years ago about photography. We know how that turned out.

 

[ChrisLensman]

The ones who complain the loudest about AI art are the reason it's popular in the first place. There are artists out there who charge upwards of 800 bucks for a piece of cover art. And those are the ones who sound most upset about people choosing free AI art instead.

AI art has a very dream-like quality to it. The images usually look great at first glance and the more you look at them the more mistakes you notice. Take this one for example. I love the hair, the face, the pose and especially the expression. It all looks decent to good... And then you notice the eldritch abomination she has in place of a left hand. So yeah, AI art certainly isn't perfect. And while you can spin the wheel until you get the perfect image, it gets frustrating after a certain number of failed tries.
That same sense of dream-like detachment also applies to the process of generating these images in the first place. You basically put in a prompt, cross your fingers and hope the AI behaves. Specific details are right out. Anything that requires consistency is right out. And some words the AI just does not know, though you won't know which words it doesn't know until you start trying.

It still has a long way to go until it can rival actually decent artists but I do believe that AI art looks better than 80% of the people calling themselves "artists" on DeviantArt.
And that is more than good enough for the low low price of 'free'.

Definitely wouldn't publish on Amazon with AI art, though.

 

[Succubiome]

I used to explore that and it's actually not as good compared to a professional book editor, so it really lacks exposure

There's a reason I said "decentish"!

 

[MouseDestruction]

Do you complain about all the mass produced stuff that you own in your house? Probably not. Well that used to be a job.
I'm quite glad for that too, wouldn't own even half of my stuff without it. And now my stories get art that they never would of had.
Progress is great. I can make 1000 pictures in a day if I want, I could have never done that, even if I could draw.

 

[IshiharaNiaoka]

Using AI art isn't a problem for a free story. The swampy part is when monetization comes into play.

Many of the arguments against AI art also could be used 100 years ago about photography. We know how that turned out.

How did it turn out
I se

I'm going to go on a little rant here, so I apologize for that.

Copyright law is a modern invention (1710). It was designed to help allow authors to turn a profit. Essentially, with the printing press coming into existence, books were becoming cheaper to make, and so an author might pen a book, then someone would copy the book and sell it, making it hard for the author to make money.

Fast forward to today, and we have copyright on everything. Even nebulous concepts. Its absolutely ridiculous, and many countries don't respect copyright. Now, don't get me wrong, I think copyright in some degree is useful. I think direct copying, or minor changes to existing pieces rebranded is bad for everyone. In a world where mass production and reproduction is possible, some degree of direct copyright is the only way to incentivize creation of new ideas.

For example: The Harry Potter books in their entirety, in any language, should be under copyright protection. Any updates or basic grammatical changes should also fall under that copyright. In my opinion extended HP Universe (Same magic system, basic landmarks etc) should not fall under that copyright in my opinion, as long as the producer doesn't claim to be JK Rowling.

People should be able to make Micky Mouse fan fiction and sell it, in my opinion, as long as it doesn't directly involve existing portions of the copyright (it can't just be a few scenes inserted in an existing work).

Now, onto the actual crux of the AI discussion. AI artwork. Boy howdy does it make artists upset. I don't blame them, I heard recently that commission work is down something like 50%. The honest artists accept that this is part of life now, and argue rightfully that the quality and consistency of AI art doesn't beat an artist. I agree with them on that. If I'm producing a professional work, AI art won't cut it for repeated images of one character in different scenes (Don't get me wrong, AI art can actually do this, but it'll take you hundreds, if not thousands, of hours of work, so for the most part, just pay an artist. You'd have to generate about a hundred very high quality versions of your character that are all consistent, then go back and train a LoRA on that character, and you could maybe then generate consistent images to use throughout the novel.).

The other arguments against it are all flawed. Or at least all the ones I've seen are flawed. Here are a few.

"It was trained on my images without my consent!": Guess what? ALMOST ALL ARTISTS TRAINED ON OTHER ARTIST'S WORK WITHOUT THEIR CONCENT. If you, as an artist viewed other art, and to any degree liked some parts of it, you have now trained on another artists work without their express consent. That is how learning works. IF courts were to decide this was a problem from AI companies, I'd be willing to bet massive class action lawsuits would come up suing any artist that shares some degree of similarity with an older artist, because they also trained under the same rules.

"It'll make it impossible for artists to make money!": And? We didn't reopen coal mines, we shut down seamstresses, blacksmiths, the whaling industry, the horse and buggy industry, and countless others. We've settled this issue as society. We don't care if an industry disappears for convenience. However, if you look closely, all those industries do still exist, they're just much, much smaller.

"It sometimes produces almost exact duplicates of existing images!": First, everyone who argues this is disingenuous about it. They tried, very, VERY, hard to make it generate the near copy. Which, DUH, you can ask artists to do this too. Hell, we mass produce copies of images all the time. Either by just screenshotting a picture, or through an actual printer. We even have artists who specialize in making replicas of other artist's styles.

If anyone has others, feel free to throw them up so I can shoot them down, or maybe you'll change my mind. The genie is out of the bag, and I won't feel bad for using it when everyone else does.i

I see I see
I do

There's a reason I said "decentish"!

I don't know what that word means ? sorry pls could you explain

eldritch abomination

????

 

[RepresentingSilence]

This like asking if it's wrong to use a car instead of a horse

 

[John_Owl]

It's fine, but it's not like you can copyright it either. So if you ever think about publishing, go get it commissioned. Otherwise have fun.

The water gets a bit murky with what I do. I generate AI art then alter a few things by hand. See, I can't start from a blank canvas and make a masterpiece - I just don't have the talent. BUT I can take an existing artwork and change minor details and keep it looking good. As such, My images are usually about 50-75% AI and about 25-50% my own alterations. for instance, the cover for Dragonbound (look below, in my sig) I bet you can't really tell where my handiwork ends and the AI begins (I did more than just the title/author name).

Wait, artists don't do this when you commission them? I don't see anything unreasonable about that, it just sounds like common sense, the commissioner should be involved with the making of the commission as much as the artist.

I asked my friend to drew my cover photo for me and he just kept asking me questions, sending me sketches and I told him what to change until it looked how I wanted it to look like. But I just assumed all artists did this when you commission them. I mean, no matter how much detail and info you initially give them, they can't possibly do it exactly how you imagined it, unless they ask you questions while sending you sketches and receiving feedback on it.

most artists offer a limited number of reworks. Also, each artist will consider "one rework" differently. I've worked with artists before that said they'll redraw the base picture for each email, so one email is one rework. others will simply change the sent image so each detail you mention is a "rework". so, if I order a commission and reply with an email that says "longer hair, blonde hair, add a scar across the cheek, and tatter up the armor a bit", some artists will say that's 1 rework cause it was all in one email. others will say that its 4 reworks, as it's 4 details that need changing.

the artist I want for my cover art charges $200 per commission, but they offer 3 reworks and count per message, so the above would be 1 total rework. which means that's the most likely to get my business once I can afford it.

 

[Ilikewaterkusa]

I see alot of controversy with ai art. And I don't know if I should hate it or like it. I use ai art for my cover because I like it and I didn't have to pay anything.

I honestly don't have the money to commission art 100$? 1200 cedis? My parents would sk me if I'm mad. I also do not have a graphics tablet to draw one, I honestly wish I did and I've asked my mum to buy. But she always complains. Saying the Amazon purchase and import tax is too much. So I've just lost hope on gaining one.

Stories are sometimes judged based on their cover. So if an uncoloured paper art is there it may seems unprofessional.

Due to my preference I would honestly prefer a coloured art than a paper one, unless the paper is coloured.

Colours here too are expensive as hell due to the inflation.

I understand why alot of authors use ai art. The designs, we don't pay much, it's fun to play with if there's more please say.

I don't hate ai art, but I'd I say I like it too I may get hated. I prefer real art to ai though, that's why I'm learning art.

And when I think about it, this situation is like the ai writers. Who use ai to generate stories than create the story themselves.

It depends on how you use AI stuff

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

Use them. Case law will support the copyright claim of the human behind and not the AI, as our input is the principal actor and not the AI itself.

The AI is just a tool and thus lacks the creative element to create a right in any shape or form.

The AI and their creators have no tenable claim to anything.

 

[Deleted member 84247]

I don't know what that word means ? sorry pls could you explain

"Decentish" of decent quality. That basically means the same as saying "it's pretty alright" or "not bad".

 

[georgelee5786]

no

 

[IshiharaNiaoka]

This like asking if it's wrong to use a car instead of a horse

This like asking if it's wrong to use a car instead of a horse

Cars are faster than foot.

The water gets a bit murky with what I do. I generate AI art then alter a few things by hand. See, I can't start from a blank canvas and make a masterpiece - I just don't have the talent. BUT I can take an existing artwork and change minor details and keep it looking good. As such, My images are usually about 50-75% AI and about 25-50% my own alterations. for instance, the cover for Dragonbound (look below, in my sig) I bet you can't really tell where my handiwork ends and the AI begins (I did more than just the title/author name).

most artists offer a limited number of reworks. Also, each artist will consider "one rework" differently. I've worked with artists before that said they'll redraw the base picture for each email, so one email is one rework. others will simply change the sent image so each detail you mention is a "rework". so, if I order a commission and reply with an email that says "longer hair, blonde hair, add a scar across the cheek, and tatter up the armor a bit", some artists will say that's 1 rework cause it was all in one email. others will say that its 4 reworks, as it's 4 details that need changing.

the artist I want for my cover art charges $200 per commission, but they offer 3 reworks and count per message, so the above would be 1 total rework. which means that's the most likely to get my business once I can afford it.

Damn 200$ and only 3 rework?

That's like 3000 cedis in my country.

Use them. Case law will support the copyright claim of the human behind and not the AI, as our input is the principal actor and not the AI itself.

The AI is just a tool and thus lacks the creative element to create a right in any shape or form.

The AI and their creators have no tenable claim to anything.

I see I see

"Decentish" of decent quality. That basically means the same as saying "it's pretty alright" or "not bad".

Ohh thanks for explaining ?

 

[Deleted member 84247]

AI are more trustworthy than artist. I will only trust an artist if there is a third party involved like Fiverr. That being said I did commission an artist that wasn't on Fiverr too, but the experience of commissioning on those sites have been better. They have reviews from costumers and stuff. I am more likely to trust an artist if I have seen other people comment about them or review their work.

With AI I don't have to worry about all of the stuff that comes from human interaction, but with humans they are more likely to get every specific detail I want.

 

[John_Owl]

Damn 200$ and only 3 rework?

That's like 3000 cedis in my country.

The reason they only offer three reworks is because they send progress notes as they work on it. they only count it as a rework if what you suggest would require a whole new drawing. such as a new pose, a new scene/background, etc.

 

[Sagacious_Punk]

I'm going to go on a little rant here, so I apologize for that.

Copyright law is a modern invention (1710). It was designed to help allow authors to turn a profit. Essentially, with the printing press coming into existence, books were becoming cheaper to make, and so an author might pen a book, then someone would copy the book and sell it, making it hard for the author to make money.

Fast forward to today, and we have copyright on everything. Even nebulous concepts. Its absolutely ridiculous, and many countries don't respect copyright. Now, don't get me wrong, I think copyright in some degree is useful. I think direct copying, or minor changes to existing pieces rebranded is bad for everyone. In a world where mass production and reproduction is possible, some degree of direct copyright is the only way to incentivize creation of new ideas.

For example: The Harry Potter books in their entirety, in any language, should be under copyright protection. Any updates or basic grammatical changes should also fall under that copyright. In my opinion extended HP Universe (Same magic system, basic landmarks etc) should not fall under that copyright in my opinion, as long as the producer doesn't claim to be JK Rowling.

People should be able to make Micky Mouse fan fiction and sell it, in my opinion, as long as it doesn't directly involve existing portions of the copyright (it can't just be a few scenes inserted in an existing work).

Now, onto the actual crux of the AI discussion. AI artwork. Boy howdy does it make artists upset. I don't blame them, I heard recently that commission work is down something like 50%. The honest artists accept that this is part of life now, and argue rightfully that the quality and consistency of AI art doesn't beat an artist. I agree with them on that. If I'm producing a professional work, AI art won't cut it for repeated images of one character in different scenes (Don't get me wrong, AI art can actually do this, but it'll take you hundreds, if not thousands, of hours of work, so for the most part, just pay an artist. You'd have to generate about a hundred very high quality versions of your character that are all consistent, then go back and train a LoRA on that character, and you could maybe then generate consistent images to use throughout the novel.).

The other arguments against it are all flawed. Or at least all the ones I've seen are flawed. Here are a few.

"It was trained on my images without my consent!": Guess what? ALMOST ALL ARTISTS TRAINED ON OTHER ARTIST'S WORK WITHOUT THEIR CONCENT. If you, as an artist viewed other art, and to any degree liked some parts of it, you have now trained on another artists work without their express consent. That is how learning works. IF courts were to decide this was a problem from AI companies, I'd be willing to bet massive class action lawsuits would come up suing any artist that shares some degree of similarity with an older artist, because they also trained under the same rules.

"It'll make it impossible for artists to make money!": And? We didn't reopen coal mines, we shut down seamstresses, blacksmiths, the whaling industry, the horse and buggy industry, and countless others. We've settled this issue as society. We don't care if an industry disappears for convenience. However, if you look closely, all those industries do still exist, they're just much, much smaller.

"It sometimes produces almost exact duplicates of existing images!": First, everyone who argues this is disingenuous about it. They tried, very, VERY, hard to make it generate the near copy. Which, DUH, you can ask artists to do this too. Hell, we mass produce copies of images all the time. Either by just screenshotting a picture, or through an actual printer. We even have artists who specialize in making replicas of other artist's styles.

If anyone has others, feel free to throw them up so I can shoot them down, or maybe you'll change my mind. The genie is out of the bag, and I won't feel bad for using it when everyone else does.

If we get deeper into the rabbit hole, the whole idiocy with IP copyright remaining property of the author until death and 70+ years afterwards and all that jazz, that was instigated in the first half of 20th century by the American corpocracy - Hollywood and Disney (yes, Walt-era's Disney) in particular. They were the ones that pushed legislation for adoption of longer copyright periods, because "muh money, can't get enough! think of the starving artists!", and this was adopted in Europe post-WWII and then in the whole world as we know it today.

Before that? Copyright had the same period as patent inventions - 20 years. After that, you got what you could, and then your art went public domain. Simple as that.

But no, some people just had to put a showstopper on the fountain of creativity itself. Tch, don't you just love mercantile societies?

Imagine aspirin being "copyrighted" the same way as The Lord of the Rings. Or penicillin. Or multivitamin tablets. Or LDC screens and microwaves and 4G. Or ABS on cars. Or the fucking transistor that kicked off the whole electronic revolution.

Yeah, George Orwell's 1984 pales in comparison to such hypothetical scenarios.

Guess we just got lucky it was "merely" art that got the short end of the stick. Oh, wait, scratch that - cultural fracking exists; folk tales and myths co-opting exist; strong-arming and coercing independent artists exists; DMCA exists. And more.

Yeah, enough ranting.

 

[Azure_Fog]

I think AI art is fine and you acknowledge that it is from an AI. Although, if you’re publishing a book I really think you should commission something at that point. Paying for AI art feels wrong.

 

[ZukoMee]

Using AI art for a book cover is fine. Anyone stupid enough to pick that hill to die on should be helped along to their early grave to spare everyone else the unnecessary burden of having to interact with them. They are a waste.

Everybody wants to be a wannabe activist for something nowadays. I swear people are just bored and looking for shit to do for the hell of it.