Photographers & AI: Part 2

As was discussed in Part 1, photography has become less of something that needs a professional to make and something much more accessible to everyone.

With AI now able to make something realistic, it has made even bothering to take a photo to post something that doesn’t need to be done. Also, with most people having a smartphone with a camera on it, many people don’t think about others taking photos and don’t see the value in it. Even at a large event like a wedding, some people are just having a friend take photos on their phone instead of hiring a photographer.

AI image generation is now accessible to many people. Want a picture of a person and an animal? Just tell a computer what you want, and it’ll make the image. No need to hire a photographer to take a picture of you and your dog, or needing to hire an actor and someone with the breed of dog you want. There might be extra fingers, toes, or paws; the face doesn’t look good; or the limbs are at a strange angle, but even those issues are starting to disappear as the software learns what is “good” and what isn’t.

It has gotten to the point that many people can’t tell if it’s real or not. I often need to look at an image closely to be able to tell. With people then posting these generated images as if they are a photographer who took a photo of their pet, it makes it even harder on those who are trying to make a living in photography.

What is worse is when the account that is posting the AI image itself is a computer program (often referred to as a bot), often used to scam people who respond. These are filling up social media sites, since it costs whoever is controlling them almost nothing in time, little for the computer power or network connection, and they can flood the services to hopefully trick people into giving personal information and/or money. The personal information often is then sold, which is then used by someone else to try to get money and/or more information.

For the average person, using AI images for their own personal use, when they provide the fact that the image was AI-generated and not a photograph taken by capturing photons. I personally don’t have an issue. I do have an issue when they call it a “shot” or “photo,” trying to lie that it was something they used a camera to take.

Many digital photography programs are now including AI generators. I have used them on my photos to remove a branch or fence and replace it with something more natural. BUT the root image is a photograph I did take.

For me, AI generative fill is a tool to assist a photographer. Full AI image generation is a toy.

As I talked about on Authors and AI, the background of the copyright of the AI use is hard:

• Copyright laws are complex, with AI images not being able to be protected
• Content used to make the data, which is used by the software to generate the image, is rarely shared, so I don’t know if any of it used images that were copyright protected without permission.