Fy

@fyscuit

she/her
fyscuit.cafe/

Animator. Divided between a hundred hobbies. Has bees for brains.

When I do art (rare) I post them on this tag:

#fyart

I like doing zines sometimes! Check out my itch for free comics, paid comics, and some non-comics stuff

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Fy @fyscuit8/21/2023, 11:24 PM

Irasutoya now has an AI tool and it's challenging my opinions on what an ethical AI tool could be. If all of Irasutoya's illustrations really are done by the same illustrator, who is the owner of the company himself, and the dataset used was exclusively his own illustrations, then there is no problem with it, right? It's the most ethical application of AI I've seen so far.

But it still rubs me the wrong way. Irasutoya has such a huge variety of free to use illustrations and it's so fun to mash them together like paper dolls to create anything that it feels like a waste having a tool to try to replace the craft. In theory this is what I've been saying AI should strive towards, but I'm still feeling really meh about it. Maybe it's just kinda weird letting computers draw after all.

But anyway, I tried it out and the results are pretty good, so enjoy. "Green haired girl using the computer", AI on web canvas, 2023

I guess computers are just tablets nowadays. I enjoyed it better when I didn't have to hold the screen up Wow, vtubing technology is so real nowadays, it feels like she's coming out of the screen!!! UHM

If i can be honest tho: the monetization models and resource usage bother me more than any discourse about whether it's art or not. The idea that resources are being spent to create garbage pictures to try to salvage a single good one, and that people have been paying more for access of models than commissions/freelance would cost them just for the sake of having a stupid enormous output in an age where the internet is already so bloated... Nothing is enough to sate people anymore, only an endless stream of "content" as quick as it can be provided. I wanna believe in the good the tech can bring, but if it's only to feed this monster we've become then what's the point

#AI art discourse #ai art #irasutoya #its kinda weird to get this deep about irasutoya lol #i have thoughts on the impact this could have in the illustration market but im honestly not knowledgeable enough of the japanese illust industry to give an opinion more relevant than 'vibes'

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in reply to @fyscuit's post:

Tom "Skeletom" Farro @skeletom8/21/2023, 11:50 PM

Oh now THIS is challenging stuff.

Fy @fyscuit8/21/2023, 11:59 PM

It's easy to say "if it was like this it'd be fine" until it actually happens and you have to face what it means hehe. Would love to hear your thoughts on it if you have any

Tom "Skeletom" Farro @skeletom8/22/2023, 12:04 AM

To me it's strange that this guy would try to automate himself out of a job like this. He has such a strong brand, why tarnish it with these half-baked in-betweens?

Fy @fyscuit8/22/2023, 12:47 AM

Ooooo yeah, this is something I avoided thinking about because it's so charged haha.
His whole business model is offering art for free for the general public and charging for bigger publications/heavy use, and doing specific illustrations for IPs on the side. The big clients will probably keep commissioning him in order to keep quality and likeness of character, so I think this is just a way of getting an extra buck from the public that only use it for free.
Now how it feels to him as an artist, to automate his own work like this? I have no idea. That's too much detachment for me

Blackberry Mochi @Blackberry-Mochi8/21/2023, 11:56 PM

"Maybe it's kinda weird letting computers draw after all" is really the biggest point here to me. Like, obviously AI is unethical as hell in nearly all forms, because stealing from artists like that and trying to obviate them is genuinely horrible, especially for those that use their talents to make a living, but like...

It's just so lame, y'know? What AI does that people AREN'T doing is lame as hell to begin with. I started trying to draw right around the time AI art was just a joke and it all looked like fever dreams, but then it started looking like real art, and... wowza, it all feels so incredibly lame and disappointing.

It isn't even just that it's cheating, though it ABSOLUTELY IS (amongst those other previously-mentioned things), it's just that... if you aren't actually drawing it, then you didn't care that much, right? It feels like folks reveling in the potential of AI art don't actually care about what they're making, to me, which is really frustrating, as somebody who spends hours and hours trying to use art to get across ideas (or less time just doing a doodle; the two best forms of art!! Maybe??)

Like, my stuff is amateur, I don't know any techniques and complicated coloring/shading is beyond me, but... I mean, putting effort into making some idea/vision real, no matter the quality, is extremely cool to me. Always has been!! Even before I started drawing!!! And using AI completely negates the effort part!!! Which is genuinely one of the most valuable parts of art, I think!!! Just looking at something somebody drew and imagining the effort that went into it AND APPRECIATING IT!!!

There is, of course, as displayed here, the fact that AI inevitably isn't perfect and won't ever be able to perfectly match what you want from it, but I just think the laziness and apathy involved in the process of using AI is so crummy. In this scenario, that's the biggest problem, I think. With nearly everything else, ethical concerns are absolutely more important (this garbage is obviously taking so much work away from folks, whether it's AI images or AI writing or whatever other form), but the fundamental lack of interest in art that AI-users seem to have is just so... miserable.

...Anyway hi, I rambled a little!!! AI is evil. That's all.

Fy @fyscuit8/22/2023, 12:29 AM

(disclaimer: my parents both dabbled in contemporary art in a way or another, so I have -very- complex feeling about what "art" is)

I have a bit of a different stance on it from most artists because I don't think craft and effort are necessarily what makes or breaks it. To me AI is more akin to those avatar/doll makers; it's about the results and not the process, but that doesn't necessarily detract from the value it has to whoever made it. I don't like to write off the desire to create something just because it's using shortcuts - there's people using use to make a quick buck fooling people, there are industries using it to throw their talents in the trash, but there's also a lot of people who are just using it to feel the joy of creating something, and I feel it's too entitled to just ignore that that -desire- is genuine, even if misguided.

But while I take this stance there's a lot of these so called AI artists coming to people who honed their craft for years and whose art fed those toys they love and telling them to give up making art, because it's useless fighting against it. So whatever sympathy I have is misguided as well. Like you said, the laziness and apathy of it all is what kills it.

In a better world where these tools were created ethically, and there was respect for the craft that fed these tools, I could see it being used by people to leverage what they're missing, to support art pipelines and make people's life easier but not take the creation out of their hands. But current end goal is to have complete control over everything and exclude every outside input without any effort.

tl;dr I appreciate the tech and I think we could all play along, but everyone making these tools and using it have chosen violence

And to address your journey with art: I think an important thing about making art is to enjoy the process and not focus on the end result. If you enjoy learning, if you're kind with yourself every step of the journey and allow yourself to be proud of how far you've come, there's no AI or magic tech that can take your joy away from you. And honestly you improve a lot faster when you're having fun with learning stuff rather than trying to make something good!
At the end of the day whatever you make will be 100x times more valuable regardless how perfectly rendered the AI stuff is, because its part of you and your learning journey

Blackberry Mochi @Blackberry-Mochi8/22/2023, 12:47 AM

I suppose I was being a lil narrow with my statements there yaaa. After posting and going for a quick walk, I was like "but some folks just can't" (literally was thinking of avatar generators and othersuch tools that create things with a very limited scope, pff), but, y'know, what I wrote was already kinda rambly.... EITHER WAY THOUGH, YES. Absolutely agree that there IS a benefit to AI art for folks who are limited in their ability to, y'know, express. I think if it gives folks joy in that sorta way, that's cool as hell.

And I probably should've rephrased the "effort is a part of what makes your art valuable" bit 'cause!!! I mean. I certainly don't think approximating the worth of art/yourself based on how much You Make Yourself Do Something Creative is very healthy at all, and art, first and foremost, should just be something you do because it's fun and you have ideas, as you said (that's how I started drawing for sure!!! Going "well this looks extremely bad, BUT I had fun and drew what I wanted to draw, so I win"). I was more or less just trying to say "if you made it, that's worth a lot", but!!! Crummy phrasing.

Overall, yeah. It certainly has some genuine joy to offer, and if some folks do, in fact, experience that with AI, that's excellent, even if the whole ethics of the situation are... complicated as hell. It's just, like a lot of things in society that we derive joy from, there's folks who're aggressively trying to commodify it and use it to make money at the expense of, y'know, a lot of things. In the current age, it's really hard to have nice things.

Fy @fyscuit8/22/2023, 1:32 AM

Haha sorry, I wasn't trying to contradict or school you, just had these bottled up feelings because so many artists venerate the concept of effort. I agree with all you said before too - what I was talking about was the hypothetical world I imagine, what you talked about was the disappointing reality we have. The concept of AI isn't inherently evil, but whatever is happening right now definitely is

Blackberry Mochi @Blackberry-Mochi8/22/2023, 4:41 AM

Oh yayaya don't worry, I gotcha. That was more me going "Yeaaah I was thinking about that actually" pff. My wording was kinda bad anyway!!!! But. Yes. AI complicated......

Panko 🍤 Vtuber @karikaripanko8/21/2023, 11:56 PM

You wouldn't AI generate me!!

Fy @fyscuit8/22/2023, 12:30 AM

bet

Mr. Selachidon @MrSelachidon8/22/2023, 4:19 AM

If he has developed this engine and all it's bit's and pieces and is offering it free as a very low quality image generator... I suppose it's alright; it feels like he's selling his soul to devil here but hey, if that's what he wants then who am I to say? The big thing I see is that; he's making cash off it, he gets a say in how it's used, and at the end of the day it's his content that you are using with his permission. Also, while normal folks and joksters can use this program to make some memes and jokes, people who are willing to actually lay down hard money to get a quality product from the artist can use this as a very loose reference for what they want.

I think AI art is trash 99% of the time, and its only real benefit is maybe spit balling ideas or concepts. The moment you try to use it beyond anything more than that, you're going to get laughed out of the room; not to mention, despite everything AI art tries to do, it all tends to look the same.

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