4 ms·

For what it’s worth (and it’s probably not much), it doesn’t cost that much to commission comic book-style art from an actual artist online. When you do that, t

by rafram 2y ago

For what it’s worth (and it’s probably not much), it doesn’t cost that much to commission comic book-style art from an actual artist online. When you do that, the proceeds go to an artist, not to an AI company that stole from them and a software developer who wrote a wrapper around their API.

warkdarrior 2y ago
Maybe, but then I have to negotiate with the artist, handle their refusal to draw art of my choosing, and wait for their (possibly unpredictable) schedule. AIs mostly avoid these problems.
op00to 2y ago
Didn’t the artist “steal” from artists that came before them by looking at and taking inspiration from their photos? Especially ones that would do such artistic genres as commercial coloring book art?
- jmathai 2y ago
  Yes. But they are people, perhaps with families to feed. Not computers. Cool idea. I can see keeping colored pages of these by my kids up on the fridge a lot longer than what’s on there now!
  - op00to 2y ago
    So it’s ok to steal as long as you are feeding a family with it? :) I get what you’re saying, anyway and it’s an important distinction. I guess what you see as “stealing” I see as inspiration. I also believe that there will be artists who use these new artistic image generation models in ways that are new and interesting just like the first person who used spray paint for graffiti was ripped off by everyone else. It delighted my kids to see themselves depicted in coloring sheets in situation where they are currently interested. There is no world where I would have paid an artist to make these photos, and we would have just colored on blank paper. Again, I get that real people’s content was devoured by these big companies, but at the same time I am much more concerned about bigger issues and would rather focus on getting ahead of AI rather than fighting it.
  - fennecbutt 2y ago
    As a gay dude I don't fall for the "but they have a family" thing, it reminds me that I'm worth less in many eyes for that reason. Anyway, the problem isn't with automation, as per usual it's with animalistic, selfish human beings who would rather hate each other while the rich get richer, rather than vote to implement a well needed framework to set up UBI, proper taxation of corpos, etc. But nah, that person has a different skin colour than mine, that person has different sexual preferences to mine. I do hope the machines take the reigns at some point.
    - jmathai 1y ago
      > As a gay dude I don't fall for the "but they have a family" thing, it reminds me that I'm worth less in many eyes for that reason. I don't think you're worthless at all. And families come in many shapes and forms.
      - fennecbutt 1y ago
        Thanks <3
paulcole 2y ago
If this person’s service was to pay human artists $24 for a 23 page custom coloring book you’d be crying on here about them not paying human artists enough. Almost nobody is paying $100 or more for a custom 5-page coloring book. This service isn’t taking work from human artists.
13_9_7_7_5_18 2y ago
[dead]
richardw 2y ago
My opinion isn’t fully formed but I currently think either all content producers have a claim (potentially workable as eg a discount), or only those who contribute should get access to AI’s. And by all I mean the AI companies owe a huge debt to all humans who wrote or designed or drew anything. The vast majority of the benefit of this technology relies on volume: the billions of pages and lines of code we wrote for other humans, but have now been repurposed. This technology relies on bulk, which was mainly unprofessional or freely given content, by those who intended it for other humans. It was not 100% built only on the output of the few who charge for their exquisite words or designs, even if their output is higher quality. Alternatively, let the AI companies go for it but everyone who uses any kind of AI should understand that they’re standing on the shoulders of the millions of developers and nonprofessional writers whose work has now been repurposed. Not the few artists and journalists. So those artists and journalists should both refuse to contribute to, and use, AI. * I’ve written very little of this useful content, but would be happy to pay my share to those that have built what we have. I also turn off training on my content, but I pay a lot for models. Feel free to help me think through this with comments of your own.
- jfengel 2y ago
  I am following a similar mental path. I feel like the AI companies should be paying some sort of tariff on their output, going towards everyone on the planet who contributed anything at all. I don't think you can account for it more finely than that.
  - richardw 2y ago
    Yup, it feel similar to mining. The models are a transformation of the underlying content. The content is owned by “us”. A mining company can come in and transform rock into iron but it owes something to the grantors of the mining rights. There is certainly a contribution in improving how the body of work is represented but we treat the “AI” as the smarts, when really it’s a lens on the collective knowledge we have built. You can make the lens better, bit not claim ownership of the body of work. Right now that’s what’s happening, with a few edge cases for artists and publishers.
jstummbillig 2y ago
If it does not cost that much, that is obviously because the artist is too cheap. If you find that to be a preferable equilibrium, that's a choice I guess, but I find it fairly ironic in light of the purported motivation.
bix6 2y ago
This is a cool technological feat but what is the cost to humanity and its artists? Some of these replies seem rather dismissive to the artists’ plight.
- nxm 2y ago
  “learn to code”
  - bix6 2y ago
    Just code the food!
- ipaddr 2y ago
  Cost is nothing because this service isn't offered currently. No income lost and might spark an interest in coloring books which grows the artist's income. Artists have been around and existed in more repressive societies throughout time. The best art is usually produced from the greatest struggle. Artists will engage and create art in this new world. The cost of not providing a new surface for artists to explore is what kills art.
  - qotgalaxy 2y ago
    [dead]
  - bix6 2y ago
    How does buying an AI generated coloring book lead to more sales for the artist that doesn’t offer AI generated coloring books?
- ronsor 2y ago
  They're dismissive because we've had the same moral panics before with the introduction of photography, then sound recordings, and then digital art tools, and then vector art, and then 3D, and also the Internet to an extent, and... You can see where this is going, right? In the end, humanity and even artists will be fine overall, even if the world changes.
calebio 2y ago
Usually when you commission something you're asking the artist to do art and create something unique with their own artistic flair... not just line-trace an existing photo. The intention and cost of something like that is not at all comparable to what is being offered here.
ipaddr 2y ago
In fairness no artists are advertising a personal coloring book. The time, effort and cost would put this out of reach for 99.99 of people. No artists are losing income because of this and no industry is being upended. This is a new product that's available because of a technology advanced. Why the focus the artist? Everytime you order in food online you take away a tip from a host, server, bartender and take away a job from a person who answers a phone. Why focus on artists when so many have been affected by technology.
- Something1234 2y ago
  And yet there’s plenty of adult coloring books made by a human out there if you’re willing to go to a brick and mortar shop. Got a super cool one from dick blicks, with a lot of underwater scenes. Also paper quality is important. I can’t imagine getting as far as I did in mine if it was newspaper
  - saretup 2y ago
    That’s because those are not personalized. The economy of scale allows for artists to make generic coloring book with high quality art, but it’s expensive for artists to create (and customers to buy) custom made coloring books personalized for the customers photos.
  - jen729w 2y ago
    My partner makes one! Go grab a copy if you're in Australia, the wonderful POP local -- started as POP Canberra -- sells them. https://www.poplocal.com.au/product/bum-man-colouring-book/ https://www.poplocal.com.au/product/bum-man-colouring-book/ He's 'Bum Man'. A man (actually it's asexual) who is a bum. I mean c'mon.
    - giarc 2y ago
      Looks cool, but they should show more of the pages online. All I see is the (already coloured) front cover.
- seeEllArr 2y ago
yieldcrv 2y ago
Those transactions never would have happened, and never will happen.
thehappypm 2y ago
I can get ChatGPT to do this for literally free. Even in the free tier, I can get a couple images per day.
patch_collector 2y ago
I tried to do exactly that once. I was offering between $20-$40 per image to make a few coloring pages as a mother's day gift for my wife. Not complex images either -- just basic coloring pages from photos of my wife and child, without backgrounds, for my kids to color in. I reached out to multiple artists, and got one image back (from a good friend). I gave up on commissioning actual artists, and traced the images myself on a tablet. I imagine someone with the right knowledge of where to find artists and the willingness to wait on their schedule could have done it faster, but I'd have used this service if it had been around.
darajava 2y ago
I can't imagine how much it would cost to commission an artist to do a whole coloring book and then organize them and send them to print but it's a good point. AI is never going to be as good as a real commissioned artist, but this idea makes having something similar far more accessible to a lot of people.
- fennecbutt 2y ago
  AI will exceed the capabilities of human beings in any task given enough time. Sure, not now. Not tomorrow. But less than 1000 years from now? Definitely, imo.
fennecbutt 2y ago
Lmao yes it does. Wtf. I'm a furry, I commission a decent bit of art and furry artists (unless they're super popular) tend to actually be much cheaper than normies. Commissioning a comic is >$100 for a page, from a popular artist at least several hundred. And that's also for personal use with no commercial rights whatsoever - it's actually an impasse because they technically still own the art, you technically own the character in the art, so it's in licensing purgatory, which is fine for conbadges, smut, icons and whatnot. I used to work at an agency that shared a floor with an art studio, commercial rights for art, especially something as complex as a comic page can easily run into $1-10k or more. Don't get me wrong, artists deserve the money they get, but as with everything that gets automated, there's a financial incentive to do so. Inb4 someone drops all the etsy links of sellers doing AI art as well or (as has been done for a loooong time) using a non-ml based filter to achieve the same thing. There are definitely cheap-er options available from Brazil, China, Venezuela etc (same as fursuit commissions) but that's also another interesting topic in relation to ai; we already outsource heavily.

by rafram 2y ago

warkdarrior 2y ago

Maybe, but then I have to negotiate with the artist, handle their refusal to draw art of my choosing, and wait for their (possibly unpredictable) schedule. AIs mostly avoid these problems.

op00to 2y ago

Didn’t the artist “steal” from artists that came before them by looking at and taking inspiration from their photos? Especially ones that would do such artistic genres as commercial coloring book art?

jmathai 2y ago
Yes. But they are people, perhaps with families to feed. Not computers. Cool idea. I can see keeping colored pages of these by my kids up on the fridge a lot longer than what’s on there now!
- op00to 2y ago
  So it’s ok to steal as long as you are feeding a family with it? :) I get what you’re saying, anyway and it’s an important distinction. I guess what you see as “stealing” I see as inspiration. I also believe that there will be artists who use these new artistic image generation models in ways that are new and interesting just like the first person who used spray paint for graffiti was ripped off by everyone else. It delighted my kids to see themselves depicted in coloring sheets in situation where they are currently interested. There is no world where I would have paid an artist to make these photos, and we would have just colored on blank paper. Again, I get that real people’s content was devoured by these big companies, but at the same time I am much more concerned about bigger issues and would rather focus on getting ahead of AI rather than fighting it.
- fennecbutt 2y ago
  As a gay dude I don't fall for the "but they have a family" thing, it reminds me that I'm worth less in many eyes for that reason. Anyway, the problem isn't with automation, as per usual it's with animalistic, selfish human beings who would rather hate each other while the rich get richer, rather than vote to implement a well needed framework to set up UBI, proper taxation of corpos, etc. But nah, that person has a different skin colour than mine, that person has different sexual preferences to mine. I do hope the machines take the reigns at some point.
  - jmathai 1y ago
    > As a gay dude I don't fall for the "but they have a family" thing, it reminds me that I'm worth less in many eyes for that reason. I don't think you're worthless at all. And families come in many shapes and forms.
    - fennecbutt 1y ago
      Thanks <3

paulcole 2y ago

If this person’s service was to pay human artists $24 for a 23 page custom coloring book you’d be crying on here about them not paying human artists enough. Almost nobody is paying $100 or more for a custom 5-page coloring book. This service isn’t taking work from human artists.

13_9_7_7_5_18 2y ago

[dead]

richardw 2y ago

My opinion isn’t fully formed but I currently think either all content producers have a claim (potentially workable as eg a discount), or only those who contribute should get access to AI’s. And by all I mean the AI companies owe a huge debt to all humans who wrote or designed or drew anything. The vast majority of the benefit of this technology relies on volume: the billions of pages and lines of code we wrote for other humans, but have now been repurposed. This technology relies on bulk, which was mainly unprofessional or freely given content, by those who intended it for other humans. It was not 100% built only on the output of the few who charge for their exquisite words or designs, even if their output is higher quality. Alternatively, let the AI companies go for it but everyone who uses any kind of AI should understand that they’re standing on the shoulders of the millions of developers and nonprofessional writers whose work has now been repurposed. Not the few artists and journalists. So those artists and journalists should both refuse to contribute to, and use, AI. * I’ve written very little of this useful content, but would be happy to pay my share to those that have built what we have. I also turn off training on my content, but I pay a lot for models. Feel free to help me think through this with comments of your own.

jfengel 2y ago
I am following a similar mental path. I feel like the AI companies should be paying some sort of tariff on their output, going towards everyone on the planet who contributed anything at all. I don't think you can account for it more finely than that.
- richardw 2y ago
  Yup, it feel similar to mining. The models are a transformation of the underlying content. The content is owned by “us”. A mining company can come in and transform rock into iron but it owes something to the grantors of the mining rights. There is certainly a contribution in improving how the body of work is represented but we treat the “AI” as the smarts, when really it’s a lens on the collective knowledge we have built. You can make the lens better, bit not claim ownership of the body of work. Right now that’s what’s happening, with a few edge cases for artists and publishers.

jstummbillig 2y ago

If it does not cost that much, that is obviously because the artist is too cheap. If you find that to be a preferable equilibrium, that's a choice I guess, but I find it fairly ironic in light of the purported motivation.

bix6 2y ago

This is a cool technological feat but what is the cost to humanity and its artists? Some of these replies seem rather dismissive to the artists’ plight.

nxm 2y ago
“learn to code”
- bix6 2y ago
  Just code the food!
ipaddr 2y ago
Cost is nothing because this service isn't offered currently. No income lost and might spark an interest in coloring books which grows the artist's income. Artists have been around and existed in more repressive societies throughout time. The best art is usually produced from the greatest struggle. Artists will engage and create art in this new world. The cost of not providing a new surface for artists to explore is what kills art.
- qotgalaxy 2y ago
  [dead]
- bix6 2y ago
  How does buying an AI generated coloring book lead to more sales for the artist that doesn’t offer AI generated coloring books?
ronsor 2y ago
They're dismissive because we've had the same moral panics before with the introduction of photography, then sound recordings, and then digital art tools, and then vector art, and then 3D, and also the Internet to an extent, and... You can see where this is going, right? In the end, humanity and even artists will be fine overall, even if the world changes.

calebio 2y ago

Usually when you commission something you're asking the artist to do art and create something unique with their own artistic flair... not just line-trace an existing photo. The intention and cost of something like that is not at all comparable to what is being offered here.

ipaddr 2y ago

In fairness no artists are advertising a personal coloring book. The time, effort and cost would put this out of reach for 99.99 of people. No artists are losing income because of this and no industry is being upended. This is a new product that's available because of a technology advanced. Why the focus the artist? Everytime you order in food online you take away a tip from a host, server, bartender and take away a job from a person who answers a phone. Why focus on artists when so many have been affected by technology.

Something1234 2y ago
And yet there’s plenty of adult coloring books made by a human out there if you’re willing to go to a brick and mortar shop. Got a super cool one from dick blicks, with a lot of underwater scenes. Also paper quality is important. I can’t imagine getting as far as I did in mine if it was newspaper
- saretup 2y ago
  That’s because those are not personalized. The economy of scale allows for artists to make generic coloring book with high quality art, but it’s expensive for artists to create (and customers to buy) custom made coloring books personalized for the customers photos.
- jen729w 2y ago
  My partner makes one! Go grab a copy if you're in Australia, the wonderful POP local -- started as POP Canberra -- sells them. https://www.poplocal.com.au/product/bum-man-colouring-book/ https://www.poplocal.com.au/product/bum-man-colouring-book/ He's 'Bum Man'. A man (actually it's asexual) who is a bum. I mean c'mon.
  - giarc 2y ago
    Looks cool, but they should show more of the pages online. All I see is the (already coloured) front cover.
seeEllArr 2y ago

yieldcrv 2y ago

Those transactions never would have happened, and never will happen.

thehappypm 2y ago

I can get ChatGPT to do this for literally free. Even in the free tier, I can get a couple images per day.

patch_collector 2y ago

I tried to do exactly that once. I was offering between $20-$40 per image to make a few coloring pages as a mother's day gift for my wife. Not complex images either -- just basic coloring pages from photos of my wife and child, without backgrounds, for my kids to color in. I reached out to multiple artists, and got one image back (from a good friend). I gave up on commissioning actual artists, and traced the images myself on a tablet. I imagine someone with the right knowledge of where to find artists and the willingness to wait on their schedule could have done it faster, but I'd have used this service if it had been around.

darajava 2y ago

I can't imagine how much it would cost to commission an artist to do a whole coloring book and then organize them and send them to print but it's a good point. AI is never going to be as good as a real commissioned artist, but this idea makes having something similar far more accessible to a lot of people.

fennecbutt 2y ago
AI will exceed the capabilities of human beings in any task given enough time. Sure, not now. Not tomorrow. But less than 1000 years from now? Definitely, imo.

fennecbutt 2y ago

Lmao yes it does. Wtf. I'm a furry, I commission a decent bit of art and furry artists (unless they're super popular) tend to actually be much cheaper than normies. Commissioning a comic is >$100 for a page, from a popular artist at least several hundred. And that's also for personal use with no commercial rights whatsoever - it's actually an impasse because they technically still own the art, you technically own the character in the art, so it's in licensing purgatory, which is fine for conbadges, smut, icons and whatnot. I used to work at an agency that shared a floor with an art studio, commercial rights for art, especially something as complex as a comic page can easily run into $1-10k or more. Don't get me wrong, artists deserve the money they get, but as with everything that gets automated, there's a financial incentive to do so. Inb4 someone drops all the etsy links of sellers doing AI art as well or (as has been done for a loooong time) using a non-ml based filter to achieve the same thing. There are definitely cheap-er options available from Brazil, China, Venezuela etc (same as fursuit commissions) but that's also another interesting topic in relation to ai; we already outsource heavily.