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For visual art I feel that the existing approaches in context engineering are very much lacking. An Ai understands well enough such simple things as content (bi

by Daub 1y ago

For visual art I feel that the existing approaches in context engineering are very much lacking. An Ai understands well enough such simple things as content (bird, dog, owl etc), color (blue green etc) and has a fair understanding of foreground/background. However, the really important stuff is not addressed. For example: in form, things like negative shape and overlap. In color contrast things like Ratio contrast and dynamic range contrast. Or how manipulating neighboring regional contrast produces tone wrap. I could go on. One reason for this state of affairs is that artists and designers lack the consistent terminology to describe what they are doing (though this does not stop them from operating at a high level). Indeed, many of the terms I have used here we (my colleagues and I) had to invent ourselves. I would love to work with an AI guru to address this developing problem.

skydhash 1y ago
> artists and designers lack the consistent terminology to describe what they are doing I don't think they do. It may not be completely consistent, but open any art book and you find the same thing being explained again and again. Just for drawing humans, you will find emphasis on the skeleton and muscle volume for forms and poses, planes (especially the head) for values and shadows, some abstract things like stability and line weight, and some more concrete things like foreshortening. Several books and course have gone over those concepts. They are not difficult to explain, they are just difficult to master. That's because you have to apply judgement for every single line or brush stroke deciding which factors matter most and if you even want to do the stroke. Then there's the whole hand eye coordination. So unless you can solve judgement (which styles derive from), there's not a lot of hope there. ADDENDUM And when you do a study of another's work, it's not copying the data, extracting colors, or comparing labels,... It's just studying judgement. You know the complete formula from which a more basic version is being used for the work, and you only want to know the parameters. Whereas machine training is mostly going for the wrong formula with completely different variables.
- Daub 1y ago
  I concur that there is, on some matters, a general agreement in art books. However, certainly it does not help that there is so much inconsistency of terminology. For example: the way that hue and color are so frequently used interchangeably, likewise lightness, brightness, tone and value. What bothers me more is that so much truly important material is not being addressed as explicitly as it should be. For example: the exaggeration of contrast on which so much art relies exists in two dimensions: increase of difference and decrease of difference. This application of contrast/affinity is a general principle that runs through the entirety of art. Indeed, I demonstrate it to my students by showing its application in Korean TV dramas. The only explicit mention I can find of this in art literature is in the work of Ruskin, nearly 200 years ago! Even worse is that so much very important material is not being addressed at all. For example, a common device that painters employ is to configure the neighboring regional contrast of a form can be light against dark on one edge and dark against light on the opposing edge. In figurative paintings and in classic portrait photography this device is almost ubiquitous, yet as far as I am able to determine no one has named it or even written about it. We were obliged to name it ourselves (tone wrap). > They are not difficult to explain, they are just difficult to master. Completely agree that they can be difficult to master. However, a thing cannot be satisfactorily explained unless there is consistent (or even existent) terminology for that thing. > So unless you can solve judgement (which styles derive from) Nicely put.
  - skydhash 1y ago
    > For example, a common device that painters employ is to configure the neighboring regional contrast of a form can be light against dark on one edge and dark against light on the opposing edge. I'm not fully sure of what you means. If we take the following example, are you talking about the neck and the collar of the girl? https://i.pinimg.com/originals/ea/70/0b/ea700b6a0b366c13187edf9e29569d25.jpg https://i.pinimg.com/originals/ea/70/0b/ea700b6a0b366c13187e... https://fr.pinterest.com/pin/453596993695189968/ https://fr.pinterest.com/pin/453596993695189968/ I think the name of the concept is "edge control" (not really original). You can find some explanation here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpSlGmbUB08 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpSlGmbUB08 To keep it short, there's no line in reality. So while you can use them when sketching, they are pretty crude, kinda like a piano with only 2 keys. The best thing is edges, meaning the delimitation between two contrasting area. If you're doing grayscale, your areas are values (light and shadow) and it's pretty easy. Once you add color, there's more dimension to play with and it became very difficult (warm and cold color, atmospheric colors, brush stroke that gives the illusion of details,...). Again, this falls under the things that are easy to explain, but take a while to be able to observe it and longer to reproduce it. There's a book called "Color and Light" by James Gurney that goes in depth about all of these. There's a lot of parameters that goes inside a brush stroke in a specific area of a painting.

by Daub 1y ago

skydhash 1y ago

> artists and designers lack the consistent terminology to describe what they are doing I don't think they do. It may not be completely consistent, but open any art book and you find the same thing being explained again and again. Just for drawing humans, you will find emphasis on the skeleton and muscle volume for forms and poses, planes (especially the head) for values and shadows, some abstract things like stability and line weight, and some more concrete things like foreshortening. Several books and course have gone over those concepts. They are not difficult to explain, they are just difficult to master. That's because you have to apply judgement for every single line or brush stroke deciding which factors matter most and if you even want to do the stroke. Then there's the whole hand eye coordination. So unless you can solve judgement (which styles derive from), there's not a lot of hope there. ADDENDUM And when you do a study of another's work, it's not copying the data, extracting colors, or comparing labels,... It's just studying judgement. You know the complete formula from which a more basic version is being used for the work, and you only want to know the parameters. Whereas machine training is mostly going for the wrong formula with completely different variables.

Daub 1y ago
I concur that there is, on some matters, a general agreement in art books. However, certainly it does not help that there is so much inconsistency of terminology. For example: the way that hue and color are so frequently used interchangeably, likewise lightness, brightness, tone and value. What bothers me more is that so much truly important material is not being addressed as explicitly as it should be. For example: the exaggeration of contrast on which so much art relies exists in two dimensions: increase of difference and decrease of difference. This application of contrast/affinity is a general principle that runs through the entirety of art. Indeed, I demonstrate it to my students by showing its application in Korean TV dramas. The only explicit mention I can find of this in art literature is in the work of Ruskin, nearly 200 years ago! Even worse is that so much very important material is not being addressed at all. For example, a common device that painters employ is to configure the neighboring regional contrast of a form can be light against dark on one edge and dark against light on the opposing edge. In figurative paintings and in classic portrait photography this device is almost ubiquitous, yet as far as I am able to determine no one has named it or even written about it. We were obliged to name it ourselves (tone wrap). > They are not difficult to explain, they are just difficult to master. Completely agree that they can be difficult to master. However, a thing cannot be satisfactorily explained unless there is consistent (or even existent) terminology for that thing. > So unless you can solve judgement (which styles derive from) Nicely put.
- skydhash 1y ago
  > For example, a common device that painters employ is to configure the neighboring regional contrast of a form can be light against dark on one edge and dark against light on the opposing edge. I'm not fully sure of what you means. If we take the following example, are you talking about the neck and the collar of the girl? https://i.pinimg.com/originals/ea/70/0b/ea700b6a0b366c13187edf9e29569d25.jpg https://i.pinimg.com/originals/ea/70/0b/ea700b6a0b366c13187e... https://fr.pinterest.com/pin/453596993695189968/ https://fr.pinterest.com/pin/453596993695189968/ I think the name of the concept is "edge control" (not really original). You can find some explanation here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpSlGmbUB08 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpSlGmbUB08 To keep it short, there's no line in reality. So while you can use them when sketching, they are pretty crude, kinda like a piano with only 2 keys. The best thing is edges, meaning the delimitation between two contrasting area. If you're doing grayscale, your areas are values (light and shadow) and it's pretty easy. Once you add color, there's more dimension to play with and it became very difficult (warm and cold color, atmospheric colors, brush stroke that gives the illusion of details,...). Again, this falls under the things that are easy to explain, but take a while to be able to observe it and longer to reproduce it. There's a book called "Color and Light" by James Gurney that goes in depth about all of these. There's a lot of parameters that goes inside a brush stroke in a specific area of a painting.