The header shot is a “pure” Artificial Intelligence photo! It began with a blank page in Adobe PhotoShop. The page was selected by the Lasso Tool and AI Contextual Task Bar Tool was instructed to create an “ocean background sea oats foreground”. And this is what was created!
For this week John has suggested we explore Artificial Intelligence techniques found in various software programs such as Adobe PhotoShop and others. Some software programs have had AI editing around for several years and is regularly used to remove digital noise, distractive objects and enhancing details. I use it in this context along with Dodge and Burning Tools when posting images on the internet or sharing with others. I have not used AI’s Contextual Task Bar much in Photoshop so it was fun playing around with it for this photo challenge.
For the challenge I selected this photo from several years ago showing an old house atop a cliff in Kennebunkport, Maine (left side). I decided to replace the background and sky using the Adobe’s PhotoShop AI Contextual Task Bar Tool. Interestingly, a few months ago I stumbled on another picture of this house on the internet and thought it would be fun to use AI to make my photo look similar to that one. (Be sure to click each image to see details.)
This is my finished version of the old cliff house which was built in 1915.
To re-edit this, the Lasso Tool was used to direct AI where to make the various background changes. After selecting an area AI is given a written instruction like add “ocean water” to remove the cliff on the bottom right, “Yellowish clouds” above the water line, next “clouds with flying birds”, the last was adding additional “yellow clouds” on the left side. Overall, I think AI did a good job. For example, deleting part of the cliff to add ocean water or adding clouds turned out fine. Although, the flying birds could be smaller in size but I was unable to adjust them.
In this picture below, I wanted to show the fishman catching something so the AI request was “fish splashing in water”. There were not any suitable fish images although the splashing water turned out well! The sky was also replaced using PS’s Sky Replacement editing tool instead of asking AI for help.
The original photographer’s picture below was taken on a golf course but it did not have the space needed for a subject. Extra space was created using PS’s crop/generative expand tool. Then AI was instructed to provide a “galloping horse” for the subject. It took several attempts to get one that worked because trees in the background created some interference with most of the design.
AL is being talked about and seen more and more in connection with photography. Just recently on the internet, I viewed a couple of exhibits by professional photographers. They identified their work as having been altered or digitally edited. One person identified her series of birds as “The Envisioning Habitat An Altered Reality Series”. The birds featured looked lovely and realistic although I thought the AI backgrounds were surreal looking.
The other photographer, whose pictures were very good and realistic looking, described his work as “artography”, a word I needed to look! The definition: ”artography” is a unique blend of digitally manipulated photography and design. Photos are captured, edited, and creatively blended through layers and textures in digital software.” How many of us create “artography” to some degree? I know I tend to when using PhotoShop and Topaz software programs.
As a reminder, be sure to read John’s thoughts about the use of Artificial Intelligence in photography and see his great examples. Click here for his post, photobyjohnbo.
In closing, this is a favorite quote which seems fitting concerning the use of AI designs in Photography.
“Photography for me is not looking, it’s feeling. If you can’t feel what you’re looking at, then you’re never going to get others to feel anything when they look at your pictures.” – Don McCullin
Really well done Sylvia! And love “artography”, very clever! Terrific post
Many thanks, Tina! In case you did not see the article in Charleston Style & Design Magazine on Mitch Schrieber and his “artography” work, here is the link: https://mitchschlimerartography.com/news.html. Enjoy!
Excellent examples, Sylvia and I like your honesty that it wasn’t straight forward. It never is in my experience. I’m not sure about the term artography. Once it is a composite of photography and AI content, isn’t it just digital art?
Hi Sofia, you are asking a good question about “artograpy” vs digital art. I’m not sure of the correct answer but found more information about it when googling “what is artography in photography”. In addition, here is the link to the professional photographer who labels his work as “artography”: https://mitchschlimerartography.com/news.html.
Sylvia, I’ve got me a new word to use, “artography”. I’ll be using that in the future. Thank you!
Your images turned out beautifully, and I like the concept of building an image with several requests. This would be fun for building a fantasy world for a project or story.
Thank you, John! Being able to compounding edits with AL does seem to offer even more options when editing. You might also be interested in reading my reply below to Egidio about doing this. As a side note, here is the link to the photographer who labels his work as “artography”: https://mitchschlimerartography.com/news.html
Sylvia, what interesting experiments you had here. I have not tried to use AI as you did, i.e., with compounding edits. The opening image with the oats and the sea seemed very realistic. Excellent post!
Thank you, Egidio. I found that when compounding edits using AI a selection tool needs to define the area first (ie, the lasso tool) so AI knows where to use its creative magic. Also I found it is better not to ask it to do too much at once. Please let me know what you think if you decide to try it. The opening image turned out to be a surprise even though I had to ask a couple of times to get the one you see here. 😉
Beautifully written and great examples to guide others in this journey. Your creative juices and thoughts are right on. Thank you for this, Sylvia. Well done.
Thank you Donna, glad you enjoyed seeing these AI examples!
Beautifully demonstrated the purpose and usefulness of AI in photography.
Love the Kennebunkport clicks.
As it stands I feel AI is a time consuming process to get the desired effect and translate what is in our mind.
We may see improvement in the future.