AI Art Is Here and the World Is Already Different
... When a friend who had been experimenting with DALL-E 2 described the tool as a place to dispose of intrusive thoughts, I nodded, scrolling back in my Midjourney window to a pretty convincing take on “Joe Biden tanning on the beach drawn by R. Crumb.”
I still use Midjourney this way, but the novelty has worn off, in no small part because the renderings have just gotten better — less “strange and beautiful” than “competent and plausible.” The bit has also gotten stale, and I’ve mapped the narrow boundaries of my artistic imagination. A lot of the AI art that has gone viral was generated from prompts that produced just the right kind of result: close enough to be startling but still somehow off, through a misinterpreted word, a strange artifact that turned the image macabre, or a fully haywire conceptual interpolation. Surprising errors are AI imagery’s best approximation of genuine creativity, or at least its most joyful. TikTok’s primitive take on an image generator, which it released last month, embraces this. ...
When AI art fails a little, as it has consistently in this early phase, it’s funny. When it simply succeeds, as it will more and more convincingly in the months and years ahead, it’s just, well, automation. ...
See the full story here: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/09/ai-art-is-here-and-the-world-is-already-different.html
Disney Files Patent for Augmented Reality Ride Without Glasses
This month, they have published a patent application for a visual effect system that allows theme park guests to see 3D augmented reality imagery without glasses.
The system "allows a viewer with eyes positioned at the left and right eye box positions to perceive a three-dimensional (3D) virtual object in the physical space concurrently with light from physical objects or scenery in the physical space," according to the patent filing.
In other words, if I can describe this correctly, instead of projecting left and right images that you would see through a pair of glasses as a 3D image, the two images would be projected on a transparent surface in front of your ride vehicle - that would do the job of the glasses in bringing the two images together as one, 3D image.
See the full story here: https://www.themeparkinsider.com/flume/202209/9139/
Gucci built a persistent town inside of Roblox
Gucci is making its presence inside of Roblox a little more permanent. The fashion brand previously collaborated with the virtual world for more short-lived experiences, like the surreal Gucci Garden from last year, and is now releasing a more persistent space called Gucci Town. The space features a central garden that links together various areas, including a space for mini-games, a cafe, and a virtual store where players can, of course, purchase virtual Gucci gear for their Robloxavatar. (The company says the virtual outfits make use of Roblox’s new “layered clothing” tech.)
Gucci says that more than 20 million players visited the garden last year, despite it only being available for two weeks, and it expects the new space to steadily evolve over time. ...
See the full story here: https://www.theverge.com/2022/5/27/23143404/gucci-town-roblox
World’s First A.I. Crossword Game Introduced By Guinness World Records Puzzle Master
The Guinness World Records Puzzle Master has recently launched the world’s first A.I.-powered crossword game that is uniquely designed to solve up to 50% of the puzzle for solvers while learning their solving habits to help them eventually reach Grand Master Solver status. The more you play, the faster you improve.
Simply titled “A.I. Crossword,” the innovative puzzle introduces several never-played-before crossword-solving experiences among daily crossword offerings. Among them is in-game commentary while a player solves the crossword, a reward of “stunnable” facts, and clever comedic video analysis of one’s performance.
Midjourney founder says ‘the world needs more imagination’
... David Holz’s version of this technology, known as Midjourney, quickly rose to prominence, and everyone who got their hands on this text-to-image generatorwas thoroughly impressed. Most recently, the Colorado State Fair’s annual art competition awarded its blue ribbon to emerging digital artists to Jason M. Allen, who had used Midjourney to create an artwork called “Théâtre D’opéra Spatial.” ...
... 1. Could Midjourney replace human designers? ...
“It’s kind of like the moment humans invented cars. Just because cars can go faster than humans, doesn’t mean we cut our legs off. You are going to use cars to get someplace faster. It’s basically augmenting our speed,” he said.
2. Does it plagiarize or violate content policies? ...
Holz claims that the AI engine is designed to only “take inspiration” from the data and ensure that the output is entirely novel, that is, unlike any image that’s publicly available. Oddly enough, Holz claims to have received multiple requests from artists to double down on Midjourney’s ability to take inspiration from their own work as well as others. ...
3. Will it produce results that demonstrate gender biases, reinforce racial stereotypes — or contain anything explicit? ...
As Midjourney is intended to be open by default, it has strict policies on ensuring that content is PG-13. It automatically blocks text inputs that are inherently disrespectful, aggressive, abusive or sexual, Holz confirmed Most importantly, the rules are enforced for all content, including interactions in private mode. ...
“I feel like there are people in technology who basically act like we have no past, and there’s a lot of people in the world in fear of not having a future. But I feel like the truth is we’re actually very much mid-journey,” Holz said. ...
See the full story here: https://venturebeat.com/ai/midjourney-founder-says-the-world-needs-more-imagination/
