Only Gaps
Every shot I add to a post or article gets edited. Most of the time, they are not overly strong edits, shifts in contrast, lifting shadows, and of course cropping - as apparently it is impossible for me to shoot a shot straight. I edit in Adobe Lightroom, mostly on my phone, so it isn't really conducive for high end post-processing, but good enough for what I am doing, and the shots I am taking.
However, what I haven't tried until today, is AI. No, I am not putting AI-generated images in, but Lightroom does have a generative-AI "remove" function in its tools. And since I hadn't tried it, I thought I would see what kinds of results it would get with what would other wise be a pretty difficult (for me) edit in Photoshop, if doing it manually. But it seems, no one does anything themselves anymore, and just uses tool to gap-fill all of their skill-gaps.
For a remove, the AI has to predict what would be behind the object, filling it with something that it assumes will suit. While far from perfect, Lightroom gives some options in the refine section to choose which version suits. I didn't play with that much yet though, just used the default.
The first image was one I took at the beach yesterday of my wife, where there was a woman sitting behind in the background. It wasn't too bad, as it was on a strong blur, but it does create unnecessary clutter and breaks the horizon line. This is something I could fix in Photoshop, if I still subscribed for it. But instead, selecting the remove and blocking out what I wanted to take away with a little extra around the edges, it took about 20 seconds for it to get this result.
Before & After
The second one was taken the day before yesterday at the cottage, again of my wife and this time brushing her hair. Fr me at least, this would have been a challenging edit, because it would have required rebuilding the scene piece by piece. And at least for this shot, there would be no way I would be putting that kind of time and effort into it. But again, for the sake of the experiment in Lightroom, it was a good choice to to try.
A few thirty seconds later.
Before & After
There are five changes made and while the results are not perfect, it is pretty impressive that it puts in the corners and tries to make the shadows blend into the picture. Unless looking for the changes, it would definitely pass a once over glance, even though the angles are slightly wrong and the shadow unnatural. And of course, if I had refined it and played more, I am sure it would have been much better.
But....
Because I know what has gone into the changes, I am not a big fan of them. Yeah, it would be fine for a cover image or something like that, but it is no longer completely mine and they no longer feel the same because of it. The way I capture photos is to reproduce what I am seeing, not for the image itself. Even when I edit, it is me doing the editing, me making the changes, me making the decisions on what is there, what is not, and what is good enough.
My heart is gone from these.
What it does point to though is how easy it is to make an image that is "real" to begin with, unreal in a realistic way. All those Instagram models using a hundred filters to smooth their skin, narrow their waist, brighten their eyes and whiten their teeth digitally, but are not that in reality. And I wonder, when they see themselves in images and then in the mirror, are they happy with the difference, or have they too, lost heart?
Generative-AI is only going to get better and people will use it more an more to fill not only their skill gaps, but also the gaps in their expectations, the gaps in their opinions of themselves, and the gaps in who they believe themselves to be. And the problem I predict is, the more we use AI to fill our gaps in self, the more gaps will form until there is very little left of who we are, and what we could have been.
Only Gaps.
Taraz
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It is a slippery slope. Is it not? It actually did a great job on those photos not that I thought they weren’t just as good with the real composition and background images. All I think about is the double edged sword of convenience, and how the only real purpose we have this universe to connect with others. And things get really convenient the real magic of humanity stops happening then what happens if all of these connections between people and our environment are all wearing the condom of AI? Not worth the convenience.
It’s easy to imagine where we are as the endgame and you are right. It’s only just getting started so imagine the drawbacks down the line.
The "condom of AI" - love it.
It is going to get insane in the coming few years, where convenience puts the majority out to pasture. I have no idea what kids will do in the future, unless we fundamentally change what it means to be part of society.
I've only used it a little bit. I appreciate how it can allow you to remove unwanted things from photos. Like I said though, I don't usually think to ever use it.
Really useful, but at the same time - what becomes of the actual image and what makes it different to a completely AI generated one?
On my phone at least it just makes a copy of it. I was thinking about that the other day thought that you are probably uploading the original somewhere. Although, I use Google Photos for backup anyway, so it is already on their servers.
Yeah, I get that. What I mean is that the more changes made to the photo, the less it is actually a photo. May as well generate one using the face of your subject - then they can choose all the other features :D
I understand what you are saying, but to be fair, back before digital photos, it took actual artists to touch up photos. I remember my dad had to send some negatives out to get certain things touched up for the client. At that point is the photo his anymore or the artist that manipulated it. My guess is this debate isn't new, just the format.
Perhaps it isn't solely his, more of a collaborative effort. There was art in the touch up - same with Photoshop skills, as there is plenty of good and bad. The AI touchups though, even if better, have no skill of a human in it - other than perhaps the coder, but even that is questionable these days :)
Eventually there will be a point where the AI is considered the artist. Maybe anyway.
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STOPResults are pretty impressive, especially the time that it was achieved in... I recall editing images for clients in Photoshop and it took a lot longer...
Yeah. It sucks to edit even small things out manually. But, it feels like rewriting history for personal photos and that is a slippery slope.
Agree that even though these tools can make life easier, they also risk taking away the personal touch that makes the art unique.
Without the flaws, what does life become?
I woul have peace of mind 😄
I have long argued there is no such thing as perfect - even in theory :)
Photo-bombers no more!
:D
There are apps that open closed eyes and change expressions etc - what is the point of taking a photo? Just load the face you want in and put it wherever you like.
It's a lot of arsing around to do that, unless it's that important to you.., just take another shot?
People don't even bother taking a shot these days. Just generate something meaningless.
You’ve actually raised a profound concern; the idea that Generative AI could become a crutch not just for skills, but for identity itself. AI is already widely used to bridge technical or creative gaps, helping people produce work they couldn’t otherwise. That’s empowering, but it risks dependency. Your point about people using AI to fill gaps in self-perception is striking. If someone relies on AI to define who they are, they may lose the chance to grow through struggle and self-discovery.
Many are already dependent and without it, they have little to offer. Which means, soon, they will have nothing to offer.
Yeah, you're right. I'm afraid once I try leaning with AI because honestly, I'm afraid it will replace most of human jobs that's why I don't dare opening any AI tool or something. I'm just reading lots about it via search bars. By merely reading lots of articles, I'm getting several information. Why do we need to depend on it if we ourselves have knowledge on any matter? We studied in school for more than a decade. If there are serious topics that need thorough research, we can directly do the normal researching, not the AI-generated details. Anyways, just my thoughts...Peace! 😆
Seeing that 20‑second AI “remove” turn a cluttered beach shot into a clean‑look picture blew my mind – it’s insane how Lightroom can now do what used to need a pricey Photoshop subscription. I get the rush of speed, but the moment the tool decides what belongs where, the photo loses that personal fingerprint you described, like it’s borrowing someone else’s vision. It’s funny how we’re already letting AI smooth out Instagram bodies, yet we still cling to the idea that a manually edited image is “real.” If we keep outsourcing every little decision to an algorithm, we might end up selling AI‑crafted “authenticity” on our balance sheets, and that’s a weird kind of tax cheat. Still, kudos for testing the tech and showing us both the promise and the price of handing creative control to a black box.
Me parece interesante lo que puede hacer ese programa, yo recién descubrí Zonerai, que también hace lo mismo pero también puede cambiar el peinado, convertir imagenes en blanco y negro en imagenes a color e hiperrealista, etc, y tiene casi todas las funciones de forma gratuita, pero tiene muchos errores y crea cosas bastante bizarras de vez en cuando, también me gustaba mucho Whisk que te permitía combinar varios diseños distintos en una nueva composición o crear uno desde cero.
Personally I like photos because I consider them historical pieces as much as artistic ones so there's an automatic rejection/repulsion when there's that much editing to remove stuff that was there even if the desire is purely artistic "just" wanting to improve the composition.
despite any and every other notable thing they might have done in their lives my respect for someone can drop an unreasonable amount the second they want to tamper with/erase any part of history for any reason
Though having said that I know you were just experimenting with the AI removal tools but while it improved the composition of the first shot I think it actually made the second one "worse" as the "clutter" in the original shot was actually accidentally well balanced, if anything the only thing I would have done would be to take out the protruding red thing, and because I would do it manually like a luser (loser user) it would definitely take longer than the AI XD
That does remind me I haven't tried a lot of the AI tools for art yet, I kind of want to but I don't know if there's any in Darktable (which I'm not very good at yet and haven't explored fully either way) and the ones that I'm aware of in Krita I wouldn't use anyway (they're dropping flats and doing clean outlines both of which I actually like doing).
If it's any consolation while there are definitely a lot of people doing those things you're describing there's also a lot of people that don't like and actively avoid genAI stuff. More geared towards academic and blogging; I read at least one article (I am too lazy to find the link even though I'm still relatively sure it's still in my newsfeed somewhere) saying how "a lot" (at least in the particular course the blog author was running) of university aged "kids" don't like genAI and generally consider it "cheating", and an article I read more recently about how some people (I can't even say "old farts like us" as the author was aiming for devs and people who would read that kinda thing and not for any specific age as such but doesn't actually know what they got) really, really, really hate it.