William Overington

I was considering your post and wondered as to what is "hotel art" as I had not known the term before seeing it your post. A search for hotel art produced surprising results, for art hotels. Interesting yet not, I presume, not what you meant. Yes, I have been. William

There was no reply from management on Monday. I mentioned that it was a Bank Holiday in England on Monday. Someone, clearly as fun, suggested that (therefore) get in the beer, start the dancing. I linked to a YouTube video of some line dancing to the song Roll out the barrel. It all got deleted. For the avoidance of doubt I am not saying it was right or wrong for it to be deleted, I am just informing pixelstuff as to what happened. William

Because of copyright issues and perceived copyright issues otherwise. Yes, I have been researching what can be done using Bing Chat AI. I have obtained prints and framed them, just for my own art collection. I have no idea at all what Photoshop will or will not do. Because I feel that some users of Affinity products would be delighted to have access to such a facility, and some users of Affinity products would be very much against any AI being anywhere near their work. So if Affinity Generative AI were a separate program that could be used alone yet could also be accessed through the other Affinity programs, then people who would like that facility could buy a licence and people who do not want AI anywhere near their work could avoid buying a licence and also be content that there was no AI in the Affinity programs that they are using. As well as pictures, Affinity Generative AI could also write short stories, and poems, including haiku and sonnets and villanelles. Having only been trained on poems and short stories written by Affinity Staff. I have no experience of using AI for fixing up pictures. I saw a video about it once. I have, however, used Bing Chat AI quite a lot for producing original pictures, mostly requesting in the style of paintings by a particular artist, group of artists, or artwork, such as The Bayeux Tapestry and the Lascaux Cave Art. William

I suggest an additional Affinity product, Affinity Generative AI with the AI system used trained only on art produced by Affinity Staff Artists and the original pictures and all of the legal documents involved included too. The end user could enter a text prompt, short or long as desired, even specifying which Staff Artist, the Staff Artist perhaps identified only by a stage name if so desired. Then the end user would have an original, royalty-free image to use. Maybe with built-in metadata and/or some in the picture watermarking system, unobtrusive to the eye yet detectable with specialist software. One could be using Affinity Publisher, want an illustration, go through to Affinity Generative AI, specify a size and a text prompt, receive the picture, go back to Affinity Publisher and include the illustration in the document. An original, unique picture, not a piece of clip art or a stock photo known to others. Royalty-free too. Some of the Staff Artists could each be featured more than once, using a different stage name each time, for example, once for portraits, once for traditional buildings, once for modern art, and so on. Also, one could if one wished, use any of the pictures produced by the Staff Artists royalty-free too. Offering Affinity Generative AI with only such carefully controlled content used to train the AI system and the legalities all carefully worked out and openly published would be an innovative leap forward. William Overington Friday 31 May 2024

I have my writing style. That is what I wrote. I opine that what I wrote conveys my intended meaning with precision. William

Because I had stated that that is what Bing Chat AI does, so I used the exact same wording. Using the exact same wording avoids the possibility of a reader thinking there is or might be some difference in meaning. William

Quite possibly. However, Bing Chat AI outputs 1024 pixel by 1024 pixel jpg files each containing an image, Affinity Designer can be used to output 1024 pixel by 1024 pixel jpg files each containing an image, so I decided to have a try. William

I understood both. The fuzziness is a topic for discussion. The leaving it was requested after also adding to the discussion, so my right to reply to that addition overrode the request to leave it at that. William

Yet one can have a conversation with the AI and it will modify its output as a result of the discussion. I have done that. William

Yet if the same perpetual fee gets you what you have now and in addition has you also being able to use Affinity programs on a web facility if you choose to do so, then that could be very good. For example, if you happen to be in a public library and you could use a library open access computer to use an Affinity program using the web version. Then when you get home be able to download the file to your local computer and continue. William

I suppose that a version of the Affinity programs could run on a website and a logged on user could use it as a web application, sending output as an email attachment or uploaded to another website or downloaded to local storage. This could be useful if one is using a shared computer. William

Here are the lyrics in German, together with a button for some translations. Stefanie Hertel - Nicht Jeder Kann Ein Mozart Sein lyrics (lyricstranslate.com) William

My mistake then. What did you mean please? William

Bing Chat AI allows a prompt of up to 4000 characters. I have thus far only used far fewer than that in a prompt. 4000 characters, each space counting as a character, is around the size of a 500 word essay. William

At least some of the credit. In (non-AI) Affinity Designer, what about some credit in digital artworks for the Affinity staff who programmed the special effect tools? What about some credit for the people who manufacture the artist's watercolours used to paint pictures? William

Yes, you are correct. When prompting the AI with text I ask it to produce an original painting. You are not being pedantic, you are being precise. William

The theme of the song is that not everybody can be a Mozart when it comes to playing music. I remembered the song and it seems appropriate when the use of generative AI to produce images is criticised by people who are expert artists. Yet you later clarified your position in relation to what I wrote about my use of generative AI, which I appreciate, thank you. William

There is a prohibition on posting any AI generated images in this forum. If that were not the case I show you some beautiful ones. But there are a few posted some time ago. William

Thank you. Some of you have that talent and ability. I know what I would like to produce but producing it is another matter. Well, I have used Bing Chat AI to produce some paintings. I have bought a print of some of them. I have framed the prints. Nothing art industry about it, just uploading a jpg file to a website that advertises the production of a one-off custom greeting card from a photograph, except that it is not actually a photograph that is used, it is a jpg file containing the information of a photograph, so using a jpg file of an image generated using a computer program, or by an AI program, works fine - the business is fine with me doing that. The framing is just me framing the picture in a frame from a supermarket, sold as a frame for a photograph or a certificate. So two facilities that mention a photograph but no photograph actually used. I am pleased with the results. For those people who can do the work themself, fine, but not everybody has the ability to do that. So, for me, when I can specify details in a text prompt and observe them in an AI generated painting, I am delighted. I regard it as to some extent like transferring ideas from my mind into a permanent form, if I imagine a research centre, I can use a pen and paper or a computer to write a novel featuring it. I know that that is not exactly the same, but I tend to regard using generative AI in a similar sort of way as to using a pen and paper to convey ideas from my mind to a permanent form that other people can consider. Yes. However, not everyone has the ability to do that. William

@KarinC If you would like to say why you are confused I can try to explain anything that I have not described sufficiently well. William

@Westerwälder Well, alright that is a response, and I asked how readers feel about the idea, would you like to say why you laugh at that idea please? I would like to know your reasons. Maybe I have missed something or made an error. William

Suppose that there were to be a product Affinity Generative AI and the AI system used had been trained only on art produced by Affinity Staff Artists and the original pictures and all of the legal documents involved were published too. The end user could enter a text prompt, short or long as desired, even specifying which Staff Artist, the Staff Artist perhaps identified only by a stage name if so desired. Then the end user would have an original, royalty-free image to use. Maybe with built-in metadata and/or some in the picture watermarking system, unobtrusive to the eye yet detectable with specialist software. How would readers feel about that? One could be using Affinity Publisher, want an illustration, go through to Affinity Generative AI, specify a size and a text prompt, receive the picture, go back to Affinity Publisher and include the illustration in the document. An original, unique picture, not a piece of clip art or a stock photo known to others. Maybe a request should be made in the Suggestions forum for this product to be produced please. William

Regarding the comments made by @nickbatz Where exactly is the line to be drawn? For example, if an end user of Affinity Designer in pixel persona uses a watercolour brush supplied as part of Affinity Designer, to what extent is the result the end user's own work and to what extent is it a joint work with ... well a computer program or whoever designed that brush or both? Here is a small version of a picture that I produced a short while ago. The original is A3 with a 1000 pixel brush. I chose the green colour rgb (0, 255, 0), I chose the brush size of 1000 pixels. I guided the path of the brush, I decided to produce the picture. Could that reasonably be called "an artistic decision". Yet any image that a person looking at the picture might see in it is purely as a result of what is within the design of the brush and not from any decision of mine. Also, if an artist paints a picture with wet paint, from where did the paint come? Did the paint manufacturer use machinery to grind the pigment? Even if the artist gets some pigment from a natural source and chooses to grind it. Oh, that pestle and mortar, was it fired in an industrial kiln? So it seems to me that there is a sort of spectrum as to how much of an art work is really from the artist and how much is from an outside contribution. As long as it is properly acknowledged and not purported to be otherwise and there is no violation of copyright, I consider it alright if someone writes a text prompt to a generative AI program and then delights in the artwork produced. Please consider, if I write a poem and I then use Affinity Publisher to produce a PDF document to print copies of my poem, where does the typeface that I use fit in with it being my poem if the font is one that has not been designed by me? Certainly, some people say that the typeface does not change the meaning of text, but I do not agree with that as I consider that the typeface used adds some je ne sais quoi to the meaning of text. In another thread I made a comment about AI. I repeat it here. Perhaps at some future time an enterprising company will offer a generative AI program together with all the images and associated metadata upon which it has been trained, all of the art being fully licensed with all of the licences published too. Maybe that will be a Canva product. William

Perhaps at some future time an enterprising company will offer a generative AI program together with all the images and associated metadata upon which it has been trained, all of the art being fully licensed with all of the licences published too. Maybe that will be a Canva product. William

Well, what about the invention and implementation of printing using moveable type? That was a very significant development. That technology was basically the same for over five hundred years, certainly greater precision, some mechanization of typesetting, but basically metal type having ink applied to it and physically pressed onto paper. That development and its application had enormous effects. Some readers might enjoy this video. William