New AI Image Generation Program

[Cat]

I read an article about a new AI (artificial intelligence) image generation program called DALL-E that's supposed to be able to generate life like images based on a sentence that you give it. I was all excited thinking that it would be a great way to create some placeholder photos for Christmas cards and the like without needing to worry about model release forms and all that. 

Well... er... um... maybe not! Seriously, I can NOT stop laughing! 

But maybe it would be useful for something else? Anyhow, here's the URL if anybody wants to try it out. https://labs.openai.com/

[KeegansCreation]

That is a nice looking owl. Not mutated at all. Between this perfectly nice owl and non-photo examples above it looks like this bit of computer wizardry has promise just so long as we stay away from "photos".

[jennifer22]

@KeegansCreation To be fair, it was the best looking owl of the bunch. lol

[Wildart]

hI ALL, I have used this, great for landscapes and objects, terrible at people LOL.. lots of fun tho

[PenguinPower]

It gets so close sometimes... but it's just not right... why did it amputate the arm of the poor raccoon... and what's up with the poor deformed paws on that squirrel.. 

 
OMG... I asked it for an old fashioned Santa Claus in the style of Vermeer, because it seems to do better when asked for paintings and when given a specific style... I almost died laughing.. that last Santa is sooooooo drunk.

[Cat]

Hahaha! Maybe the raccoon is holding its arm behind its back? And maybe the squirrel is wearing little round squirrel mittens? Well anyway... I'm thinking perhaps it does a better job with things that have less specific requirements in order to be believable? 

[KeegansCreation]

These are the Santas that didn't get hired at the mall. They didn't even get an interview. Security had to escort them out.

[PenguinPower]

OK - I've found something it actually does do well - I asked it to do Santa Claus petting a reindeer, woodcut style. 3 of the 4 were pretty weird. But one came out nice - a little tweaking in Photoshop, a transformation into a vector SVG in Illustrator and I've got a nicely useable design 😅. I'll admit this would have taken me far longer to do from scratch.

Old Fashioned Woodcut Santa Claus and Reindeer
by Works_For_Peanuts

[jennifer22]

Cute!

[Cat]

Oh wow! That looks great!

[BKMuir]

I just tried to log in and found that they are cell-phone centric as is most of the world these days. They asked for my phone # and there was a button to "send"? so I am assumming that they are using it to send something to my phone - I don't have a phone. Can't complete the sign-in - can't delete what I have done. 😞

[PenguinPower]

If you have a google account you can log in with that, though if you have to make a new one, I'm not sure you can get around the cell phone thing there anymore either. 

[Deb]

Hilarious! is this a free tool?

[Cat]

It works on a credits system. You have to sign up for an account and at that point you get 50 free credits - each credit gives you one "generation" - like you get to type in one sentence to tell it what to generate, and it will pop out 4 different images for each "generation." The images are 1024x1024 - and there doesn't seem to be any way to get it to output a bigger image.

Anyhow, after your initial 50 credits they automatically refill your account with 15 free credits each month. You can buy additional credits but I don't know how much they cost. I believe it's still in the beta stage and there are obviously some "issues" that need to be worked out! I'd be very hesitant to pay for anything at this point since the results are so iffy, but it's fun to play with, and I was able to get it to output a few non-people things (flowers and landscapes) that look vaguely usable.

Anyhow, here's the URL if you want to play with it: https://labs.openai.com/

[ColsCreations]

You can use "outpainting" to expand your image infinitely. You can Google it to find some amazing examples. Girl with Pearl Earrings is most-cited example. I haven't tried it myself as each section you add costs a credit and you could blow through them in a heartbeat trying to learn.

You can buy 115 credits for $15. Which is 460 images! My initial assumption was that you'd get charged  1 credit per image downloaded but nope, you get charged 1 credit per "generation" (four image versions) which works out to only $0.03 - $0.04 per image.

[Cat]

Very interesting! What's "outpainting?"

[Cat]

Never mind - I just saw the outpainting section of the software. Still trying to figure out exactly how it works but I was able to turn this:

into this:

Promising!

[Windy]

Ah, so this is why your earlier prompts were resulting in flowers cut off. If you want the whole flower, it's gonna cost you!

[Artsiren]

Lol. Yeah, I've been doing a bunch of AI art as well. Faces are pretty funny until you've done a bunch of tinkering. And don't get me started on hands - AI has **serious** difficulty not giving hands all sorts of extra fingers folded and bent into inhuman shapes. Ha ha.

Once you've got to an image with vaguely human facial features, try GFP-GAN, a separate AI that does face-fixing. I was using it quite a lot, as it also scales up 512x512px image using a (third) AI without the enlarged image being all pixelated. But for some reason, very recently every face I tried started to look similar; it was modifying the eye colors, nose and lips so everybody looked the same! Don't know if that was a glitch, and if so, whether it has been fixed yet. Beside that, though, the faces do look fairly real, depending on the original image - sometimes you'll still need GIMP (or Photoshop, etc) to mess with the eyes, as they can still come out gazing off in opposite directions!

I've just posted a sci-fi portrait on my Twitter account, showing the evolution of what I got from a few hours worth of AI, followed by another day or so tinkering, re-doing clothing, background and lighting. Here's the tweet:

https://twitter.com/artsiren/status/1577284581086351360

And for a simple-to-use web version of GFP-GAN, try Baseten, here:

https://app.baseten.co/apps/QPp4nPE/operator_views/RqgOnqV

[KeegansCreation]

That sci fi woman looks good, even features not all horrifically distorted. Yay!

Completely independent of AI, I just tried that Baseten link on an old vacation photo from when I had a worse camera. It just what it does and you can't tweak but it did a far better job of sharpening than Photoshop's inbuilt sharpening tool. So thanks for the link.

[Signa]

I think the extra hands are fun! lol but I'm a teenage weirdo so don't mind me. 

[PenguinPower]

I've still been having good luck getting it to give me woodcuts. I edit them quite a lot, but the final outcomes are nice.

Winter Chickadee on Holly Woodcut Winter Holidays
by Works_For_Peanuts

Woodcut Owl with a Gift Snowy Night Winter Holiday
by Works_For_Peanuts

Christmas Lights Merry and Bright Woodcut
by Works_For_Peanuts

[Cat]

Those are great!

[Doodles]

My Daughter made this one do you all like it?

Beautiful winged Angel lovers in snow believe
by DoodlesGifts

[WolfMoonArt]

That's beautiful!

[Doodles]

Thanks!  I did make her sound like a child she is 40 and loves art.

[EvalineMae]

I thought this was lovely when you first posted it, forgot to post but better late than never. Must be nice to have an artistic assistant / co-creator on your Zazzle team!

[Doodles]

Thanks she just did the Angel set  for me may take some prying to get her to do more lol. She isn't side kicking with me I wish she was. I hope you have a great Holiday Season

[EvalineMae]

Thanks Doodles, you and your daughter too! As she has an artistic side, maybe one of these days she'll get hooked.

[Doodles]

your welcome and thank you. I can only hope she does 

[angelafuller729]

AI artwork is AWESOME. I've been playing with it for about 6 weeks now at Night Cafe, which allows you to 1)earn credits, 2) use any images you create for commercial purposes, 3) allows you to add the link to an art print for sale - so those in the Night Cafe community that are scrolling through and "liking/commenting" on creations can buy a print direct from you.   You asked how else these designs could be used?  Here's a collection of ornaments and stocking  I created from my wildlife series 

 https://www.zazzle.com/collections/wild_animals_christmas_stockings_ornaments-119550289641065863  

and here's my NightCafe profile: https://creator.nightcafe.studio/u/AlteredUrbane 

[ColsCreations]

Just an FYI per an email from Dalle-E:

You own the generations you create with DALL·E.

We’ve simplified our Terms of Use and you now have full ownership rights to the images you create with DALL·E — in addition to the usage rights you’ve already had to use and monetize your creations however you’d like. This update is possible due to improvements to our safety systems which minimize the ability to generate content that violates our content policy.

[mw1designsart]

I have been working in Midjourney for quite some time and with a subscription. They (Midjourney team) released v4 only yesterday and I am absolutely blown away at the imagery and quality.  Seriously amazed at some of the incredible work that can be prompted. Enjoy this dapper basset hound I generated hours ago. Wow! 

mw1designsart

[WolfMoonArt]

I love that!

[Anne]

That's beautiful, @mw1designsart 
I am just a bit confused about their terms of service. As I understand it, you have some copyright, but Midjourney also keeps full copyright. So not sure how useful that is for using these images on Zazzle?

[KeegansCreation]

I have now fully embraced Midjourney too and sprung for the 10$/month subscription so I can have access to v4 and use the images commercially. V4 is mind blowing and well worth the price. Your basset hound is high quality. There is a learning curve with all the parameters but elated youtubers are only too happy to provide instructional videos.

I asked for neon palm trees against a black background, hoping for an 80's vibe (neon against black was very big then) and it did not disappoint, although it did surprise. There are two suns and it's heading towards vaporwave. This seemed suitable for a tumbler.

Neon Palm Trees
by KeeganCreations

[De]

This would be really awesome to use for photo place holders.

Also as the main image for nostalgia type items.  

Talk about showing the beauty of individuals.

[PenguinPower]

I've got a new round of credits so I've been giving it another go... Occasionally I get lucky and it spits out something I can really work with. This one took a round of variations, but then pretty minimal touch ups to be really cute.

Cute Ice Skating Mice Watercolor Foil Holiday Card
by Invincible_Penguin

On the other hand.... when I asked it for a woodcut of a pile of christmas bulbs, it gave me onions..

[De]

It would be great to see the photos it would put out of real fishermen and women.

[Badeesie]

I was thinking I might be able to get fun puzzles and notecards with the outpainting tool.

[MarilynR]

Thank you!