The Internet is Imploding- Patreon Newsletter Dec 18th (Patreon)

Hey Artnerds,

This week has been ROUGH- or at least, the INTERNET this week has been rough.  This week hasn't been too bad on a personal level- my family (including Joseph's parents) went to Natchitoches for a couple of days to enjoy the lights.

Early Access and Backer Exclusive:

Nothing new this week, but I'm working on a bunch of stuff! 

New to the Public:

Tuesday, December 13th: Easy Christmas Ornaments- Watercolor Stashbuster: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cjyn5c1JYUE&t=203s9 (watercolor, watercolor tutorial, watercolor painting)

Saturday, December 17th: Easy to Paint Bright Christmas Lights Watercolor Stashbuster: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTE6G42mwIQ (watercolor, watercolor tutorial, watercolor painting)

Favorite Shorts:

Tabling at the New Orleans Book Fair: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Zp1JjDkBkUM

Unboxing New Art Books Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/lZ4lqbCtw_A

Unboxing New Art Books Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/YQ42D_fUZHk

I've been working on painting Chapter 9 (sharing the progress to Tiktok and to my Youtube shorts), and playing a little catch up on reviews.

I wanted to get those of yall who are interested caught up on this week's internet drama- AI Generated 'Art" and Musk banning the promotion of other social media sites.  This isn't meant to be an exhaustive explanation, just a quick recap with some resources for those interested.

A quick bit on AI generated 'art' 

(written by Joseph- I wanted a computer scientist's POV that was relatively unbiased)

A.I. generated art utilizes machine learning to produce a novel image based on a model which was trained on existing images with their corresponding captions. The most recent wave of models use deep neural networks trained on billions of images + captions to morph a diffusion pattern into an image which bests match a text or image prompt provided to the model. Training a model is very computationally expensive, but using a model is much less so.

So what's the problem?

The art pieces these models were trained on were obtained without consent or permission from the original creator- the artist.

Some sites allow this to happen but are not clear with their artist users that this is allowed, and did not notify them properly when this change occurred. 

Some sites are trying to rectify this issue by making AI scraping an OPT-OUT option on the artist's part (hence the #NoAI tag), but many artists feel it should be OPT-IN OPT-OUT, not just opt out.

When this issue is pointed out, nothing is done by the AI's creators to remedy the situation or remove the pieces.  In fact, several are hostile.

No compensation for the artists whose work is being used without their consent, nor have any of these modeling companies put forth any public offers for compensation or collaboration in the future.

Many artists, especially those new to the industry or currently looking for work fear that this will cost them jobs, as many employers would prefer to hire the cheapest rather than someone competent.

Some of the people utilizing AI to generate 'art' are claiming that they're the artist in entirety when all they contributed were the written prompts (think like a Google search).

There are accusations that artists who have problems with the above issues are gatekeeping art and are ablist, including artists who regularly share resources and tutorials.

Many of these companies hide behind the law CURRENTLY (this is debatable), being on their side rather than making the ethical choice.So all in all, it's a mess with a lot of bad takes and bad choices.

A thread on why the #NoAI tag alone won't work on DeviantArt and Artstation that also explains how AI 'art' generators are trained  

My stance on AI generated 'art'

Cross-posted and slightly edited from my LinkedIn

In a different world, with different standards and protocols, with artist consent from the get-go, and protection and compensation for artists, I MIGHT feel differently about AI-generated 'art', but as it stands, I say No to AI-Generated Art.As a comic artist and a teaching artist, I have worked my entire professional career (and most of my student career) to try to make learning art and developing art skills more accessible to those who wish to pursue it. I have volunteered, student taught, created free resources, donated art supplies, and even run a small arts scholarship. If you genuinely want to learn how to draw, paint, play, sculpt, sew- I want to help support that and encourage the time and dedication required to do so.No matter how many other artists' work I study and learn from, my own physical abilities, muscle memory, taste, and even life experiences will color my work and make it individualized. Taste and personality give each sentient artist's work individuality.  I say sentient because even animals are capable of creating art- elephants are capable of painting representations of elephants. AI is not capable of utilizing its own taste or discretion to create art, and while humans are putting in prompts and inputs into the algorithm and using their own taste to select which images to share, in the end, the artists whose work went into that algorithm were not given the chance to consent or deny consent. And until AI art is opt in and opt out at an artist's whim and will, I do not feel it is ethical to artists.I have no problem with other artists using my art to learn or for inspiration, nor do I have any issues with other artists utilizing my bases, templates, or tutorials. I do not give consent for it to be used in a styleset, and I teach art offline and on. Always happy to help other artists willing to invest the time. Not willing to continue to be used against my will. Although it is often disheartening and difficult, I will continue to share resources and tutorials for learning artists and those who wish to begin their artistic journey for as long as possible.I request employers at all sizes to consider my points when selecting who to hire for projects. While I believe there is the possibility for ethically created AI-generated images, I do not feel the current modes (particularly those that are popular and accessible) are using those methods, pursuing consent FIRST, or making it easy to opt-out of their styleset, and thus, are not ethical.

What's going on on Artstation, a portfolio site artists use to curate, collate, and share their work with peers and employers.More on that topic from VICE.

Some arguments against AI generated 'art'.

An example of how this is problematic and painful for the artists whose work are used to train these algorithms

Ok, so what can we do?

For the time being:

Support legislation that enforces and protects our work

Educate yourself on what's currently going on

Speak out against AI 'art' being passed off as the work of the person who wrote the prompts

Put pressure on social media and portfolio sites to enact measures that will protect their artists from scraping

Do not use AI generators (I would argue including the ones on Tiktok by TenCent which are crazy popular right now) until standards have been set, stolen art has been removed, algorithms have been reworked and retrained, and we have set some guidelines for how human artists will be compensated for their work.

and most importantly- SUPPORT HUMAN ARTISTS.

What's Going on with Twitter?

Elon Musk bans promotion of specific social media sites on Twitter, effectively limiting how creative folks promote themselves and their work.  While I've been promoting my other socials for months now, this is a good reminder to follow me ELSEWHERE because, at some point, I'm leaving Twitter.

Edit: Whoops, maybe no?  Those original tweets were deleted?

Where you can find my work/Alternate Socials:

Cohost: https://cohost.org/NattosoupHive @nattosoupMastodon: https://mastodon.art/@NattosoupInkblot Art: https://inkblot.art/profile/nattosoupInstagram: https://instagram.com/nattosoup Facebook (business): https://www.facebook.com/nattosoup

Please let me know if you'd like me to start posting with more frequency on any of these sites, and if you're following me, PLEASE let me know, I'd like to follow you back!

Fortunately, personal sites, Youtube, Etsy, and Patreon aren't on the banned list yet, so if you're still migrating away from Twitter, please use this opportunity to do so.

Painting Comic Pages

I've been sharing daily check-ins on Tiktok and Youtube Shorts, if you're curious about how they're coming along!  

Aeron lift kit

Hunching over those pages for multiple hours a day was pretty killer.  I knew I couldn't keep working like that- it isn't sustainable for an entire chapter, let alone two more books.  I looked at stools for artists on Blick, but their options are pitiful, and I've tried many of those in the past.  Joseph did a little digging and found out that Aeron makes a drafting chair, and then did a little MORE digging and found out there's a conversion kit for my Aeron desk chair.

Joseph installed the kit, and while it's MUCH higher now, it's actually made the chair really uncomfortable for me, and there's still some modification in store to make this a situation that will work.

Christmas Is Next Weekend

So I probably won't have an update between now and then.  If you celebrate Christmas, I wish you a Merry one, and for my friends of other faiths, I wish you a safe and warm winter full of friends, family, and good food.  May 2023 be kinder than 2022.