In this article, we explore how to integrate AI into your photography practice while retaining creative integrity.
Staying true to your creative vision and not being swayed by trends or pressures requires focus and strength.
AI is an incredible tool and source of bountiful fantastical images. Those who aren’t dazzled by its glamour are threatened by it.
When combining AI into our photography practice, we can use it to facilitate our vision. However, using it the wrong way can extinguish our creative spark.
Read on to gain insights on how to use AI and retain your artistic integrity.
Photography, AI, and the Art World
Did you know that photography, like AI, when it was first introduced to the public, was not initially considered an art form?
Capturing rays of light bouncing off objects using a machine was too technical to be considered art in the 18th century.
People could not accept that a mechanical device, pointed and clicked by a human, could create art. The world believed art should involve skill, time, passion, talent, and most importantly, the human touch.
To me, this sounds like a duplicate of today’s dilemma, as people debate whether images created using AI can be considered art.
The birth of photography reshaped the entire art world. The camera’s superior ability to capture reality impacted artists’ perceptions of their work.
Photography was now the master of recording the world, recording its surroundings more realistically than any art form could ever aspire to.
After two decades of being an art outcast on the edge of acceptability, photography was finally embraced by the art world.
Maybe this was not because anything about photography changed, but because a new generation was born. A generation that grew up accustomed to the photographic process.
Similarly, today we can see AI shaking the idea of what it means to be a photographer down to the roots.
Will AI be accepted and understood by future generations as an art form, in a way that we, stunted by our traditional outlook and limited understanding, can not comprehend?
Combining Photography with AI
Art results from an artist’s vision, their concept, and the message they wish to convey. They sit back and imagine what they wish to create.
This can be the color palette, the lighting, the scene, the composition, or the emotional response they wish to trigger.
Artistic vision does not necessarily mean the artist envisions a specific scene. Instead, their primary purpose could be to evoke an emotion or express an idea.
I believe the concept behind the art piece is the integral ingredient that defines art as art.
AI is not capable of creative vision. Nor is it capable of imagining an inspired concept. AI can not dream, envision a new angle on life, or reflect on its emotions.
The reason for this is because AI can only regurgitate images. Images that AI has been programmed to create by humans through machine learning.
AI is restricted to designing images in the style that it has been taught. Therefore, if you allow AI to direct your artistic vision, it could be argued that you are replicating others’ art.
Using AI to inspire or direct your work is the point at which you lose your creative integrity.
There is no sin in using AI as a tool; no one would blame you for using such a fast and precise tool. A tool that will save you hours of work to achieve the result you are aiming for.
But if you use AI to inspire or allow it to lead the creative vision, you will surely lose your way.
You also run the risk of becoming lazy and losing your refined photographer’s eye and your artistic spark.
So, where do you draw the line? When is AI purely serving your artistic vision? And when have you let AI intervene and lead the project?
The trick is to be clear about your creative goals and use AI as a tool, not for inspiration.
Why are you taking photos? Is it to express a sentiment, to share a crucial message, or to inspire the world?
AI as the Servant, not the Master
The question is not how much you use AI to touch up, adjust, or edit a photo, but how much you deviate from your creative vision by using AI.
Let me explain: Do you allow AI to lead your creative vision or use it to facilitate the process?
AI will help you rip through mundane editing tasks. The speed at which AI works makes it many a professional photographer’s right-hand man.
AI can scan images speedily and uses algorithms to interpret the information contained within a photo. This allows AI to make quick, precise edits.
Using AI, I can make alterations and edits at rapid speed, adjusting exposure, contrast, color saturation, and tailoring the image to my specifications.
I never deviate from my artistic choices, knowing the result I wish to achieve, and I use AI as a device to reach my goal.
In this case, AI is being used as a tool, not to inspire. Opening each photo in an album and adjusting it to the desired style is a technical step, not a creative one.
In this situation, AI could be likened to apprentices trained by great artists like Leonardo Da Vinci.
Leonardo’s apprentices would prepare pigment and canvases, and even paint areas of larger murals.
Having apprentices assist in the artistic process saved the masters valuable time to dream up new designs.
In a similar way, AI can be used to save a photographer time by completing repetitive tasks that don’t impact the artistic direction.
Leonardo directed his apprentices. However, if the roles were swapped and the apprentices directed Leonardo, it would no longer be Leonardo’s work but the apprentices’ work.
The same is true when using AI.
AI leads the directive vision when the photographer has no preference. Suppose the photographer allows AI to add the latest tacky fad filter or adjust the crop to perfect thirds. The photo may look rad and trendy, but that doesn’t make it art.
The line defining the border between AI facilitating your workflow and AI becoming the project leader is ambiguous and depends on your personal art practice.
AI the Artist
So, how can you tell when AI has crossed the line from servant and stepped into the role of artist?
It could be debated that AI can never be an artist.
AI copies human innovation; it can not generate its own, as it does not have the capacity for unique imagination.
AI takes all its material from others; it is a regurgitator, and a skilled and competent one at that.
No one can replicate like AI, fast, glitzy, and ingeniously. However, even if it’s glamorous and quick, it’s still simply an uninspired, non-unique repetition.
Something needs to exist before AI can hand it to you. As humans, something does not need to exist for us to dream it up.
AI can be a lubricant for your creative juices, but don’t let it take over. You have lost creative integrity when you decide that AI’s version of an image looks better and use it as a replacement.
This is when the lines become blurred. If you think AI has a better idea, you risk losing your confidence to create or be inspired.
Let AI be a support, not a replacement. You can’t hand over your creative vision to AI just as you can’t hand it over to a friend and call the photography your work.
Keep the artist reins firmly locked in your hands.
Transparency and AI-Blended Photography
When integrating photography and AI, being transparent about your process is essential. Transparency and authenticity will not only increase trust but also gain you respect.
I have had many exhibitions displaying various photography styles and techniques, from images processed in the darkroom to highly Photoshopped digital photos.
I was always transparent about the process. Not only because my techniques interested the public, but also because being honest builds trust.
Being honest is even more crucial with the onset of AI art. Plus, it’s easy to be open about your intentions and methodology.
We are in a time when people are only beginning to integrate AI into their world and are struggling to understand it.
Merging traditional photography techniques with AI art to create contemporary work is controversial, but this also makes it intriguing.
If you intend to explore and experiment with AI as an evolving art form, it’s possible to generate hype around your AI-blended photography work without losing your creative integrity.
Sharing your artistic process via videos or snippets of your work practice can captivate an audience and gain new followers.
Warning, Lazy AI Eye
Photographers gain an eye for fine detail, light, and composition from many years of working with photographs.
Whatever you do, don’t let your photographer’s eye get lazy when integrating AI into your workflow.
If you hand too many of your editing tasks and artistic decisions over to AI, you risk starting to rely too heavily on it.
Keep things in check by asking yourself if you would have decided to make that edit, or are you just taking the easy way?
Overly relying on AI can dull your perception, resulting in you losing your unique aesthetic and your creative spark.
Photographer turned AI Artist
We live in the post-photography era. An era that allows photographers to experiment with how they cover world humanitarian, social, and political topics.
One such photographer is Michael Christopher Brown, an American photojournalist whose themes span war, survival, identity, and displacement.
His career stretches across two decades and six continents. His reportage of the Libyan revolution in 2011 using his iPhone sparked the first controversy of his career, and his use of AI-generated photographic art the second.
Using his smartphone to document a serious social disaster like a war sparked debate. Particularly regarding the type of equipment that should be used, and professionalism as a photojournalist.
Accustomed to pushing against accepted cultural norms, Brown dipped his artistic toes into AI and experimental media, merging his photography with AI-generated images.
90 miles was his first AI-generated photography work. It records the plight of the Cubans who risk their lives when attempting to escape Cuba by crossing the 90-mile stretch of sea between Havana and Florida.
Brown has inspired other photographers and artists with his experimentation and adaptability.
90 Miles by Michael Christopher Brown. Source: Instagram
Using AI generations, you can “create a vision of what is was or can be” like never before.
It could appear that some photographers on the world stage have handed the creative reins over to AI, bowing before their new creative master. Is it bye-bye to human inspiration?
However, when we take a closer look at their process, we begin to see that their work requires more than a few word prompts and the click of the magic AI generation button. It involves extensive skill, vision, and planning.
For instance, producing the artist’s specific design and vision involves hours of AI training using the photographer’s collection of photos.
We can now use AI as a reportage illustration using AI generation programs like Midjourney. Midjourney allows you to prompt and train AI with photos to influence the style produced.
Brown excels at whatever he turns his camera lens to, including sparking controversy and debate in photojournalistic circles.
Brown argues that AI is a reality, so why debate its place? Why not use it? Brown describes himself as both a photographer and an artist.
The leap into the arms of AI-generated art is not what he would consider to be part of his photography practice. Although he uses his photography to train AI, he describes the AI generations as artistic storytelling.
I admire Brown as he is authentic and sincere; he does not hide the tools or techniques he uses. By being open and transparent, he draws the world’s attention to the realism and use of AI-generated images.
90-miles is created from the depths of AI’s machine training, but when making AI-generated art, Brown was directing, and AI was obliging; he had a clear vision of what he wanted to achieve. Thus, he was always the creative director, and I believe he never lost his creative integrity.
Although Brown received heavy criticism for using AI, I believe he gave the world a gift by demonstrating how photojournalists can use AI to misrepresent the world.
The question is raised: Do photojournalists use these AI tools incognito?
The world we live in is grappling with a new reality: how can we know what is real and what isn’t?
Deepfakes are the opposite of what traditional photography was to the world. Photography gifted hyper-realism, and AI gives deepfakes. AI has inverted our grasp on reality and given us fakeism.
Just like photography was once considered a threat to the art world, AI is currently considered a threat to everything creative, from photography to art to writing.
Photographers who utilise AI as a new tool are often ostracised by the photography community as the community attempts to retain its integrity and traditional techniques.
Carl De Kyzer, a Belgian photojournalist, admits he never wanted to deceive anyone when he created AI art to explore and express new themes.
He had previously photographed in India, Congo, and the Soviet Union—and admits that when he first experimented with AI, he was unimpressed by the results.
I can relate to this: AI can be challenging to direct to obtain the precise result you envision. This is when many people fail and lose their creative integrity by taking the lazy road and using what AI has delivered.
But when De Keyzer was no longer permitted to return to the Soviet Union, he turned to AI to create Putin’s Dream.
De Kyzer, like Brown, used his collection of photos from his previous trips to Russia to train Midjourney’s AI.
He says his background in photography gave him the skills to direct the process and generate images that closely matched his creative vision.
Photographers have highly trained eyes. They can learn how to create a balanced composition; they have an eye for textures, colors, and composition.
Critics of his work say that the images he generates using AI are too real and could confuse the public.
It seems that AI automatically attracts an adverse reaction, whether warranted or just a knee-jerk reaction to something people can’t comprehend remains to be seen. I believe it is the latter, as the general public resists change.
Analog Backlash
Interestingly, AI-generated art has encouraged a new wave of enthusiasm for traditional photography techniques.
Interest has grown in capturing images on film and taking time to manually select the correct settings, exposure, aperture, and shutter speed.
Photographers revert to darkroom developing to embrace film’s raw, authentic, and unedited beauty.
Photographers are delving into photography practices that were archived due to the convenience of digital cameras.
They’re experiencing a newfound love for natural imperfections, like leaked light or out-of-focus objects. The artist enjoys not only achieving their goal, but also the process from conception, method to actualisation.
This hails a deeper appreciation of photography. The skill involved in the technicalities of capturing the perfect shot is once again celebrated, not taken for granted.
Under-processed film photos contrast with the hyper-glamorized and polished AI images.
We can only eat so much cake before we crave a healthy meal. Is it the same with AI?
At first, we are entranced by its fantastical, otherworldly creations, and later we crave the imperfections of human flaws.
The raw, rough, real side of life, the shadow we know in our daily grind.
Conclusion
AI generates not just images but also highly charged debates. AI-generated figures are known as the “Uncanny Valley” in photography circles.
AI can create images that look so real that it’s impossible to tell if they are fake. We can no longer rely on imagery to tell the truth.
It’s as if the art and photography world has come full circle. Now, AI is shaking the photographic world as photography once shook the art world.
While photography gives us snippets of reality, AI slams us into a world of illusion.
This is only the beginning. New artists’ genres and new photography techniques will emerge and merge with AI.
It is inevitable, like a tidal wave sweeping over the shores of our creative vision. But this doesn’t have to be a negative development, just like the invention of photography.
You can use AI to your advantage and ride its wave to enjoy its wonders. Just remember not to get swept away by its glitz; instead, retain your wits, your photographer’s eye, and your creative vision.
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