Author: 8thangel

In an update to my previous post, I have abandoned AI image generators for the time being. The randomness factor is just too high to be able to realistically grant any authorship to the prompter. It isn’t recreating the image you have in your head. In fact, it was unable to manage this in any of the experiments I made. At best, it was able to give me a couple of ideas for future images. But even this I don’t like. Will an AI image now be the source for much of the art that we come into contact with? Pandora’s box has truly been opened.

It’s not that artists have never borrowed, but at least they were borrowing off fellow humans, meaning the final image in question was distinctly human. AI is trained on humans, but its final output is random, if random can truly exist in a computer.

To be completely honest, there was an initial period where I waxed lyrical about AI image generators capabilities, but now this has been replaced by a sickly feeling. I’m not sure if this is partly due to the massive backlash from actual artists using a physical medium, or whether it is just from using it more extensively, and thus seeing the artifacts/errors that paint the image as distinctly AI. Either way, I have seen enough to know that I will be abandoning it for the foreseeable future, and will instead look to continue with photography (which, although similarly lambasted during its infancy, is still capable of representing a more accurate artist’s vision from mind to medium).

It will be slow, but I hope to make more pro-life images in the future, within the photography medium, and with other human artists as my inspiration.

I thought I’d write a post on some experimentations I’ve made with Open AI’s DALL E2. For those that don’t know, it’s an AI image generator. It works by taking some textual prompts from the user, before fashioning what seems to be a unique image every time. Not only can you specify what you want it to draw, but you can also specify the style you want it to be drawn in. Now, it seems to have some degree of poetic (or not so poetic) license in how it interprets your prompts. No matter how specific you make it, it will still deviate significantly at times from your instructions. The result of this, though, is some large variation in output.

So, I started first by looking to generate pro life images by generating images of women and the zygote. I won’t go into specifics on the prompts I used (due to another project I’m working on), but I got quite specific. Here is the first keeper that was generated.

I was surprised by the quality of this. Compositionally, it is not perfect, as it almost seems to be cut from a larger picture. Perhaps the software isn’t aware of the conventions for which features should be in the frame. But it seems to be of reasonable quality, and is certainly better than anything I can draw.

An even more interesting image is included below. As we can see, it isn’t a very detailed image of a woman, but it is an image that an artist could perhaps choose to take forward further themselves.

I then moved on to images of the baby. This generated a number of interesting, if not wholly bodily accurate images. I’ve included one below.

I would classify the images as interesting, although I don’t really connect with them. Perhaps connection is related to intention and workload.

Interestingly, the Catholic Pontifical for Life is currently conducting a review into “emerging technologies”, and Pope Francis has said that we must, “ensure that scientific and technological growth is reconciled more and more with a parallel development … in responsibility, values, and conscience.” When looking at AI image generators, we must consider the potential, as with other AI’s, for job displacement. At the moment, with the low resolution images these AI’s are outputting, the artist’s job is safe. But what about the future? Certainly, there will presumably always be a market for physical art created by human hands. But for those specialising in digital art, there may be problems on the horizon in terms of competition, as the creation of art passes into the hands of the masses, as digital cameras, and particularly phones, did for photography. The result will be a more diverse art space, but perhaps a less lucrative one.

However, we must also consider the value that a non-generated piece of art possesses, namely that of intention. There is no outpouring of soul into an AI generated image. Even with the most specific of prompts, the pictures generated are those seen by the computer, not the human. And so physical art, and perhaps art which travels on a medium, such as film photography, will keep a degree of value as being that created by a human (although there is no way to know whether an AI image has been used as a starting point for the picture). Certainly, when I look at AI generated images, it’s hard to find a connection, knowing that I am not peering into a human’s soul, despite it being an art piece. They are more like Frankenstein images.

With this in mind, it’s hard not to wish that AI image generators are banned. What we seem to place value on is human imagination, but with the advent of this technology, we can never be sure whether the image idea execution came from a human, or from a machine. It is important to note, though, that humans have often borrowed or reimagined art ideas from other humans in the past, which means that intentionality is never truly what we imagine it to be. It’s just that now, humans can borrow from another source too when creating their physical art.

A further problem comes from the AI generator in that you can ask it to copy a style, or produce variations on an image input. This is perhaps more problematic for the artist, as a style is like a signature for the artist. Often, it defines who they are. Problems arising from this could include “style dilution”, where the artist’s style becomes saturated into the market before they have reaped any kind of financial reward from it. One way to combat this would be to keep art secret until a body of work is complete, but this also diminishes the artist’s earning potential. In a market where any style can be replicated, how do you keep the market hungry for originals?

Despite calls for AI research to be halted or delayed it’s unlikely that this technology will remain out of reach forever. Perhaps then, we need to brace ourselves for this “Artificial New World”.

So, can this image generator be used to benefit the prolife movement? I think yes. There is relatively little pro-life art, as far as I am aware, and part of the difficulty is in the difficulty of creating art in general. Unfortunately, people are not drawn to highly divisive topics for fear of backlash. In this sense, AI provides an avenue for those that perhaps do not have the time or skill to create art in the traditional sense. Problems, however, are the disconnect people may have with the art generated. Is it going to be able to move people to changing their minds? Is the software good enough to even depict human emotion accurately? On the latter point, I would say no. The software seems to have difficulty depicting highly realistic human emotions. It also seems to have a propensity for inaccurate bodily depictions, particularly the face, which may conjure negative perspectives for people.

Still, others may have better luck than me in dealing with this software, so I have created a Facebook Group for AI Pro-life images, if anyone is interested in contributing. It’s called ProLife AI

The image that I have attached at the top of this page shows my film development outdoor lab that I used for developing my Entwined project large format image. It definitely makes an outdoor lab seem far more glorious than it actually is. With that being said, there are some benefits. Most obviously, the views. Then we have the clean air! (This in particular is a massive benefit. No more dirty black and white chemicals invading your nostrils and lungs). Finally, we have the benefit of not needing to designate and temporarily shut down a room (of which most only have a limited quantity in their household).

The negatives include, first and foremost, the weather. Those snow covered mountains may look good, but the freezing conditions wreak havoc not only with your body, but also with your chemicals. The speed at which the chemicals lose temperature is quite fast, so you’ll need to use a water bath as well, and keep development times on the shorter end if possible.

You may also need to look at your equipment. A glass thermometer is never really a good idea, but even less so in the winter (as I found out!). I actually used an electronic meat thermometer in the end, although you may find something better or more accurate.

Also, if, like me, you have no nearby water source, then expect to be running to and from the kitchen a lot with hot and cold water.

Finally, back to equipment, you are going to need a daylight tank. I myself use a Paterson Orbital, which has been adjusted for black and white development.

A further problem is that your water is not going to be at room temperature. If it’s winter, then it’s going to be significantly colder than the recommended levels, so you will need to use hot water, and then wait for it to cool down. And you can be waiting a long time.

You will also need a table to work on. And if you don’t want to get in trouble, you will also need a plastic sheet cover. I went for a lovely red and white polka dot design.

Some problems I encountered included getting direct sun on my daylight tank. (I have some suspicions that this may have caused a development mark on one side, although I can’t be sure.) I also shattered a thermometer, as already mentioned. Finally, the cleanup job was a bit of an effort. As my balcony is used in fairer weather, I had to really be sure that I wasn’t leaving any nasty chemicals around.

So that’s it really. A film development outdoor lab is possible. You heard it here first!

It has been a long time since I began photography. There have been many, many images, some of which I think are beautiful, some not. Over time, however, the satisfaction of taking images has waned considerably. Along with other aspects of my life, my photography began to feel empty. I felt that the only things that weren’t empty for me were those that were created with some form of love. Essentially, superficial beauty had lost its appeal for me.

Around this time I had a major medical crisis, which brought me back to the catholic church, and my life seemed to get back on course for a while. Being part of church and taking the sacraments helped me immensely.

I then had another crisis, which made me hit rock bottom, and I once again drifted away from the church. That was 5 years ago. The good news is that I am currently well again, and my old self has returned somewhat. I am back at church again, taking the sacraments, and once again, I feel that God has helped lift me out of my despair.

I don’t want to follow the same path that I previously traveled. This time I want there to be purpose to all of my actions. Of course, I’m sure I will make mistakes, but I am hoping to turn over a new leaf.

How does this relate to photography? Well, while I have some spare time, I would like to dedicate my photography to a cause. That is the only way I feel that it is acceptable to pursue it.

And so I have been looking at something I feel very strongly about: abortion. I know this is a very contentious topic (especially so at the moment), but I feel that I have to speak up and engage in the debate. I am, as the title of this post would imply, pro-life.

There are many bible quotes that suggest that life begins in the womb. (See Top 10 Pro-life Bible Verses However, the trouble is that atheists do not believe in God. In this sense, it is possible that other arguments may also help to persuade.

Now, I do not pretend to be an authority on the matter, but I feel that there is a prominent argument which is being largely neglected by people, and that is that science has been unable to prove how consciousness, and in particular, phenomenal consciousness forms. The presiding view seems to be that it arises from the brain. But I would argue that this is materialist. Materialism is the belief that there is nothing beyond matter and this reality. It is a deterministic perspective. If we hold that the Big Bang is true (that is, that the whole universe was born at a specific point in the past) then the materialist perspective implies that every choice we make was already pre-destined at the point of the Big Bang. In other words materialism implies that choice (free will), is actually an illusion. When you really consider it, this is an absurd position.

So, if choice and agency (free will) does exist, as the majority of us are wont to believe, and free will implies consciousness (since we need to experience something in order to make a choice), then we can start to draw some conclusions.

Consciousness must, at least in part, be attributable to a force exterior to reality, ie. a soul. At this point we must consider the question of when ensoulment of this exterior force takes place. It is possible that this is from conception. It is possible that it takes place, for instance, once the brain is ready. But if we are considering a force outside of measurable reality, then we are really talking about God. Then, if belief in the Christian God is correct (as I believe), then the Bible passages relating to the pre-born are important, namely, “you knit me together in my mother’s womb”. If God is knitting us together in the womb, then he clearly has plans for us. Furthermore, it doesn’t say you knit my body together, but “me”, implying that the person is already present. This would imply the case that the soul is present from conception.

So, if we believe in free will, then we must have a soul present, probably at conception, and perhaps also consciousness. This implies that abortion is a heinous action.

For those that remain unconvinced, we can then consider a thought experiment:

Consider a man who has been asked to demolish a house. He knows there may be people inside. In fact, he has been told so. He demolishes the house without checking for people.

I think we can see from the thought experiment that the attitude to abortion is not consistent with attitudes to killing elsewhere.

There are also those that are pro-abortion purely due to a political stance. To those people, I would say please consider that perhaps the political system is broken, with neither left nor right, or even center, holding a position that is consistently for life in all its aspects. The Catholic Church can certainly not be placed on the political spectrum, as Pope Francis has alluded to.

Finally, the picture that I have attached to this post is my first photograph that attempts to be pro-life, and is called, “Entwined”.

Entwined Project Description There is an entwined relationship between two souls in pregnancy, beginning with conception and ending in death, a relationship characterized by love, beauty, and pain. The entwined roses represent this relationship.

I hope to make more pro-life photography in future. But in the meantime, if you would like to also contribute some pro-life photography to the world, then I have created a pro-life photography group here. I would like to hope that others are also willing to share images that they hope will serve to remind people of the beauty that comes with pregnancy and children.