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Colorizing an Icon - The Danziger Gallery's Moonrise Controversy · The Nerdy Photographer Podcast

0:07
Casey Fatchett: Okay, redo, redo, Mulligan. So, Springsteen
0:11
says to Madonna, hello. Welcome to the Nerdy Photographer
0:17
Podcast Special Edition. I'm your host, Casey Fatchette. I'm
0:21
here today with my friend Helen Stoilas. Helen, welcome to the
0:25
show. You've been on before. Welcome back to the show.
0:28
Helen Stoilas: Thank you. It's been too long.
0:30
Casey Fatchett: Yeah, it has.
0:30
Helen Stoilas: Hello to my favorite tipster, my go-to
0:35
source for all photography news.
0:40
Casey Fatchett: Put that on the website.
0:45
Helen Stoilas: No, if you're, if you're, if you're sending me
0:47
something going on in the photo world, I know I should pay
0:50
attention. It's catching,
0:52
Casey Fatchett: it's catching on. We're talking today about
0:57
Hubbub, a hullabaloob,
1:00
Helen Stoilas: absolutely a hubbub.
1:02
Casey Fatchett: Oh, whoopsie daisy, may someone might call it
1:06
of the recent AI colorization of Ansel Adams Moonrise over
1:14
Hernandez.
1:17
Helen Stoilas: I like the bracketing.
1:17
Casey Fatchett: Yeah, I put in the bracketing. You can't see
1:19
it. This is a audio only podcast. I did hand brackets,
1:25
because I mean, officially just called Moonrise, I think, but I
1:29
think it's..
1:30
Helen Stoilas: I think it's the full thing. I think it's Moon
1:32
Rise over Hernandez, yeah, New Mexico. Yeah,
1:35
Casey Fatchett: that's what I thought it was, but then I was
1:37
like reading some other stuff.
1:38
Helen Stoilas: I get, yeah, like it's.. it's been referred to
1:40
different ways, it was referred to differently by the gallery,
1:43
yeah, just
1:44
Casey Fatchett: calling it moonrise, and so I was like
1:46
Helen Stoilas: I think for shorthand you could probably go
1:48
by moonrise, yeah
1:49
Casey Fatchett: All right, just so we know what we're talking
1:50
about, it's a black and white, the very famous, very famous
1:55
black and white photo
1:55
Helen Stoilas: In museum collections, yeah,
1:57
Casey Fatchett: yeah, photo by Ansel Adams and the Danziger
2:02
Gallery decided at APAD AI P A D, the photo show, as it's also
2:07
known in New York City, in April, decided to show this AI
2:13
colorized,
2:14
Helen Stoilas: colorized version
2:16
Casey Fatchett: without telling anybody about it
2:18
Helen Stoilas: and not talking about it
2:20
Casey Fatchett: So, you, I told you about this happening, this
2:23
Helen Stoilas: You told me about it, and I reached out
2:24
immediately.
2:25
Casey Fatchett: Yeah I mean, I, as soon as I heard about it, I
2:27
mentioned it to the Adams account on threads and stuff.
2:31
Helen Stoilas: They probably had a few people reaching out to
2:33
them. I'm sure,
2:34
Casey Fatchett: I'm sure.
2:34
Helen Stoilas: I think, because you're, you're, you weren't the
2:36
first one. A lot of people I talked to had the same kind of
2:39
question of, is the Adams estate involved, because it would seem
2:42
obvious that for a gallery of the reputation and the history
2:47
of Danziger to create a work like this, they would have
2:51
consulted the estate, you know, that turns out not to have been
2:55
the case.
2:56
Casey Fatchett: Yeah, yeah, the Adams estate came back and said
2:59
that they were in no way informed, or had no way, in
3:04
absolutely no way approved of, or had given any sort of green
3:10
light to this, which I think automatically puts it in a real,
3:14
ethically gray area, even though it's technically in the public
3:21
domain
3:21
Helen Stoilas: public domain,
3:22
Casey Fatchett: but it's sort of like I don't know
3:24
Helen Stoilas: I'm curious about why it's in the public domain. I
3:28
haven't really been able to kind of suss that out completely. I
3:30
didn't have a chance to ask the Adams estate to kind of explain
3:36
that yet, and I've seen different kinds of explanations
3:39
for it, because Adams had created work for the National
3:43
Park Service, which is under public domain, as so many of
3:46
the, you know, photographers of that era working for, like, the
3:48
Department of the Interior. Yeah, there was Dorothea Lange,
3:52
you know, like there were a lot of famous photographers who did
3:56
work for the government, you know, and so their work is under
3:58
public domain now, because it was created for the US
4:02
government, right. This I don't think is one of those, even
4:05
though it was created around the same time. And then I saw
4:08
something about the fact that this work was created in 1941
4:12
and so there wasn't copyright then. There wasn't copyright
4:16
until what, 7878 and then 90, right?
4:20
Casey Fatchett: Yeah, I don't know, but I don't know if they
4:21
can apply for copyright at that point.
4:23
Helen Stoilas: He could apply for copyright, and then he had
4:26
an opportunity to renew, apparently for copyright, and
4:31
what I saw online was that he didn't renew his copyright, so
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the copyright lapsed then from that first initial copyright
4:38
kind of like protection, but then I've seen other things that
4:42
say, despite that, anything, most of his work would fall
4:46
under copyright protection until 70 years after his death, which
4:50
is 2054 you know, like
4:53
Casey Fatchett: not now,
4:54
Helen Stoilas: which is not now, we still got some time, we got
4:56
30 years, and add to that. Not just the copyright, the
5:03
trademark Ansel Adams is a trademark name, you know, and
5:08
the trust oversees that. The family, you know, continues to
5:14
use his trademark. He's got the Ansel Adams Gallery in Yosemite,
5:19
which is family owned and continues to put out prints, and
5:23
that doesn't expire, right?
5:25
Casey Fatchett: Yeah,
5:25
Helen Stoilas: and they in the Danziger AI work, it
5:30
specifically, I mean, it says it's it's it's iconic, even
5:35
using the word iconic, iconic, cancel Adam's moonrise, you
5:41
know, so I'm, you know, the gallery said that it had
5:46
consulted an IP lawyer to make sure it was on firm legal
5:50
ground, but I think it's still, I mean, we know how difficult
5:54
copyright is on both sides, you know, to enforce and to kind of
6:00
like prove that it's not copyrighted material,
6:02
Casey Fatchett: right? And also, just, it's the if you're going
6:06
to consult an IP lawyer, why wouldn't you consult?
6:10
Helen Stoilas: Why wouldn't you trust,
6:11
Casey Fatchett: like, in some ways? Like,
6:13
Helen Stoilas: what's my big question? Why pick of all the
6:15
artists? Why pick Ansel Adams?
6:17
Casey Fatchett: Yeah, it's well, because it's an iconic piece,
6:22
Helen Stoilas: it's an iconic.. no, you're right, because it's
6:23
an iconic piece, it's recognizable, it has real
6:26
strong, real strong public imagination, you know, like it's
6:32
got a very.. it resonates with the public imagination really
6:35
strongly, and there's two things that I think are really
6:38
important about Ansel Adams's work in this context, number
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one, he, he was basically a defining figure in making
6:48
photography a fine art, you know. He was a co-founder of
6:54
MoMA's photography department, you know.
6:58
Casey Fatchett: Yeah,
6:58
Helen Stoilas: photography would not be in museums if it weren't
7:00
for Ansel Adams, you know, like it wouldn't be recognized as an
7:03
art form, you know, and second, he was an environmentalist, huge
7:10
environmentalist, he was, he was part of the Sierra Club from the
7:12
age of 17, you know, he was constantly like saying, you
7:19
know, we need to protect our environment, we need to, we need
7:22
to not build highways, we need to not do billboards. He would
7:25
hate data centers. Like, exactly, why would you do an AI
7:30
work like the most rapacious technology of the work of a
7:37
noted environmentalist? Yeah, you know,
7:41
Casey Fatchett: yeah, like the estates statement saying, like,
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this isn't about AI as a thing, we're not, you know, like
7:53
admonishing AI, whatever, like, you know, Ansel was at the
7:57
cutting edge of, like, new, like, exploring things in new
8:02
ways, and whatever, and it's like, and was curious about
8:06
where computers might take things, like, yeah, I still
8:08
don't think he would be cool with AI data centers destroying,
8:12
Helen Stoilas: but also environment, the environmental
8:15
question, I think, without a doubt, he would not be on board
8:18
with that,
8:19
Casey Fatchett: yeah
8:19
Helen Stoilas: the question of AI as a tool is a little bit
8:22
more open-ended.
8:23
Casey Fatchett: Yeah,
8:24
Helen Stoilas: no, because he was interested in, I mean, the
8:26
camera is a tool, right? So the argument can be made that this
8:31
is just another tool for artists to use, but you've now taken
8:34
that out of the artist's hands. He doesn't have any input into
8:38
what,
8:39
Casey Fatchett: and there's no mention where
8:40
Helen Stoilas: there's work, right, and, and the people who
8:42
are responsible for protecting his intellectual property and
8:46
his legacy have not been involved, so that entire, you
8:51
know, the agency has been, I mean, there's no question of
8:55
this being used as like a tool to further photography when it's
8:59
being applied to an artist who doesn't have any say in it, you
9:02
know, like you're just taking the human element completely out
9:07
of the equation, which I think is the thing that most people
9:11
are responding to, you know, because it Ansel climbed
9:17
mountains, you know, he was in nature, he would. This isn't
9:21
just like him, just documenting, and he also was very, very
9:25
particular about how he created these images. You know, when you
9:30
look at moonrise, this is not just a straight documenting of
9:34
a,
9:34
Casey Fatchett: oh, this ice, I pulled over the side of the
9:36
road, and
9:37
Helen Stoilas: exactly, no, this is that sky is unnatural, that
9:40
sky is ominous. That sky is like otherworldly, you know. It's so
9:46
dark, it's.. and those clouds kind of like looming on the
9:48
horizon.
9:50
Casey Fatchett: I don't know if you're aware of this. There are
9:51
two versions.
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Helen Stoilas: There's many versions. He was creating prints
9:55
of this. He created prints in the 40s, and then he created
9:58
prints in the 60s, and. 70s, yeah, the later ones, iterations
10:03
of it that don't have that up, that kind of like moodiness,
10:06
right? The
10:06
Casey Fatchett: later ones have are more moody, yeah, darker,
10:11
Helen Stoilas: yeah. And those are the ones that are in museum
10:12
collections, right? Those are the ones that you know are
10:16
recognized, and he, he was very conscious of how he was doing
10:21
that in his prints, right? He was very particular. You
10:25
probably know this better than you absolutely know this better
10:28
than I do. He created zoning, yeah, you know, which is.. do
10:31
you want to explain? It's like,
10:33
Casey Fatchett: like the zone system for deciding, like,
10:36
where, like, exposure, like in various. okay. So, when Helen
10:42
asked me this right in our conversation, I totally flub it.
10:45
So I came back to re-record what the zone system is. So Ansel
10:51
Adams was trying to create a scientific method for
10:56
translating what he saw in the field into a predictable,
10:59
controlled way of exposing for those shots, his solution was to
11:04
divide the entire tonal range from absolute black to absolute
11:08
white into 11 zones labeled zero through 10. Used Roman numerals
11:13
for this, so you'll commonly see it as, like, you know, in Roman
11:17
numerals. Anyway, zone zero is perfectly pure, featureless
11:21
black zone 10 or X in Roman numerals is pure featureless
11:27
white zone five sits in the middle, that's the 18% gray that
11:34
your camera, if you use a digital camera, and their light
11:38
meter inside of it is calibrated to see as quote unquote correct,
11:42
so everything your camera sees that your is it exposes for is
11:47
that middle zone, the perfectly in the middle. Now each zone is
11:53
one exposure away from its neighbor, so to if you're
11:57
looking at your exposure and it's exposing for the for zone
12:03
five, and you want to expose for zone three, you need to come
12:07
down two stops, or you need to double your shutter speed twice.
12:12
Does that make sense? All right, I hope so. Yes, I hope that
12:17
makes sense. All right, back to our discussion, it's just it
12:23
just going back, like, yes, he was out there, he was in this,
12:26
he was a human being,
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Helen Stoilas: He was climbing mountains,
12:28
Casey Fatchett: he was a human being in nature, and they, and
12:31
this is like, they, they didn't even list any human artist who
12:34
had any, supposedly it was like we used AI, and then we
12:38
photoshopped, and I happened
12:40
Helen Stoilas: that's what I was trying to, when I, when you
12:41
first tipped me off of this, that was the first thing I was
12:43
trying to suss out was who was responsible for this, who did
12:47
this, you know, because there is no, it just says AI generated,
12:52
and it says that there was a master printer, and the master
12:54
printer is Lamont Studios, over here in Long Island City,
12:58
Queens, right?
12:59
Casey Fatchett: Yes, gonna say I may have a connection to that,
13:02
if you needed the
13:04
Helen Stoilas: I've been digging. I reached out and
13:06
didn't hear anything. Okay, um, I reached out to the gallery,
13:08
didn't hear anything, and I, you know, when it first kind of
13:12
happened, and dancer, earnest statement said he wasn't talking
13:15
to, you know, you, he declined opportunities to speak to the
13:19
press, but if you're doing a project like this, it needs
13:23
context, you know. You need to kind of.. I had people asking
13:26
me, it.. you know, is this an artist statement? Is it supposed
13:30
to be, you know, kind of like a statement about the use of AI?
13:34
There wasn't anything kind of explaining,
13:36
Casey Fatchett: no,
13:37
Helen Stoilas: what this was, right?
13:38
Casey Fatchett: Nothing.
13:39
Helen Stoilas: And I think that's what's kind of caused a
13:41
lot of the confusion and you know upset behind it, because it
13:47
was kind of presented with a price tag, and that's it,
13:52
Casey Fatchett: that's all. There's there's no context
13:55
around it, and like you said, is this - are you trying to say
13:58
something about AI, about artists, about whatever it is,
14:02
just sort of like, nope, 10 grand, yeah, $10,000
14:07
Helen Stoilas: smaller, six or eight, yes, you know,
14:10
Casey Fatchett: or you know, if you only want to, you know, 20
14:12
by 30, well, 6000
14:13
Helen Stoilas: yes, you can also order this same colorized, like
14:17
a colorized version of Moonrise on eBay for like 20 bucks, yeah,
14:22
Casey Fatchett: but it's not done by a master printer, done
14:24
Helen Stoilas: by a master printer. You're right, Casey.
14:26
Yes, absolutely. Because
14:27
Casey Fatchett: also you can't copyright it.
14:30
Helen Stoilas: Who's collecting this? That's what I want to
14:32
know.
14:32
Casey Fatchett: Well, and I was having this conversation
14:34
actually with the person who has a connection with the printer,
14:36
Helen Stoilas: yeah,
14:36
Casey Fatchett: and they are saying, like, oh, you know, it's
14:39
what, who is this for? Who's like, so somebody can say they
14:42
have an Ansel Adams in their house cheap, because the, the
14:47
estate, I don't know if you, so they charge like 100 grand for
14:51
like their estate prints of this, but they
14:53
Helen Stoilas: also, they also have poster
14:57
Casey Fatchett: lithographs, yeah
14:58
Helen Stoilas: they have lithographs that are. Much more
15:00
affordable, you know, like a couple 100 or something, you
15:03
know, like 4000 or something. I think is the most they're like,
15:06
you know, lithograph prints go for. So, yeah, you could have an
15:10
absolute kind of like, you know,
15:12
Casey Fatchett: official quality
15:13
Helen Stoilas: official, yeah, version of this from the from
15:17
the gallery, from the Ansel Adams Gallery. It's not
15:22
unattainable, it's not something that is.. I mean, it's not in
15:25
color,
15:26
Casey Fatchett: right?
15:26
Helen Stoilas: But what is.. what does the color actually add
15:28
to it? It's my..
15:30
Casey Fatchett: well, I feel like when the..
15:33
Helen Stoilas: why would you want it in color
15:35
Casey Fatchett: to see what Ansel Adams was seeing when he
15:37
took the photo..
15:38
Helen Stoilas: But we're not seeing what Ansel Adams was
15:39
seeing, like you said, like this is not processed a
15:43
documentation, and that's what he, that's not what he wanted to
15:45
do with this work. He wanted to, he wanted to record, and he
15:50
wanted to kind of, like, you know, portray these landscapes,
15:53
but he wanted to portray them in a very emotional way, you know.
15:56
And he wanted to kind of like make them inspiring and make
15:58
them kind of really something that would touch people, you
16:02
know.
16:03
Casey Fatchett: Yeah,
16:03
Helen Stoilas: so it's not just about putting your camera out
16:06
there and clicking, you know, it's about actually thinking
16:09
about the scene, the color, the light, you know, the depth, what
16:16
you're, what it's communicating, the kind of like emotional
16:18
response you get from it. So it's a lot of that that I don't
16:22
think gets conveyed in the same way with the color photograph,
16:26
you know.
16:26
Casey Fatchett: It just, it comes across to me as like a, I
16:29
don't know, it as lifeless in a way. It just feels like, even
16:34
though you've added color to it, so it's supposed to feel more
16:37
alive, and like you're actually there, as opposed to this old
16:41
timey photo with black and white, and it's not living, it
16:45
just like
16:46
Helen Stoilas: an Instagram filter, yeah,
16:49
Casey Fatchett: you suck the soul out of it, it just like it
16:51
doesn't, it looks like, yeah, it looks like you've slapped an
16:56
Instagram filter on it, and it has it You've taken the human
17:03
element out of it. You've taken the
17:05
Helen Stoilas: the human element is the big part of it, and
17:07
especially so this was displayed at a major art fair where the
17:12
focus was on human photographers, right? You know,
17:15
and it was really kind of like a lot of the press at the time was
17:18
like the A Pad show reminds us why human photographers are so
17:22
important at a time of the AI image, you know, like the
17:25
creativity and the imagination of the human is what is
17:29
tantamount, right? Yeah, and then this AI-generated work
17:33
being offered without comment was, I think, to a lot of people
17:39
really incongruous, you know, and
17:41
Casey Fatchett: there were people who tackled the AI, who
17:44
either.. there were some who used it in their creative
17:46
process, and there were others. The one that I thought was
17:49
really interesting was there's photographers who, who made the
17:53
photographs that looked like it was an AI-generated image, they
17:58
Helen Stoilas: they actually did it themselves
17:59
Casey Fatchett: But it was actually a practical image,
18:03
Helen Stoilas: yeah,
18:04
Casey Fatchett: and that is, they got commentary on, like,
18:07
you're making a commentary on on this thing, this just seems like
18:11
we want money, like we're just trying to sell this, because
18:15
it's the
18:16
Helen Stoilas: the estate, also kind of revealed that they found
18:19
out that other, either other states had been approached as,
18:24
like, you know, we can do this for your artists as well, or
18:29
they heard about the gallery using Ansel Adams as an example,
18:35
for, oh, we can do this with other artists, like, almost
18:39
like, hey,
18:39
Casey Fatchett: we've done this for them,
18:41
Helen Stoilas: yes, exactly, but
18:43
Casey Fatchett: yeah, but leveraging the name
18:45
Helen Stoilas: I don't know what the exact kind of, you know,
18:48
Casey Fatchett: wording was, but
18:49
Helen Stoilas: wording was, or how it was presented, or who it
18:52
was presented to, that's what the trust is saying, you know,
18:58
and that opens a whole nother door, you know, like, yeah.
19:02
Okay, so we're seeing a colorized Ansel Adams. Are we
19:05
going to see a colorized Weston? Are we going to see a colorized
19:07
Dorothea Lange? Like, are all these kind of like
19:12
Casey Fatchett: going after Vivian Mayer's work? It's not
19:14
color,
19:15
Helen Stoilas: these classical photography, you know, images
19:22
going to be recreated,
19:23
Casey Fatchett: Weegee
19:24
Helen Stoilas: Weegee, can you imagine? Oh my god, just bloody
19:27
Weegee. Gross, disgusting.
19:31
Casey Fatchett: It's hard enough in black and white, but
19:34
Helen Stoilas: I like, you know, like there's a artists were
19:38
working with the tools and the constraints that they had at the
19:42
time, and they were creating these really impactful images,
19:45
and I think then kind of like remixing them,
19:49
Casey Fatchett: yeah,
19:50
Helen Stoilas: doesn't really add to it, you know.
19:52
Casey Fatchett: It's, I mean, there's a.. I was thinking about
19:55
the Richard Prince Instagram captions, I think, where. He
20:00
just took other, he took people's Instagram images, and
20:03
then, like, transformative work. I changed the caption, but it
20:08
made me think, like, well, then can I just take a Disney movie
20:11
and, like, put closed captions on it and say, "Oh, I changed
20:14
it, I transformed this work by giving it a different.. I'm just
20:19
gonna put the captions of, like, the Sopranos underneath it, or
20:22
something, and, like, now it's a new work, because it's got a
20:25
different,
20:26
Helen Stoilas: which is, which is what the AI age may kind of,
20:29
like, is everything going to go out the window? I think there
20:32
are, there are people out there who think that, like, nothing
20:35
should be copyrighted, right? It should all be available, like,
20:38
it should all just be public domain, it should all just be
20:40
available for reinterpretation, and you know, just free for all.
20:46
There are
20:48
Casey Fatchett: definitely those people that I hear good comments
20:51
from them all the time. If, and I think that part of it is they
20:54
feel like if you've posted something on the internet, it is
20:58
now fair game.
20:59
Helen Stoilas: Fair game, right?
21:00
Casey Fatchett: Is that I can just do whatever I want with it.
21:04
It's there are people who definitely
21:06
Helen Stoilas: If you're actually doing something
21:08
creative with it, and you know, like actually transforming the
21:12
work. I can see that argument, you know, being a little like if
21:17
it's actually leading to more creativity, I could, I could
21:20
kind of understand it, but it doesn't, right? It doesn't.
21:23
Casey Fatchett: There's no thought
21:24
Helen Stoilas: It's kind of like it just, just kind of like, you
21:26
know, lazy, you know, like it just becomes kind of like, oh,
21:31
here it is, and I slap something on it, you know, like it's not
21:34
actually create like the creativity is work, you know,
21:38
like it's climbing a mountain, it is, it is, you know, putting
21:42
Casey Fatchett: in the effort. They even said all they did was
21:44
all they said all they did was create a colorized, like the
21:47
prompt was create is very,
21:48
Helen Stoilas: the prompt is very. And then, and then the
21:51
gallery said that they went through different proofs, and
21:53
they did iterations, photo, you know, kind of like digital
21:58
manipulation to the image to get the colors right, to get the
22:01
colors right. I mean, what are the.. I mean,
22:04
Casey Fatchett: what are the colors? You don't know what are
22:05
the colors,
22:05
Helen Stoilas: you know. So,
22:09
Casey Fatchett: what you think,
22:10
Helen Stoilas: but that's not the same as climbing a mountain.
22:12
I'm going to tell you right now. Yeah,
22:15
Casey Fatchett: yeah, it's.. it's not becoming..
22:17
Helen Stoilas: and I don't.. I don't. I don't understand why we
22:21
are of all the things to use AI for. Why creativity? Like, there
22:28
are so many boring ass things that, like, I wish I didn't have
22:34
to do, you know,
22:35
Casey Fatchett: curing disease,
22:36
Helen Stoilas: like focus on making AI do that work, you
22:39
know, rather than like art and poetry and music, and like those
22:43
are the things that you want to be freeing up people to have
22:46
time to do, like why are you giving that to the AI?
22:51
Casey Fatchett: Because they want to turn it into a consumer
22:53
like product. I know that it is
22:55
Helen Stoilas: what it is. Yeah, exactly. Becomes
22:57
Casey Fatchett: content or it becomes like something they can
22:59
sell, and that's why you know, like, I think that AI can be
23:06
used as a tool for things like pattern recognition, things
23:10
that, like, it can be used for medicine, can be used for all
23:16
worried
23:16
Helen Stoilas: about AI and medicine, to be honest, no,
23:18
Casey Fatchett: just like, like, I know,
23:20
Helen Stoilas: analyzing, analyzing things like that,
23:22
yeah,
23:23
Casey Fatchett: yes, there's those sorts of, and I always
23:28
think that there needs to be a human element to the process.
23:32
There has to be like a someone behind, even if it's data
23:36
analysis, somebody who can look at it, go like, oh, is that
23:39
really what it says, and then like check that, and be like, oh
23:44
yeah, okay, but like you said, Why are we doing poetry and art,
23:52
and like the quintessentially human acts of creation? Why are
24:02
we trying to replace those with a computer, like the, yeah, they
24:07
take away the, you know, the boring.
24:12
Helen Stoilas: I think a lot of it has to do with the kind of,
24:15
you know, like good versus bad art, right? And AI gives this
24:21
kind of like technical proficiency in some cases,
24:25
though it's severely lacking in a lot of ways, you know, you're
24:29
able to kind of like produce something on a technical level,
24:33
it's a shortcut, right, like you're able to kind of like leap
24:35
frog to a certain technical level that not many people, you
24:39
know, achieve except through hard work, you know. So,
24:45
Casey Fatchett: practice,
24:46
Helen Stoilas: I think. I think you lose a lot as well, like
24:50
from doing that, you know. Part of an Ansel is a great example
24:54
for this. He was a technical master, you know. He, he knew
24:58
how to use the tech. It so well he mastered it, you know, and
25:04
because he had put in that work from the age of like 17, you
25:09
know, like he was a young man when he started, you know,
25:13
photographing, he was able to create the images he was because
25:18
he was putting in that work, and I think this kind of like desire
25:24
to kind of like circumvent that is just resulting in a whole lot
25:29
of lazy work, you know, like it's resulting in AI slop, and
25:36
you know,
25:38
Casey Fatchett: yeah, it's it's
25:39
Helen Stoilas: auto-tuned, kind of like it's a,
25:42
Casey Fatchett: there's, there's a, it's very funny. I was
25:48
recently at a restaurant next sitting next to an artist whose
25:52
young child, probably six or seven years old, was asking for
25:56
the phone, like to play on the phone, and this artist said I'm
26:03
going to train you to be an artist, you need to be bored,
26:07
Unknown: absolutely,
26:09
Casey Fatchett: you need to be, you need to learn,
26:10
Helen Stoilas: honestly, Casey,
26:12
Casey Fatchett: you need to learn to be bored, and you need
26:14
to learn to think, and you need, he's like, you, you might be
26:18
upset with me for a few minutes now, but later in your life,
26:23
you're going to be really glad that you learned this skill, and
26:26
I was sort of.. they felt like, like a little light had come
26:30
down from the heavens and shine on that moment. I was like,
26:34
"What a beautiful thing to say to your child. A
26:37
Helen Stoilas: absolutely,
26:38
Casey Fatchett: like, you want to. it. I feel like AI,
26:42
generative AI. I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna put these
26:46
things on either side of each other, because I think that
26:48
there's a, there are uses for AI outside of,
26:52
Helen Stoilas: yeah,
26:53
Casey Fatchett: generative things. Generative AI, in my
26:57
opinion, appeals to people who don't want to put in the effort,
27:01
but want to, quote unquote, create, like, oh, I don't like
27:06
when it comes to, like, photography or art, like, I am
27:09
not a good painter, I am not, like, I'm not a good painter, I
27:14
have trouble drawing, I'm very good with photography, I'm good
27:19
with words, these things, these things that I, but I've also put
27:23
a lot of effort into those things, because I had some
27:26
natural attraction to it. I practiced, I did those, I
27:32
practiced it, drawing and painting, and just didn't, it
27:36
didn't, you know, I couldn't get past that like level of I suck
27:40
at this. I want to keep going and get better at it. There are
27:44
other things I chose to suck at long enough that I got better at
27:47
them, and I think that there's just.. it appeals to people who
27:51
don't want to go through that process, who don't want to learn
27:56
that this takes time, and
27:59
Helen Stoilas: It's okay to suck. I think that's like really
28:01
like what is important for like not everything has to be like
28:05
brilliant, right? Right away, like your writing doesn't have
28:08
to. My writing when I was a kid was absolute shit, you know?
28:12
Like you improve the more you do it, and you learn and you
28:16
develop and you you grow and it and it takes a long time, and
28:22
like shortcutting that doesn't result in the same thing, you
28:28
know, like it, and I think that is what we will see, kind of
28:33
down the line, like a lot of people are like, oh, you know,
28:35
like it's you can't avoid it, you know, kind of like adapt or
28:40
be left behind, but I honestly don't think that's the case. I
28:43
think in, you know, 50 years' time, we look back at this like
28:47
AI stuff, and we'll be like, oh, what was that? I'm sorry, you
28:51
know, like,
28:51
Casey Fatchett: hopefully we don't have to do, like, Skynet
28:54
or the Butlerian Jihad
28:55
Helen Stoilas: While we're plugged into our little battery
28:57
pod, yeah,
28:58
Casey Fatchett: Matrix, or like, didn't any of science fiction
29:03
teach you people anything? Just read a book, read some books.
29:12
The Dune is all about they fought a war against thinking
29:15
machines.
29:16
Helen Stoilas: Just read some books
29:18
Casey Fatchett: Read some books. Come on, read some, read some
29:22
sci-fi. The yeah, I think that there's already there are two
29:28
factions already that you have the people who are like consume,
29:32
consume, consume, you just have to do this so we can keep having
29:35
content for people to have to take, and then there's there's
29:39
already a backlash, I mean, which we're seeing to technology
29:43
in some ways, like the kids, kids,
29:48
Helen Stoilas: kids today,
29:49
Casey Fatchett: younger millennials, and Gen Z. I'm not
29:53
so sure about alpha, are gobbling up point and shoot
29:57
cameras, yeah. There's a huge, huge market for it. They're just
30:02
buying them all these, like, I'm not talking about, like, new
30:05
ones. Yeah, film, analog film, vintage cameras. They're
30:10
referring to digital cameras as vintage, and I'm just like, what
30:16
do you mean? But it's stuff that's not connected to the
30:20
internet, yeah. It's stuff that doesn't have filters applied to
30:24
it. They want like these things that have the display a an
30:28
accurate image of themselves, and like your phone
30:31
automatically applies computational stuff to it, even
30:35
if you don't choose it.
30:36
Helen Stoilas: Yes, yeah,
30:38
Casey Fatchett: and they're, they're like, there's so I'm
30:41
hopeful on the one hand that that sort of, and I'm hopeful
30:46
because in my own sectors of the photography industry, and like
30:52
wedding photography, the imperfect photo is becoming very
30:57
much a style that people are drawn towards, which makes me
31:01
hopeful, because it's like displaying what's really going
31:04
on in somebody's wedding day or life, or wherever they choose to
31:10
apply this type of photography, that it's not this manufactured
31:15
moment or AI-produced sort of thing. Then I see people using
31:21
AI headshots on LinkedIn, and I'm because they didn't want to
31:24
spend money on a photographer, and I'm like, I can tell that
31:27
that's not real, and you know, you, your credibility kind of,
31:33
there's a credibility tax for that sort of thing, and I don't
31:38
know, it, I think that's why I say there's like two sides, but
31:42
I think we're working,
31:43
Helen Stoilas: we're able to recognize that, right? And I
31:45
don't think we're the only ones. I think I think it's becoming
31:47
kind of, you know, every once in a while I'll get kind of like
31:51
fooled by something, you know. But I think it's becoming very
31:55
apparent what is AI generated and what is real, you know. So I
31:59
do think, and like, we're talking about, I mean, you know,
32:02
like going back to the end of thing, that photograph is almost
32:06
100 years old, you know, it's like 15 years shy of being 100
32:09
years old, right?
32:10
Casey Fatchett: Yeah,
32:11
Helen Stoilas: we're still talking about it today. Are we
32:14
going to be talking about this AI stuff in 100 years, except
32:17
in, like, kind of like, uh, what was that? Were we all a little,
32:21
Casey Fatchett: what made that?
32:23
Helen Stoilas: Yeah, are we gonna be talking about any of
32:25
these AI images in 100 years' time. I don't think so. You
32:29
know,
32:29
Casey Fatchett: they feel like fast fashion,
32:34
Helen Stoilas: yes, very fast casual,
32:37
Casey Fatchett: like dining, fast casual dining.
32:40
Helen Stoilas: There will be a digital landfill,
32:46
Casey Fatchett: man. Will there, or will it just get cannibalized
32:49
by that's the thing, is like somebody said it recently, is
32:53
like AI only recognizes data.
32:59
Helen Stoilas: Yes,
33:00
Casey Fatchett: and it needs new creativity to feed, and it's
33:03
Helen Stoilas: It's now like eating itself, right? Right,
33:05
it's just like, why those feds, so it's just going to become
33:07
this kind of like
33:09
Casey Fatchett: style, like it becomes very.. that's the thing,
33:11
it's like, unless you're like feeding it new stuff,
33:14
Helen Stoilas: crazy kind of like.. yeah, it
33:16
Casey Fatchett: just becomes. it becomes like auroburos. Hey, on
33:28
your shirt, nice, nice. That's just because you're Greek. It's
33:36
all Greek to me. Yeah, I think that it just starts eating
33:39
itself. It just starts,
33:42
Unknown: and we're definitely kind of like, you know, nibbling
33:45
on the tail right now, and soon it'll be kind of like swallowing
33:49
whole, you know. I think it's very, and that in itself kind of
33:55
highlights the flaws of it, you know. You hear about like
33:57
vibe-coded kind of like, you know, apps and websites and
34:01
stuff that are just a mess, like when actual coders look at
34:05
behind the scenes of the infrastructure, they're like,
34:07
this, why did it do this, you know, like this is, this makes
34:11
no sense, like there's a very easy, like you could have just
34:15
Casey Fatchett: done, yeah, a
34:16
Helen Stoilas: to b, you know, and this went a to j to q to,
34:20
you know,
34:21
Casey Fatchett: and then we took a little jog into the numerals,
34:24
and then came back to be
34:25
Helen Stoilas: information points.
34:26
Casey Fatchett: Yeah, we got wing dings in there, the yeah,
34:32
it's all done in service of the shortcut.
34:37
Helen Stoilas: Well, currently I feel like it's all done in
34:39
service of the venture capitalism investment, you know,
34:46
so right now it's like it has to prove itself, because a lot of
34:51
wealthy people have invested heavily into it, and so it has,
34:54
it's kind of like, you know, this has to,
34:58
Casey Fatchett: it has to make money, it has to.
35:00
Helen Stoilas: To make money, if it doesn't
35:01
Casey Fatchett: make money, what the hell are we doing with it?
35:02
Well, fine.
35:03
Helen Stoilas: Yeah, spending so much time on this.
35:05
Casey Fatchett: It's a good question. Why have they? I think
35:09
that, like we said, I think that the areas in which it could be
35:15
used for good are not the areas in which it's like really like
35:20
being pushed.
35:21
Helen Stoilas: Yes, I agree. Yeah, yeah,
35:25
Casey Fatchett: it's sort of the hey, that
35:27
Helen Stoilas: It's that fast consumerism, like you said. You
35:32
know what makes the fast fast money,
35:35
Casey Fatchett: and I think again it's almost as if the
35:39
algorithm understands my thoughts, but I was fed a video
35:45
of Prince talking about why he didn't license his songs to
35:51
Guitar Hero back in the day, and they said, "Why didn't you
35:57
choose to do this? He said, "Because learning guitar is
36:03
hard, I Yeah, and you should learn to play guitar.
36:07
Helen Stoilas: Prince. He's like a prince among men.
36:08
Casey Fatchett: Yeah, he's like, I took, he's like, it took me a
36:10
long time to figure out how to play. I got very aggravated.
36:14
He's like, but took me a long time, but it was so much more
36:16
rewarding.
36:18
Helen Stoilas: I get it. It's hard, like it is, like it is
36:21
hard, you know, and you suck for a really long time, and it's
36:24
like demoralizing, and you know, you feel bad about yourself for
36:28
a really long time, but then in the end, when you, when you know
36:33
it, and you understand it, and you can do it really well, like
36:36
he said, really satisfying, you know, like you've earned that,
36:40
you know,
36:41
Casey Fatchett: yeah, you didn't just take, like, I'm gonna lower
36:43
the bar, if you lower the bar for everybody, anybody can do
36:46
it, and what's what's so special about that to begin with, and it
36:48
just, everything just kind of becomes like homogenized at a
36:50
certain level, but it's like, I have a friend who's learned to
36:53
play three songs on guitar, that's all I can play, and he's
36:57
just like, but I feel so great when I play those, any of those
37:00
songs, I feel like so happy with myself being able to read
37:03
Helen Stoilas: more songs than I know how to play. Same here,
37:07
Casey Fatchett: good for you. I get that's awesome, but he's
37:09
like, yeah, okay, that's that's that's it. But I can like play
37:13
those with a plum,
37:14
Helen Stoilas: that's awesome.
37:15
Casey Fatchett: Yeah, Helen, thank you for being on.
37:18
Unknown: Thank you, Case. We should have
37:19
Casey Fatchett: you on as a regular guest, we'll talk, yeah.
37:22
Helen Stoilas: Anytime there's a photograph, photography topic in
37:24
the news, I'd be happy to come on and comment. Yeah, let's do
37:27
that. Let's do that.
37:27
Casey Fatchett: Special bonus Ellen episodes, where can people
37:31
find you if you're looking for your work?
37:34
Helen Stoilas: I write for the art newspaper, I write for
37:38
Cultured Magazine. You can hear me on You're No Fun Anymore, a
37:44
podcast I do with my friends about the movies of our youth
37:50
and the nostalgia we have over them, and whether they are
37:55
still, you know, they're still good, they've
38:00
Casey Fatchett: aged well or not gracefully
38:02
Helen Stoilas: aged well, like a fine wine or like an egg,
38:06
Casey Fatchett: not 100 year old egg, some of those
38:08
Helen Stoilas: Not 100 year old egg. No,
38:10
Casey Fatchett: I will put links in the episode notes for folks,
38:14
and also go out, create, make something yourself,
38:16
Helen Stoilas: create, absolutely, go do something,
38:19
yeah, do.
38:25
Casey Fatchett: Hey folks, it's Casey. I'm back. There's a
38:27
couple things I forgot to mention. One, please be sure to
38:29
subscribe to the show. Two, please leave a review for the
38:32
show. Reviews help us with discoverability, new people
38:35
finding the show. So, leave a review on Apple Podcasts,
38:39
Spotify, wherever you can, leave a review for the podcast. It is
38:43
greatly, greatly appreciated. Got it. And now, without further
38:47
ado, stay safe, stay nerdy. See you next time.
38:57
Helen Stoilas: Bye.