this post was submitted on 25 Mar 2023
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I am employed as a 3D artist in a small games company of 10 people. Our Art team is 2 people, we make 3D models, just to render them and get 2D sprites for the engine, which are more easy to handle than 3D. We are making mobile games.

My Job is different now since Midjourney v5 came out last week. I am not an artist anymore, nor a 3D artist. Rn all I do is prompting, photoshopping and implementing good looking pictures. The reason I went to be a 3D artist in the first place is gone. I wanted to create form In 3D space, sculpt, create. With my own creativity. With my own hands.

It came over night for me. I had no choice. And my boss also had no choice. I am now able to create, rig and animate a character thats spit out from MJ in 2-3 days. Before, it took us several weeks in 3D. The difference is: I care, he does not. For my boss its just a huge time/money saver.

I don’t want to make "art" that is the result of scraped internet content, from artists, that were not asked. However its hard to see, results are better than my work.

I am angry. My 3D colleague is completely fine with it. He promps all day, shows and gets praise. The thing is, we both were not at the same level, quality-wise. My work was always a tad better, in shape and texture, rendering… I always was very sure I wouldn’t loose my job, because I produce slightly better quality. This advantage is gone, and so is my hope for using my own creative energy to create.

Getting a job in the game industry is already hard. But leaving a company and a nice team, because AI took my job feels very dystopian. Idoubt it would be better in a different company also. I am between grief and anger. And I am sorry for using your Art, fellow artists.

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[–]b_a_t_m_4_n 769 points 6 days ago

That's grim. And it's just the tip of the iceberg. We've barely scratched the surface of machine learning let alone genuine AI.

In a society that judges a persons worth purely on their economic contribution it's going to be a disaster.

[–]loakkala 139 points 6 days ago

We should have been living in a resource based economy after the first depression.

[–]LifeworksGames 37 points 5 days ago

I’m working in recruitment and writing isn’t my strong suit. ChatGTP poops out perfectly fine pieces of text. Add some flavour rather than reinventing the wheel. It really made my job significantly easier.

But yeah, also the tip of the iceberg. I hate to see people get so negatively affected by it.

[–]scoob93 66 points 5 days ago

Recruiter who cannot write well and is already being actively replaced by AI. I see that entire career field vanishing as soon as tomorrow

[–]Mr_Again 6 points 3 days ago

Yes I thought that recently. Hook it up to linkedin and let it match roles with job searchers, contact them and set up an interview, answer questions etc, all automated

[–]avshrikumar 3 points 4 days ago

Actually it's the recruiters who can write well who would lose their competitive advantage, by analogy to OP's example. The recruiters who are good at finding people to harass, I mean, people who would be a good fit for the job, would not be replaced.

Also I hate the thought of software being used to automate the process of sending those emails...our inboxes are noisy enough already.

[–]hoplahopla 18 points 5 days ago

Consider that in 1 or 5 years it might also eliminate your job entirely...

[–]narcan 32 points 5 days ago

Are you worried about how impactful it’ll be in recruiting then ? Seems like it’s not too far away from replacing recruiters either

[–]Limondin 133 points 5 days ago

Based on what you've told us, even though your title is 3D Artist, you actually deliver 2D Sprites. If what you like is to sculpt form in 3D space, I suggest you to find a new job in which you actually deliver 3D models.

[–]linx_sr 418 points 6 days ago

Im sure as a 3D artist, you have a still long way to go. It's too bad that the studio you're currently working in has found a way to change innovation for procedural, but that's just the workflow of a single or similar projects. The majority of the 3d studios still rely on modeling, uv, texturing, materials, rigging, animation, lighting, art direction, rendering, game development, UI, UX, and whatnot. Don't lose hope, have a portfolio on the standby, and try to expand your craft.

[–]GeheimerAccount 62 points 5 days ago

I disagree, there are still very strong advancements for AI turning photos into 3d models or 3d models from prompts, also now that many AIs get an API there are also already applications for blender where you just tell the AI what you want and the AI does it for you...

Maybe there will be a couple of very specific things that the AI wont be able to to so soon, but if it can do 90% thats already already.

I mean OP already said that the AI basically made him 90% more productive already just because it took over so much of the creative process and is even better at it.

[–]pablas 93 points 5 days ago*

I don't think its gonna replace modellers any time soon. It will be huge timesaver for doing low poly background props but still you will need a skillful 3d artist who can edit mesh as necessary. Its not that any good prompter will learn blender overnight.

Edit:

We are far away from AI generating quad topology game ready or film assets. How do you even train model like that? Stable Diffusion often doesn't understand prompt because laion database is a giant mess. You would need to scrap (not In a legal way) all sketchfab assets to build quality dataset. I can't imagine anyone is able to buy millions of 3d assets with textures just to train the model.

It's just like Photoshop was, you need to adjust your workflow or you will die. It will be huge for VFX if you can generate background assets with textures in few seconds. But people who can combine it all together and fix AI mistakes will be still needed. There still will be demand for AAA assets. I just wonder for how long. People will be promoted from modellers to composers.

I think that in a few years almost every software will have an AI assistant which will automate many tedious tasks.

I am browsing AI subreddits daily. I know exactly how fast everything is going. I've seen Spleeter, Riffusion, Stable Diffusion, txt2vid, txt-2-3d, chatgpt, ai upscalers, frame Interpolation and so on. It is year of AI

If I am wrong then I'm shitting myself because I've just lost several years of learning 3d and texturing

EDIT2:

As it turns out sketchfab already being scrapped. We are not doomed but it will get worse. I feel dumb and scared

[–]twicerighthand 30 points 5 days ago

Nvidia release a paper a while back that generates 3D models from text or a single image

[–]the-strange-ninja 16 points 5 days ago

NVidia Picasso. They just showed some stuff off at GDC last week.

[–]Rhetorikolas 2 points 3 days ago

It's neat, but mostly lowpoly and simple stuff. I'd give it a few years before it can produce more advanced stuff, and even then, it still needs to be optimized with proper methods.

[–]Superblazer 48 points 5 days ago

You should realize that advancements in AI is occurring at an unprecedented pace. The new versions of AI are being released in a matter of months, rather than years.

[–]uknow_es_me 16 points 5 days ago

That's mainly because the advancement in most cases is the training model expanding or tweaks being made to improve the model for a target subject.

One thing that advances AI like Midjourney is the simple usage of it. There's a reason that it provides 4 variations for a prompt. The user can then say, oh upscale #1 and it will note that the result in #1 was more desirable for that prompt. Or if the user says show me variations on #2, then 2 was good but not quite what the prompt desired, then rinse repeat.

[–]ImaginaryCheetah 38 points 5 days ago

I don't think its gonna replace modellers any time soon.

OP is a modeler, and has been replaced by AI.

it's happening now.

[–]ChildBlender87The2nd 12 points 5 days ago

It seems that their bosses simply don’t care about making more distinctly original content. Where AI can only average out what is given to it, humans can introduce new factors that improve the overall quality of concepts, and therefore the finished product. They are capable of polishing an amalgamation of already existing content in mediocre ways, but regardless of how much you polish a turd, it’s still a turd. This is good enough for some companies, but others will prefer the more unique execution of human artists unless the AI becomes sentient. At that point though, we have bigger problems to worry about. It’s still a really bad issue though.

[–]ImaginaryCheetah 10 points 5 days ago*

It seems that their bosses simply don’t care about making more distinctly original content.

i can't speak for OP's bosses, but i can tell you that i've never met an accounting department that gave too two sh*ts about quality product. they want what provides the most margin, full stop. and, unfortunately, it's the same for most execs.

so OP's boss may or may not care about quality or originality, but i can guarantee the accountants and execs do not.

:<

[+][deleted] 5 days ago* (43 children)

[–]hopbel 2 points 4 days ago

Sounds more like OP is a concept artist/character designer + modeler and it's the design part that's been replaced by AI, not the modelling

[–]Rhetorikolas 2 points 3 days ago

Yeah but he's making 2D sprites with 3D models. That's a job that used to be done by 2D artists or pixel artists even before that.

[–]hoplahopla 13 points 5 days ago

Won't help if the market will settle for "much cheaper to produce automatically, even if not that good".

That's how the once huge hi-fi in the 80s-90s market died, because most people now would just listen through their phones or laptop speakers or crappy BT speakers.

It's also how first the compact, and now the consumer DSLR and Mirrorless market is drying up, since for most people their smartphone is good enough to take the pictures of their kids, holidays, and so on.

[–]Vozka 2 points 5 days ago

As someone who's had hifi as a hobby and an occasional source of income for years, the market volume may not be as big as it used to be, but despite the products that you mention the average quality of budget loudspeakers has gone way up and good sound is more affordable than ever.

Paradoxically in the headphone area the popularity of Bluetooth helped because almost all bluetooth chips contain basic digital signal processing that the manufacturers use to make their headphones frequency response more neutral. This makes the sound quality better more than lossy Bluetooth transmission hurts it.

So if this is the direction we're going to with AI, I have no issue with it.

[–]sartres_ 2 points 3 days ago

Quality hi-fi speakers are strictly better than wireless compression or built in speakers. Anyone can hear it if they pay attention, they just don't care that much.

To outdo a smartphone with a dedicated camera in 2023, you have to really know what you're doing, otherwise you'll end up with a worse result.

I think the immediate future of AI is closer to the latter (the smartphone cameras themselves rely on enough of it)--it's going to produce better than human results in the majority of cases.

[–]Mooblegum 12 points 5 days ago

Maybe the futur of 3D artists is to generate 3D models with AI and then clean the meshes and do retopology, until AI can do that by itself.

I also stopped doing illustrations for my books and generate images that I clean and edit the characters. Also I only outline my stories and make GPT generate the text. That is the only way to compete with the guys that generate full books on KDP. Trying to keep a bit of creativity by prompting and editing.

That is sad for humans creativity.

[–]bergjuden2006 2 points 4 days ago

And your book is being accepted by your publisher? It’s enough for them to get a gpt produced text? :o for both artistic and legal reasons (what gpt writes is not copyright pritected)

[–]piiracy 10 points 5 days ago

you're missing the point here. AI won't immediately replace any and all 3D modellers - the question is how many 3D modellers does a company need if AI optimizes the work flow to a point where one 3D modeller can do the work of x people in less time

[–]DaveOfTheDead3 9 points 5 days ago

I just saw an AI prompt add on for blender this past week....soo yeah I think it can learn it overnight. Better wake up and smell the diodes....a change is coming and its only good for the rich people who won't hesitate to replace you with an AI prompt and a Boston dynamics robot running android.

[+][deleted] 5 days ago (1 child)

[–]GrahamPhisher 11 points 5 days ago

Lol low poly, AI will soon sometime within the next half decade will replace you, and everyone else, sorry, AI art hasn't been taking baby steps it's been taking cheetah leaps at a 90 degree upward angle climbing up a tree with a gazelle in it's mouth.

We should all be united against it.

[–]Black_Barba 5 points 5 days ago

You would need to scrap (not In a legal way) all sketchfab assets to build quality dataset.

This has already been done.

[–]usurperavenger 231 points 5 days ago

What we've been witnessing in the past few months with AI has absolutely shaken my expectation that the future is in any way predictable.

It was similar with COVID: within six montths the world changed.

Its an inflection point.

[–]Little-Thingy 61 points 5 days ago

Now world is changing every week.

[–]justjanne 26 points 5 days ago

Welcome to IT, where the world's been changing every week for the past 20 years^

Once upon a time there was an entire indie industry of people building websites. Between social media, Squarespace and Shopify, that entire industry got automated away.

We've had this breakneck speed in tech for a long while, it's just that now slowly other industries get pulled into it as well. It's actually kind of shocking to see how surprised everyone is.

[–]voinekku 12 points 5 days ago

I'm a layperson when it comes to IT, so I might be totally off, but I don't agree with this. For the last 50 years it's been a common wisdom that if one learns the logic behind coding languages and learns a commonly used language or two, they'll be set for a good-salaried job for their lives. And it has held to this day.

Now it's completely up in the air if knowing a coding language is even remotely relevant in 5 years.

Same with 3D-modeling, animating, texturing, sound effects, etc. etc. Hell, even in concept art is questionable if the human touch is unique and valuable.

[–]justjanne 17 points 5 days ago

That's not really what I'm trying to get at here. OP complains that instead of modeling, he now has to prompt a "virtual intern" to do the work instead.

When I first learnt IT, I'd have to manually build servers and set them up.

Then we could rent and purchase servers easily, so that's what I did. Instead of building each server manually, I'd click a few buttons and someone would build and configure them for me. Now instead I'd ssh into servers to install whatever I needed.

Then ansible and puppet came along. Instead of SSHing into servers, ansible would now install whatever I needed, I'd just have to write scripts for ansible.

Then docker came along and instead of deploying applications via ansible, I'd just use docker containers, let docker handle 90% of what used to be my work just years ago, and write ansible scripts to configure docker instead.

Then kubernetes came along, and instead of writing ansible scripts, now I'd write kubernetes configurations that'd set up entire clusters of dozens of servers in seconds, configure them, run applications on them, and move them when servers failed.

What used to be a few days of work is now handled in a millisecond, fully automatically, by an algorithm.

But the job didn't go away - it just changed. Instead of doing work myself, each of these changes meant I'd now write instructions for an algorithm to do the work I used to do. The modern IT world is algorithms upon algorithms all the way down, each layer replacing the work we used to do with automation.

And now this has happened to art. Instead of drawing yourself, you'll supervise machines that draw. Your job will still exist, it's just going to change massively. You'll fix what the machine did wrong, maybe redraw a few hands, maybe adjust the prompt.

But that's why so many of us in IT focus on hobbies - many of us do amateur woodworking in our free time. Or run a few retro computers the way we used to decades ago ;)

[–]zeclem_ 5 points 4 days ago

to add onto your point, as someone who does freelance translation work i have seen the same changes over the years as well. jobs are still here, its just very different.

[–]gunnervi 6 points 3 days ago

This is all true, but, if you got into IT because you saw manually setting up servers as a fulfilling act of self-expression, it would make sense that all the changes you describe would leave you unsatisfied with the job

[–]Rhetorikolas 3 points 3 days ago

Good example. Agreed, I don't see the negatives as OP and others mention. AI-assistance is a positive to liberate the "work" from the "passion". Doing art for money is just not a good mix, when it could free up time to focus on crafting personal projects. Digital art, specifically tech art, has been automating more and more for years.

For web design, I could write HTML/CSS, but now much of it is automatically created thanks to just using Wordpress installers and themes. That's technology in a nutshell, making things easier and more efficient. Jobs evolve with the times and the tools, but the core elements and principles remain the same.

[–]pizzapeach9920 3 points 3 days ago

Much like how 3d animation killed traditional animation once technology caught up. This has been happening throughout history, in many industries. People didn’t like the printing press when it was invented too.

[–]Ange1ofD4rkness 5 points 4 days ago

No kidding. Blowing away Moore's Law was just the tip. Thankfully there is one saving grace for software developers. "Learn really old languages". Stuff where there's not enough data out there to build an AI around.

(or work on complex stuff an AI can't figure out how to process)

[–]Luqizilla 2 points 3 days ago

been living on the edge of tech for the past 12 years, and your statement feels accurate - it also baffles me how people don't get how intertwined and interconnected the world is and how shaking those foundations faster has been the norm for a while now, as someone mentioned - COVID rocked everything else and forced everyone into tech, now everyone has access to tech labour as the big tech layoffs happen - that "tech mentality" is going to start to sprawl all across industries - pharma, cars, etc

[–]Kreugs 25 points 5 days ago

Change is the only constant.

[–]don_sley 11 points 5 days ago

I feel like the world has changed differently since 2020, covid bombed the shit out of us then the Ukraine war and now the rise of AI, guess the future isn't going to be bright then.

[–]Frosty-Ad-6946 30 points 5 days ago

That’s rough bud. I haven’t started working as a 3D artist yet, and while many traditional artists argue that technology will never replace human creativity, it's becoming increasingly clear that 3D art is becoming a major force in the industry.

[–]hoplahopla 16 points 5 days ago

Well, many traditional artists see what they want to see. The market doesn't care about "human creativity", just for efficiency and profit margins

[–]Leyr2 61 points 5 days ago

I will soon begin 5 years of studying for this industry and feeling shitty that it may be worthless even before I end my studies. I don’t know what to do at this point

[–]Biny_tever 47 points 5 days ago

Hey, this is just my opinion but if you haven't invested in this industry yet, it's probably best to look for something else instead. I know that's not a popular thing to say, but It seems likely that recent tech developments are going to shake up the industry in a big way.

[–]Striking-Squash2044 28 points 5 days ago

seconding this. in this case, people are irresponsible saying to pursue your dreams, without considering that it may be crushed, and you may be left without a way to make a living in the future.

please consider your life paths carefully

[–]jazzcomputer 12 points 5 days ago

I mean - most industries that don't involve person to person contact or rely heavily on machines of any kind will face the same issue at some stage in the next 10-20 years. Considering your options carefully but there is also something in learning the fundamentals because most people don't go straight into art-direction before learning, or at least familiarising themselves with the 'from the ground up' ways of making something.

[–]Loud_Clerk_9399 5 points 4 days ago

Not next 10-20 years. Next 6-24 months. No point to learn the fundamentals since you won't be using them and anyone will be able to do these jobs. Start advocating for UBI, become a professional protester, become a laborer. Those are probably your best options. Do things that cannot be done by something not in person.

[–]Striking-Squash2044 6 points 5 days ago

I don't believe the author, nor upcoming artists should hope and bet their future on a situation that "it might not be so bad"

It is madness to be encouraging people to join an industry that the author might be competing with millions of disenfranchised artists, working on something that they have absolutely no interest in.

Again I iterate to the author, please look out for yourself and consider your life paths carefully.

[–]Ange1ofD4rkness 6 points 4 days ago

Can second this.

Growing up I always wanted to be a video game developer. However, quickly in college I realized the field was going to be flooded and bowed out completely (I already was only going to minor in it).

Yeah it sucked, what I dreamed of was lost, but I realized I needed to. To be honest, glad I did, the career as just a software developer has been awesome. Opening so many doors, with a passion I can keep lit.

I tell people now, if you want to get into video game industry, choose a different skill that you can use in said field, but aren't limited onto the video game field

[–]Rhetorikolas 2 points 3 days ago

You could always get into game development if you're still passionate about it, it's easier now than it used to be, even as a solo-dev. I was always on the art side, modeling, QA, production management. But now with AI, I can dip my toes into the game programming side more and do more tech art.

I almost went to college for animation, that was one of my main passions because it could be used for games or for VFX. But hearing the endless stories of Hollywood VFX artists getting the short end of the stick, even on major successful productions. That's one thing I'm glad I didn't focus on. I'm going back and learning some things now, but now there's easier processes and tools to realize my dreams.

[–]mlresearchoor 4 points 4 days ago

if you're feeling doubts, study some field that builds things that provide economic value (e.g., CS, mechanical engineering)

otherwise, if you truly love art as a career, go for the art job with full knowledge of the risks

[–]UndeadOeric 6 points 4 days ago

CS may not be a great pick. I have a friend with 30 years of software engineering experience who now uses GPT-4 daily and said it's 3x to 10x faster than what he can do himself, at equal or better code quality/readability. He predicts most tech companies will be able to get rid of about 70% of their current Engineering workforces by the end of the year.

[–]AlmoschFamous 4 points 3 days ago

How did your friend last in the industry for 30 years if he's that terrible of an engineer? Chat GPT can't even do entry level work. Let alone anything complicated.

[–]CaptainBucketMe 2 points 3 days ago

I'm sorry, but I deeply question your friend's ability as a software engineer if he really thinks that GPT-4 surpasses him in code quality/readability.

[–]Rhetorikolas 2 points 3 days ago

Yeah but GPT-4 still needs quality checks, the AI isn't perfect. Because he has first hand knowledge, he knows how to get the most out of it. That said, yeah I wouldn't be surprised if companies slim down their teams. Economy is already forcing them to.

[–]dats_cool 2 points 2 days ago*

Absolute nonsense. I'm a mid-level engineer and, yes, the productivity gains have been noticeable but GPT4 is NOWHERE near automating anywhere close to what I do on a daily basis. Your friend works on super basic stuff if he's able to have his productivity explode like that.

So many bad takes on reddit on software development, it's like everyone's suddenly an expert. So nauseating. I almost wish I picked a different field because I literally can't escape it anywhere I go on the internet.

I've also tried the blindly paste AI-generated code, usually for smaller stuff, and it always gets torn apart by senior devs during code reviews. They don't even know it's AI-generated, it's just the design choices that GPT4 makes is awkward with bad design patterns.

[–]Steven-Maturin 2 points 6 hours ago

Study the history of art and design in detail, and learn how to draw and paint for real. Knowledge is power. Learning softwares is just using someone else's product. AI just uses someone else's creativity. It's time for artists to get back to basics.

[–]Humble_Tea1529 93 points 5 days ago*

oh so not only were mobile games cheap and soulless, they have now figured out a way to make em cheaper and more robotic.

also that sucks bro, hope u find a better job that actually allows you to be creative

[–]bASEDGG 15 points 5 days ago

tbh I would have seen it coming as soon as midjourney v1 released.

Working for mobile games is only good for maybe 1-2 years to build up a portfolio, but it’s definitely not a long term thing.

I would love to know OPs hourly rate in that studio. I guarantee it’s minimal wage, given how mobile game studios tend to pay their employees

[–]allbirdssongs 3 points 4 days ago

yeah issue is that its hard to actually produce a portfolio WHILE wasting your energy in a studio that forces you to do awful tasteless work, you have to put in the hours after the work, i really think its better not to join that industry in the first place, i met many 2D artists that simply burned their life away on those meh companies

[–]voinekku 7 points 5 days ago

That's precisely what brings in the big bucks in capitalism, and when all the control is in the hands of people who care about nothing but the big bucks, that's what it produces. Everything is in an unending spiral towards being more and more cheap and soulless.

[–]Loud_Clerk_9399 3 points 4 days ago

People will be creative in their spare time, not on the job. But...the idea is soon nobody will need to work.

[–]Neiija 128 points 6 days ago

Isn't AI art not copyrighted? I hoped this would slow companies down in using it commercially. But anyhow, this is a legit reason to look elsewhere. Especially bigger studios that use a full 3d pipeline have not jumped on this train just yet. Maybe for exploration, but not for asset creation. Of course nobody can say how long that holds up but for now, put yourself out there.

[–]j03ch1p 77 points 6 days ago

Lots of concept art never becomes public. So "AI art" (generated images) for concepting shoudln't be an issue.

[–]Neiija 38 points 6 days ago

Yes that's what i meant with for exploration. But in the post it sounds more like it's about final game assets

[–]WhatsLeftofitanyway 27 points 5 days ago

For many small companies, this usually doesn’t matter. Unless someone blows whistle big time or someone with extremely keen eye sees the asset used in final game to be infringing copyright, this will be just water under the bridge. And if you’re located in countries where copyright law is very different, like china?

[–]Neiija 9 points 5 days ago

Yeah i figured that it doesn't matter for small companies, i just said i hoped. And this has nothing to do with copyright infringement, it's just that the images are not copyrighted, which might matter to a bigger franchise.

I don't know, if you are in a different country my advise to look for another company to work for would still stand, i didn't tell anyone to sue anyone :)

[–]MeatisOmalley 10 points 5 days ago

even so, it will be hard to determine what is ai generated or not, or the extent that something is AI generated. legally it's very messy, and most companies will get away with it, without any concern.

[–]Ruining_Ur_Synths 7 points 5 days ago

It's actually a much bigger issue for concept art.

The parts of art that AI creates are not copyrightable. If you come up with a character and then have machine learning pose it, the pose and final image is not copyrightable.

If the machine learning algorithm is designing the character or locations for you, those locations and characters cannot be copyrighted. The concepts cannot be copyrighted.

Using AI to make production art of copyrighted characters and locations is much safer than using AI to do concepts.

The only issue is that the corporation or people involved may not disclose that AI was used in generating the concepts, and file copyright for the products of AIs even though they lack human authorship so are not eligible for copyright.

It's not the art itself, its the ideas.

[–]j03ch1p 6 points 5 days ago

Legally speaking this is all gray area. We speak as if there are guidelines but there aren't, yet.

Just because a comic that was entirely generated wasn't copyrightable doesn't mean it will be the same thing in complex pipelines over many iterations.

Also concept art will never be limited to prompting: there will always be paint-over, like it happens with photobashing.

[–]Ruining_Ur_Synths 9 points 5 days ago*

its not a grey area. guidance from earlier this month.

https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2023/03/16/2023-05321/copyright-registration-guidance-works-containing-material-generated-by-artificial-intelligence

A human adding parts to an ai generated work may create a work that is copyrightable, but the work created by the ai is NOT copyrightable even though you've added to it. If the AI is designing your characters and/or locations, those things are NOT copyrightable. If you paint over something created by an AI, the work generated by the AI is the thing that invented it and has no human authorship so cannot be copyrighted, and anyone can use it. Only the other things the artist actually adds on top are copyrightable, and that does not affect the copyright of the ai generated elements.

The second edition of the Compendium, published in 1984, explained that the "term `authorship' implies that, for a work to be copyrightable, it must owe its origin to a human being."

It is extremely risky for a company to be doing any sort of concept design work using AI, if they plan on having any sort of copyright on the work. Prompts do not count as human origin. Taking work whose origin is not a human being and having a human draw over it does not make its origin a human being.

Or an artist may modify material originally generated by AI technology to such a degree that the modifications meet the standard for copyright protection.[34] In these cases, copyright will only protect the human-authored aspects of the work, which are "independent of" and do "not affect" the copyright status of the AI-generated material itself.

Even when you draw over an AI generated image, the ai generated stuff is still not copyrightable, only the stuff you add is. If the AI creates the new superman and your artist draws in his S-curl and S shield logo, the s-curl and shield logo are the only copyrightable elements. Everyone else would be free to use the character without those elements. If you got chat GPT to write his backstory you'd be double screwed.

Doing AI concept work is enormously risky. You might make something that other people are then freely allowed to use and will not qualify for copyright protection. 100% that images generated by AIs like midjourney are not copyrightable at all.

[–]j03ch1p 8 points 5 days ago

I can't access that site from my country. Either way, I wasn't aware of the recent developments in the law regarding AI generated content.

https://www.ropesgray.com/en/newsroom/alerts/2023/03/can-works-created-with-ai-be-copyrighted-copyright-office-issues-formal-guidance

According to the policy statement, works created by AI without human intervention or involvement still cannot be copyrighted, as they fail to meet the human authorship requirement. For example, when an AI program produces a complex written, visual, or musical work in response to a prompt from a human, the "traditional elements of authorship" are determined and executed by the technology—not the human user—and, thus, the resulting work is not copyrightable. On the other hand, a work containing AI-generated material may be copyrightable where there is sufficient human authorship, such as when a human selects or arranges AI-generated material in a creative way or modifies material originally generated by AI technology. Ultimately, copyright protection will depend on whether the AI’s contributions are "the result of mechanical reproduction," or they reflect the author’s "own mental conception," the Copyright Office said. "The answer will depend on the circumstances, particularly how the AI tool operates and how it was used to create the final work."

It's still extremely "grey" and vague.

Either way, concept art pipelines require a number of iterations: it's a back and forth beetwen the artist and the art director feedback. That alone counts as "author mental conception" and "arranging AI generated material".

Cheap indie devs might get their character by prompting "big tiddies girl" and that technically won't be legal, but realistically who'll be going after those guys?

AI will become like photobashing on steroid, IMO. And that is legal.

I believe specialized softwares integrating all sort of diffusion models giving you high levels of control will start to appear: AI Character creator, AI landscape creator and so on...

[–]Tyler_Zoro 2 points 5 days ago

The parts of art that AI creates are not copyrightable. If you come up with a character and then have machine learning pose it, the pose and final image is not copyrightable.

Cite specific precedent, please. The CO decision (which, I'll point out hasn't yet been tested in court) draws a very specific line around their decision based on the specifically human creativity involved. If you use AI art as a basis for a pipeline of development, then I don't think you can say that it's non-copyrightable any longer, based on the CO's ruling.

It's definitely arguable, and I wouldn't say that we can 100% know how the courts will rule, but it doesn't seem likely that we're going to turn copyright law upside down and claim that no amount of creative transformation of a non-copyrighted work can produce a copyrightable work.

That would be catastrophic for many existing uses of copyright, totally aside from AI.

[–]GeheimerAccount 13 points 5 days ago

you cant copyright the AI art itsself, but if you just use it for inspiration of course you can copyright the final character

[–]ITwitchToo 3 points 4 days ago

If you just modify it enough from what the AI spat out it's a derived work which itself is copyrightable.

[–]NGGJamie 10 points 5 days ago

Depends, if you do enough tweaking to it, then you might pass the threshold for minimum human creativity, which is the primary thing at-issue with AI generated images. But it's all untested in court so far, so time will tell how that will play out.

[–]PiterLine 51 points 5 days ago

My whole life I wanted to be an artist, I was never good at drawing, all I could do is some ok-ish doodles, at some point I discovered 3d art, and it all just clicked, I finally found something I was decent at, finally I started to see some hope for doing what I loved doing. I never thought I was going to be the best, but I also never thought that something I love so much was going to devolve into writing a prompt and getting a result possibly better than I'd ever be able to achieve. It's just depressing

[–]mrhaluko23 6 points 5 days ago

Same here bud. Its very depressing, but remember, we don't know what will happen, positive or negative.

[–]PiterLine 3 points 5 days ago

I know, usually I'm hopelessly optimistic to my own detriment, but in this case, even if the future is never set in stone, we all can still see what's the most likely scenerio. The only thing we can really hope for is that the ones who actually care will keep going no matter how pointless it seems.

[–]SometimesJeck 26 points 5 days ago

A couple of years ago, I told my architecture professor that the industry would be gutted by ai. And that was because I thought it would be able to just draw floor plans and some basic 3d. Had no clue how advanced it would get so soon.

"No no, not in our lifetime, ai will never be able to do the work of an artist or to the same quality"

Yeah right.

Its looking like a bleak future

[–]Wedongfury 9 points 5 days ago

And that's only the beginning, think about it, if jobs are replaced slowly enough (first art, software, ...), people will be asked to find "other jobs", they will have to adapt, and since it's hard to get qualified in another domain when you're in your 30s to 50s with a family to feed, well... back to almost minimum wage aka poverty for many. Imagine going from 100k$ a year to being unable to pay for the dentist. Survival of the fittest is a bitch.

[–]SometimesJeck 4 points 5 days ago

Just wait until robotics catches up to ai as well

[–]Wedongfury 3 points 5 days ago

I believe that's the good part, that's Gandalf storming Helms Deep. What scares me most is this transition where some have jobs, others don't, and government policies will just give a bare minimum to whose unable to adapt.

[–]Baron_Samedi_ 9 points 4 days ago

Man, I feel you.

I have been spending time on a project that includes AI generated outputs, lately. Prompt > refine > photoshop > img2img... The process takes all the fucking fun and sparkle out of art, making it nothing more than mindless drudgery, and also making me feel like I am just an appendage to an AI.

Fuck AI "art".

[–]Edarneor 7 points 3 days ago

I agree, this is stupid. Artists shouldn't be cleaning up after the AI, it should be cleaning after the artists, if at all

[–]Unit27 38 points 5 days ago

Use the time you save by using these AI prompts to send your resume to other companies. If they don't care about your work look elsewhere.

[–]Gioware 10 points 5 days ago

Soon there will be no "elsewhere" to look.

[–]DrawChrisDraw 147 points 6 days ago

That sucks man. It's hard for me to not resent the people that made this new technology. For them, it was a cool science project, but for artists it's like someone released an invasive species into the ecosystem.

[–]VertexMachine 46 points 5 days ago

Now the polite society learnt what "not important" masses of people felt when their job were automated or outsourced for last 100 years...

At the end making AIs will be automated too :P

[–]justjanne 8 points 5 days ago

Making AIs — software development — was actually the first part where this automation happened. With the smart autocomplete and refactoring of resharper years ago, then followed by copilot. Software development changes all the time, constantly moving one level higher on the abstraction ladder.

[–]oly_koek 38 points 5 days ago

It's mass plagiarism. And I think many of the people who have worked on it for years are in denial that it is going to be used by businesses in negative ways. Open AI literally had "open" in their name but it's always been bullshit. The key advantage of AI is even if the code is open source, the data they collect isn't. The data (mass plagiarism, I'll say it again) is what gives a competitive advantage for these business.

[–]TDixPix 7 points 4 days ago

It's so frustrating to me that it's able to reference all kinds of artist work and then go on claiming that the IP is in the algorithm. You literally prompt the AI to design using a specific person's style.

That that's not more of a problem right now really shows how artistic talent is valued in our world. A commodity and nothing else.

[–]SerMattzio3D 9 points 5 days ago*

I think you're giving them too much credit. The people that are making this tech are purposefully designing it to remove human creativity from art.

They're usually pretty well off, being paid by large companies to screw the little guy and cut jobs of talented people. I think they're quite loathsome individuals to make these "developments" with that purpose in mind, actually.

I've spoken to a lot of software engineers who find this sort of stuff unethical, especially when it steals from other people's work to "train" the AI.

[–]No_Doc_Here 5 points 4 days ago

We software people feel the pressure ourselves (or at least people are uneasy about where this is headed). Most of us are not AI/ML experts after all but develop boring business software.

These things are really good at creating software code as well and who knows what constitutes "good enough" for many classical software development jobs.

​

Judging from history "ethics" will do very little to stop the proliferation of genuinely helpful technology, so society will have to find a way to work with it.

[–]RoboticAttention 2 points 3 days ago

It is far from a "cool science project," it's very profound and technically challenging frontier of scientific/engineering endeavor

[–]aggibridges 9 points 5 days ago

I’m so, so sorry. Sending you many hugs.

[–]iszomer 8 points 5 days ago*

A part of me no longer wants to put any artistic content online ever again to be freely scraped by an AI. Then again, I wonder if we would adapt a workflow to include controversial topics in steganographic form to non-controversial art to simply poison the well..

[–]Edarneor 5 points 3 days ago

Have you tried https://glaze.cs.uchicago.edu/

There are conflicting accounts on whether it works against training AIs, but might be worth trying

[–]prateik12 2 points 3 days ago

Trying to poison the data is useless, the entire field of adversarial machine learning is dedicated to overcoming this. Algorithms can easily learn how to filter out any kind of noise.

Glaze was dealt with: https://twitter.com/lvminzhang/status/1637568638369804290

[–]flaviusb 8 points 5 days ago

This is the perfect example of how these systems are a gun pointed at the head of labour, and that part of how it works is by eliminating the quality premium.

[–]LittleLoyal16 7 points 5 days ago

Damn... :( I think many people who write as a job (translators, speechwriters, copywriters, etc.) are probably also getting the shit end of the stick like this. Everything can just be quickly done with AI such as ChatGPT and then they just have to quickly check if its good enough... AI will take the actual fun and challenging parts of creating and leave us with the boring cleanup...

[–]Wedongfury 3 points 5 days ago

It would be almost alright if it happened overnight for all jobs in the world. At least we could all depend on each other. The problem here is that only a small slice of society is affected, and they won't be able to rely on society as a whole.

[–]LittleLoyal16 6 points 5 days ago

I think a lot of people are affected but lots of people work in jobs that don't bring them happiness so any relief of that job which makes it easier is good news for them. Often us artists take a lot of pride in our creativity so it hits harder.

[–]allbirdssongs 2 points 4 days ago

small slice of society is affected, and they won't be able to rely on society as a whole.

this is so true, so we have no ways to solve the issue at a core and can only do our best to adapt into new jobs that might also get AIed in the future.

we really need to solve this at a core, actually AI can be very good and benefitional like industrial revolution once was but the slow evolve is what is making it so hard

[–]RHOrpie 37 points 5 days ago

I mean, this is no different to any career where you end up being pigeonholed into a job you didn't want to do.

The question to ask your boss is "How do I get back to 3D modelling again?". Make sure he's clear that's your passion and that you are happy to keep doing your current role because you understand that sometimes this is required. But that this isn't where you want your career to go.

If he can't get back to you with a plan... You're probably going to have to seek alternative employment.

Out of interest, can you maybe just ask to do some of the 3d work?

[–]hoplahopla 12 points 5 days ago

His problem at the moment is not employment, as he remains employed. It is the thing he loves doing being automated and taken over by AI.

[–]AtoumMirtu 5 points 5 days ago

I dont feel like seeking alternative employment would change anything if OP chooses to go to another technology/creative area, only handiwork or crafts can't be replaced (for now) it seems

[–]patrlim1 6 points 5 days ago

Take your portfolio of 3d assets and apply to a bigger studio, one where your work will be appreciated and respected.

[–]Sea_Cold9631 5 points 4 days ago

This is heartbreaking we need to take strict actions against ai otherwise we would be doomed

[–]majeric 17 points 5 days ago

Midjourney might be able to produce the texturing for your models, however, literally EVERYTHING else you would have to do yourself. Midjourney doesn't do 3D modelling. It doesn't do sculpting. It doesn't do rigging.

It would maybe speed up what 20% of your workflow. Replace some of what Substance Painter does for you.

And honestly, I have a hard time believing that Midjourney actually speeds up the workflow of Substance Painter.

I've got 20 Years of game development under my belt.

[–]bASEDGG 20 points 5 days ago*

AI might not be able to do sculpting or rigging YET, but it’s dumb to think that ai won’t develop rapidly and take care of that also.

Look at all the AI tools Nvidia is pumping out. Auto rigs have been a thing for years too and they aren’t AI based.

Only hope we have that some companies see it as a good idea to switch to a 4 day work week and that the gaming and VFX industry doesn’t have as many crunch times anymore.

One can only hope, right?

[–]kitanokikori 4 points 5 days ago

OP was using Blender to generate 2D assets, in his case Midjourney speeds them up because they skip the 3D step entirely

[–]GWinterborn 56 points 5 days ago*

I mean, I just looked at some outputs from Midjourney 5, as this scenario seemed strange to me. Not that it’s untrue for you, just not typical or even really capable of being typical. The models just aren’t there yet for most professional workflows.

[By this I mean the outputs aren’t precise, are still difficult to control, are too open to nonsense, and the AI still seems to struggle with understanding what it’s looking at when something isn’t a human person or some other form that appears in its database hundreds of millions of times. The output images and other media are just too clunky to use.]

The only way this thing would replace a human being in an art field is a scenario where nobody cared about quality control in the slightest. Maybe some forms of ultra-corporate B2B scenario.

I’m not sure what your project was, but the models/3D-adjacent images it currently produces wouldn’t have even been able to take my old 9-to-5 gig, and that was in the e-learning area of the interactive multimedia industry.

What I do tend to tell people is to focus on becoming better designers and not to worry so much anymore about being skilled at grunt work. Grunt work was never what defined art or creative endeavors, it was just one barrier to entry.

Learning to effectively and functionally design takes years and it’s not something computers are ever going to be able to do extremely well. Design requires internal qualitative and emotional feedback, neither of which computers are capable of.

That’s why computers can only amalgamate and approximate. They’re trained to design using protocols that function like the intellectual process of someone who’s not very experienced with original design or it’s principles, as they’ve not developed qualitative or emotional instincts for things like style, aesthetic, color choice, context, and function.

Computers have difficulty with relevant context outside of word association and referential precedent and have no means of experimenting with unexpected or atypical concepts.

You have to give AI fairly decent concept art to get things going in any reasonably controllable way, so there’s still that. Even then, they struggle to understand all the things I’ve mentioned while trying to actualize designs based on concept work.

As of now, human beings who know what they’re doing are faster than AI when it comes to realizing designs. People will always be needed to design in scenarios where quality matters.

Nobody has ever cared how well you push a pixel or a vertex. It was a skill by virtue of scarcity, not merit. It was a means to an end—the design product has always been the end.

I’ve been working in 3D professionally for a decade, and I’m onboard with AI cutting out a lot of grunt work from pipelines and workflows.

I would like to see it lose the text interface, because it’s a complete nightmare to use and is functionally ridiculous. Some kind of easy-select paired with a node system or something might be cool.

Regardless, even if it had that interface today the output still isn’t predictable, precise, or good enough to be useable in most professional contexts. Maybe in like five to ten years, based on current progress, when painstakingly guided through the output process by a knowledgeable and experienced human designer.

[–]Sternsafari[S] 44 points 5 days ago

You have some points. BUT: Design is ALREADY taken over by AI in our company. You say the outputs are not precise enough, or hard to control. What you need to see is, most companys are not AAA. You are right, CD Project Red would need a very precise and controllable output for their new Witcher game.

But there are thousands of small studios all over the world, not making a huge amount of money, but they are making some. And the look and style of the game does not really matter, as long as it looks good. We are one of them. Our game doesn’t need very precise outputs as we are designing on the way. So game design tell me: make a new boss character: it needs to be able to charge and slam. I have infinite freedom as an Artist. I can do whatever I want that can slam and charge (and ofc fits into the game world somehow). A roar, a bull, a flying bear. So AI in this case is the ultimate tool, as I just flick through animals and ideas until I get a good result. Even if it has 3 legs, it doesn’t matter. I can photoshop a 4th leg.

So in this case the only thing that I need to control is the style. Our game is not realistic (its a mobile game still), so even if outputs vary in style - put an outline around it, some photoshop, there you go. All looks 90% matching on mobile. Players won’t mind. Keep in mind, all we put in the engine is 2D. All animations are also 2D flipbooks. So there is no problem with control and no problem with precision.

Also I think your way of thinking over AI seems a bit old fashioned to me. It is not computers that designing anything. They are fed millions of good human made designs and the algorithm is very good in finding appealing patterns throughout, then replicating and mix and matching it. Thats why most concepts that are spit out, to me, are very appealing. And also are probably more appealing to players/customers than made by any medicore artist.

And to be honest, most medicore company like ours, only hires medicore artists. And unfortunately the art that comes out 80-90% is better than what I would be able to create. Just because the AI algorithm simply was better and faster in learning and replicating what appeals to us humans(form, colour, contrast, light), than I was able to learn throughout my short career of 5 years. The reason btw why I also think the best 100 3D artists of the world will not get a problem through AI. They are simply better and very unique. But to most of us, that does not apply.

[–]GWinterborn 23 points 5 days ago

Computers design based on those algorithms—the series of protocols if understands as how anything works. That’s not old-fashioned, that’s what happens. That’s why they can only amalgamate and approximate and struggle with context beyond word association. Those are the concepts the algorithm is built from, pretty much exclusively.

I mean, also not to be a jerk here, but from how you describe design, nobody’s doing any at your previous company. It sounds like people just kind of arbitrarily make this or that up with no real reflection or focus on how it looks or why it looks that way. Like I barely know what you mean when you say it doesn’t have to be tightly controlled or that you can just grab outputs of animal mashups. Yes, a computer can take over that workflow pretty efficiently, but that’s also a very atypical workflow for anyone who cares.

I’d like to think most developers, even smaller developers who aren’t just making shovelware for the mobile and free-to-play gods or making games as a hobby, put more energy and perspective into what they’re doing than that. That’s a very corporate, bottom-line oriented perspective to have (though I don’t think it’s often very successful, despite that).

I certainly put actual thought and direction into the media I produce for my own projects, which are also independent and small (as it’s just me).

I’m not saying you guys probably don’t work hard, but it’s not really what I, or anyone I’ve ever worked with, would accept as professional practice or design philosophy, even for something like e-learning where most of my professional experience exists (which is decidedly not the AAA games industry).

Also, we can agree to disagree I guess about how well AI designs outputs. I think they all look pretty mediocre and borderline junky. I’ve never seen anything I’d want to use myself, and I’ve tried to use it (again, I’m by myself, so I’d welcome an electronic artist’s assistant).

It does a bad job at understanding and listening. That’s when it’s being guided.

Without knowledgeable guidance, color palettes are arbitrary, composition is arbitrary, lighting is derivative and trite, and that’s if we ignore the fact most of it’s still goofy and weird looking—it all looks like someone was behind deadline and still decided to show up two hours late that day and just had to get something in for first round revisions (I know, because I’ve done it).

I’m willing to accept there’s some discrepancy between a handful of niche groups regarding what constitutes usable quality in a professional pipeline, but for pretty much every experience i’ve ever had, the outputs currently aren’t there and it’s faster to design and develop on your own.

I’d love it to be there. I really would. I’m rooting for it all the way.

I’d love to feed a computer a collection of rough concept sketches—angles and color palettes—mess with some settings, sliders, and come out the other end of a few revisions with usable media, but that’s just not where it’s at. I don’t think it’s going to be there for several years. And that’s just if professionals decide to use it as a tool, like any other tool, rather than nonprofessional just feeding it prompts, shrugging, and making due with whatever thing it barfs out.

(Here’s someone using it the way I immediately thought it could ever be useful as a tool—feeding it concepts then compositing outputs to continue the concept and reference cycle until something specific is delivered—but currently the interface is garbage and they could have done this work much more quickly on their own)

Like I said, for very corporate undertakings, like trend-chasing shovelware or B2B stuff, it could work. It’d just be doing what the people working for those types of gigs are already doing—deriving endlessly from a fixed set of rules and previously successful concepts. But for anything beyond that, even at the most rudimentary level of legitimate artistic intent, quality, and aesthetic exploration/innovation, it’s not really usable yet.

But we can agree to disagree. I’ve not yet seen anything that’d change my thinking there.

[–]Sternsafari[S] 9 points 5 days ago

I dont want to say mobile games are mostly shovelwork, but yes, mobile games are mostly shovelwork.

They don’t demand novelty, uniqueness or a unique aesthetic. They more or less just need to be fun or entertaining. Players don’t have high expectations regarding the look.

There are some fixed rules to its art, regarding contrast (always maximum, lol) or shape (bulky/cute- works in china). But thats mostly it. (For sure not all of them, but a big chunk, that is working on the market.)

Thats why, I guess, they are one of the first branches/industries that can go deep dive into using AI art for the complete product. The mentioned rules are done well enough for a shovelwork product.

[–]Danger_duck 13 points 5 days ago

OP was doing 3D design, now he's not, because of Midjourney. It doesn't matter whether you think he was following 'proper professional practicel' or not. It might not threaten your very professional and artistic workflow YET but soon you might be in OPs position and some other dude here will be telling you it's just because what you were doing wasn't advanced enough and the real artists aren't under threat.

[–]marsking4 11 points 5 days ago

Totally agree with all of this. People seem like they keep forgetting that computers can’t truly be creative. They need human input to be able to create anything profoundly new. This AI technology needs to be looked at as a tool to help speed up work flows. I know people often don’t like change, but change is inevitable when it comes to technology. Instead of fighting AI, we should focus on understanding it and using it to our advantage.

I know it sucks, but it seems like if OP is truly bothered by their new workflow they should start looking for another job.

[–]fooser82 17 points 5 days ago

Totally agree with this, I have a suspicion that OP is role playing, or his company is doing work unimaginably bad.

[–]GWinterborn 10 points 5 days ago

Yeah, I wasn’t trying to say what they’re talking about didn’t happen. I was just saying if it did happen that place sucks to work already. It wasn’t really a typical scenario, so probably not a big like industry wide phenomenon.

[–]Zavalabala 21 points 5 days ago

And my boss also had no choice

Don't, just don't. Higher ups had the complete freedom to choose not to automate your job.

Higher ups always had the choice to use AI tools as a way to empower employees to optimize their workflow and reclaim some of their life for themselves, or to use it as a replacement to maximize profit and leave employees to their own devices. Ever since the industrial revolution started it was clear that their priorities were in their pockets.

[–]DeadStringScrolls 27 points 5 days ago

The capitalists 'round these parts will just tell you this is "a great opportunity for you to move on to something better", because all outcomes are positive ones, or something to that effect.

Society rarely thinks about the devaluation of craft that comes along as a side effect of tech advancements. Some remain fortunate enough to eke out a living for discerning customers (high end woodworking is an example). Hopefully you can land on your feet!

[–]Sternsafari[S] 10 points 5 days ago

Thanks. It feels good to be understood. Even its not all happy and positive side effects.

[–]KananDoom 13 points 5 days ago

When we find out which company, if their assets were made w AI, we can straight up use them in our own projects. You can’t copyright AI output.

[–]muyuu 6 points 5 days ago

edited AI output is no different from retouching pictures or using stock assets as the base for some work

[–]randytayler 10 points 5 days ago

Someday soon there will surely be "Certified Zero AI Contribution" labels.

Like an "Organic" label for art and games and music and writing.

[+][deleted] 5 days ago (2 children)

[–]thomasbatey 2 points 3 days ago

But the demand will be incredibly tiny compared to the supply. Luckily I can see Universal Guaranteed Income being fast tracked now

[–]RogueStargun 31 points 5 days ago

You do realize there are jobs with 3d modeling that isn't just focused on making 2d sprites right? We are at least 5 to 10 years away from AI being capable of spitting out fully rigged models with correct topology (or coming up with an alternative to catmull Clark subdivision based mesh rendering altogether)

[–]OrdinaryRedditor 16 points 5 days ago

With the time it took to go from "nightmare fuel" to "fooling people with reasonably photorealistic fashion pope," I'm not so confident AI won't be pushing final frames in real time in 5-10 years.

[–]kitanokikori 5 points 5 days ago

Five years? Fam it's already here. If you think this can't be advanced quickly and that rigging and correct topology will be a moat, you haven't been paying attention to the insanely fast rate of progress that AI has been making

[–]RogueStargun 2 points 4 days ago

I know about DreamFusion and dreambooth. Theres far more that go into non static meshes than what you get out of marching cubes from those approaches

[–]MayoMusk 65 points 5 days ago

Maybe a positive spin on it. Sounds like your job just got a lot easier which means you’ll have more free time to make your own 3d models that are even more interesting to you? I dunno just trying to help.

[–]Shoddy_Employment954 82 points 5 days ago

Or the boss will just expect more output faster

[–]percydaman 51 points 5 days ago

This. Automation has always had a short period where it helps the worker, then quickly followed by changes so it really only helps the boss. /shrug

[–]ivanmalvin 9 points 5 days ago

And be able to downsize from two to one of these employees pretty easily it sounds like.

[–]coindrop 77 points 5 days ago

he will still work the same number of hours, they will just spit out more games now and the hours will be longer because the creativity is gone.

[–]VertexMachine 22 points 5 days ago

yea, and also OP is most likely drained by the job he now makes :|

[–]bairbs 9 points 5 days ago

Right. Technological advancements do nothing to help the workers. If something took you a week and now takes you 1 day, they'll hire 4 more artists to make up the difference and hit max output. All AI does is enable more output and make the job shittier for actual creatives. I loved the element of study and training that came with art. Now it's pointless.

In the future we're going to get 90% more Netflix level junk content generated by masses of "prompt engineers". It's sucks.

[–]Barxxo 26 points 5 days ago

you’ll have more free time

In the past things like that never happend although promised every time.They promised people had to work less when robots showed up everywhere.The opposite happened. Because a lot of people lost their jobs due to the robots the others had to work harder for less money. That's capitalism.

[–]Badmanzofbassline 11 points 5 days ago

This is the problem lol, it’s all about progress and doing things faster. Our endless need for "improvement" as a species will lead to our collapse

[–]jrdidriks 12 points 5 days ago

Under our current capitalist system, the profit motive will not let these ai tools be used for anything but undercutting artists. Which is a real shame because without that context I think the technology is just amazing. Sorry this happened to you. Don’t lose the joy of practicing your work even though you may not be compensated for it in the same way.

[–]foxping 6 points 5 days ago

After the current hype of AI is done, and everybody finds the next thing to get hyped about, your team, your boss will realise that it's was never about just pushing good looking images that a person's worth was, it was the vision that they bought to the table.

Your worth as an artist will be realised, not now but the time will come soon. What you can do till then is to make yourself as a great artist that any robot can not replace you. and by greatness I don't just mean being able to push out content faster than anybody else or make pretty things. be a visionary. be something that a robot can never be. Be great.

You will find a better place to express yourself, your work and everything that you want to build.

[–]mixxituk 4 points 5 days ago

one day midjourney will only being fed by midjourney and then mankinds creativity will stop

[–]LDiems 3 points 4 days ago

Folk, should I still pursue my dream of being a game environment artist? Despite the meteoric rise of AI?

[–]Northern_Silverbird 3 points 4 days ago

I stopped pursuing that dream because of AI, and I'm going to try and get into IT instead. Personally, I cannot afford to take the risk of pursuing my passion. It breaks me up inside to drop my dream of working in the gaming industry, but I just can't afford to gamble with my future. I have to be able to consistently afford medication that keeps me alive; I can't pursue something that may or may not exist in 5 years.

Unfortunately, I don't think "follow your dreams!" is a smart thing to say in this situation.

The tech is only going to improve, and there is no way of knowing what the future is going to look like. Sure, regulations will likely come in some countries, but what happens when the AI art is indistinguishable from human-made art? How will we know AI has been used? Trusting peoples' word? I don't think so. The AI space is already rife with grifters and scams because it's obvious how it can be used to—not only get out of not hiring artists—but also to easily trick people into buying art you didn't make.

It's horrible, but I highly recommend pursuing something else.

[–]irkypants 2 points 2 days ago

If you want to build environment art, you may have to already know your niche and make content related to that environment. If you are going to be the author of your own story, you will have to be the author of your own stories. No AI can yet make games that are compelling. It may be rough for a few years with these Executives trying to get rid of Labor Etc. There will be a massive homogenization. But if you have something to bring to the table that you think is Worthy it might be worth pursuing as cheaply as possible your education via web resources and not worry about a degree per se, unless you are pursuing one about storytelling, connecting with humans, self-promotion, and giving yourself permission to have self-worth without the approval of others.

[–]SpaceGazebo 4 points 4 days ago

Hang in there, OP! I'm a graphic designer and it's a weird moment for creatives right now, but... like with anything in life we'll adapt and overcome. Don't give up on what sounds like a dream situation over this!

[–]Incomitatum 5 points 4 days ago

I've had 5 people PM me, just today with this Thread and Image.

I've been trying to give them healthy frames of mind. Some are real-close to the tip of the spear on this, and feel more affected by these developments than others.

I am a creator and producer of Multimedia, focused on Concepting, Illustration and Animation. After business-development, It's what I've centered my Studio around.

While I am not against employing AI in the gaps, helping it speed up parts of the pipeline: I have no intention of giving it control of creating entire Outcomes and Art.

In Employment and much of Marketing it is imperative that we polarize, and "create Distinction". I am counciling my peers to not worry about these developments, and to focus their Craft now on the thoughtful-humanity they put into their Processes.

Do not be discouraged. Use this to speak even more deeply about your Art, how you see the world, and your process. If you weren't used to speaking intelligently about your Craft and your way of seeing the world now is your start.

How can we use this to show off the Humanity of our visions and desires?

For now, I see it as the difference between Fast Food and a Home Cooked meal.

In this way, I see us gathering entire Cabals of artists who are proudly NOT powered by Ai.

I don't think the Tech is "evil", but man IS going to use it for Exploitation (for Capitalistic Reasons).

For now; double down on your WHY: what MAKES (enCourages) you to be creative? How do you demystify your Process so we can fall in love with your Humanity? "Creation, is a holy act".

((Do not think this is an Endorsement of AI in general, I just refuse to live in Fear of it, and believe that my "career" is over)).

[–]Turbulent-Bat 9 points 5 days ago

Why was the pipeline in 3D to begin with if it’s so easy to replace with 2d images?

[–]man-vs-spider 8 points 5 days ago

That’s how donkey kong 64 was made, it not that unusual as a workflow

[–]muyuu 2 points 5 days ago

yea that was around the time it started becoming common

first time I saw it was Rise of the Robots in the mid 90s and Donkey Kong Country around that time as well

later I saw that other titles had used it like "The 7th Guest" for CD-i and Windows, and a rather obscure Sharp X68000 game "The Ancient Land of Ys" (what must be the very oldest game using that technique as early as the 80s - that machine was truly ahead of its time, it was like the Amiga on steroids and if you like the classic games RType and Rygar, you need to witness the X68000 versions)

[–]Sternsafari[S] 8 points 5 days ago

We did 3D models to be able to animate and have shots from all angles. But in the end we place 2D sprites in the engine.

I am not in the company from the founding/beginning, but as far as I know the reason is, the guys founding were 3D artists and programmers, so they decided to make a 2D game with 3D as a tool to get better and editable results, at any point in the pipeline. They had no experience in creating 2D art. They kept it that way until now, as the new tool (AI) gives way faster results.

Games like clash of clans for example are built exactly that way. 3D as a tool, 2D ingame.

[–]Turbulent-Bat 20 points 5 days ago

How does mid journey give you consistent angles like in 3D?

[–]IgnisIncendio 3 points 5 days ago

Right, I’m suspicious. From my experience AI is not consistent.

[–]TomTrottel 28 points 5 days ago

its factory workers vs. robots all over again, but now with artists.

(also weavers vs. weaving chairs)

(also fire running keepers vs. fire stone users)

Whats so evil about it is that the owners of everything always make a profit of it and give a sh*t about the damage they cause in the societies.

[–]CheckMateFluff 38 points 5 days ago

If removing labor from a society damages it then maybe we should be looking at why the society is designed that way.

[–]DeadStringScrolls 13 points 5 days ago

Humans have always and will always tie resource ownership / value to "worth" (thus the infamous "we feed you" capitalism pyramid painting, which remains as true now as it ever has been). No society has functioned for very long, if ever, under any other circumstance.

In our society, the problem continues to be that while tech advancements have made it so that we can theoretically support a significant percentage of unemployed, our greed continues to demand that if your passions can't be monetized, they aren't worth pursuing. Unless you're already wealthy through some other means.

[–]CheckMateFluff 12 points 5 days ago

There are many other societies that have better social net falls and place more value on the fact an individual can work rather than how much they do work. That place is 100%, not the USA but it could be if we all decided it was better to value each other instead of fighting over arbitrary issues.

And on the flip side, just because one avenue of exploitation has closed doesn't mean that another will not open. Artists have been used and abused for so long that we forget that this was also supposed to be a passion.

Ultimately society will have to give or collapse at some point. I know it make people angry when its mentioned but a UBI would fix almost all the automation issues afflicting society today.

[–]vignettiquette 12 points 5 days ago

The vast majority of people work jobs that aren't fun or fulfilling to pay the bills. That's just the nature of work, and it's happened a million times before to people who turn their hobby into their job; the necessity of the work drains the fun out of it.

[–]voinekku 6 points 5 days ago

Welcome to capitalism and worker alienation.

What you describe has happened to pretty much everything people used to love to do and to take pride in as their work since 1800s. It feels dystopian, because it is, and always has been.

[–]Equationist 3 points 5 days ago

I'm really sorry about this. Ideally we'd have AI-based tooling that makes it easier to sculpt and paint - instead we're stuck with tooling that translates text based prompts into pictures. Unfortunately, all the readymade training data for AI is in the form of text captions, so we're stuck with text-based interfaces to AI that lose the physical connection of crafting art.

[–]soultogetherla 3 points 5 days ago

My suggestion is to put that care into your own art work, but when at work.. follow the rules or take flight. While the position is creative, it's a job that is connected to a company that must investigate/implement new trends/tools in order to stay competitive. I hear your pain though.

[–]Phage0070 5 points 5 days ago

This advantage is gone, and so is my hope for using my own creative energy to create.

All this has revealed is that your skills are now not being fully employed in your current job. You don't need to model and rig a 3D character in order to create 2D sprites for a game, so your ability to do so is no longer useful.... for that job.

The only thing that has changed here is that your job no longer is the same as your passion. Find a new job that is what you want to do, it is as simple as that.

But leaving a company and a nice team, because AI took my job feels very dystopian. Idoubt it would be better in a different company also.

The advantage you have is that you still have your current job in the meantime. Some people lose their jobs and need to learn entirely new trades, you just had your job shift into something you aren't truly passionate about.

[–]Wedongfury 2 points 5 days ago

What about the future of his career ?

[–]zebrahdh 21 points 5 days ago

Talented people will always complain when there is an easier way to do what they do.

This isn’t just with AI… workers have been and will continue to be laid off because a machine can automate the process they do for hundreds of years now.

Consider "getting with the times" since it’s been hundreds of years… I was a painter. You know how many interior decorators started making their own "accent art" after social media exploded? All of them. It’s bullshit and their painting are trash, but people love it because it’s EASY.

[–]EfeTheNobody 3 points 5 days ago

Just wondering, what do you do now?

[–]dashrendar4483 26 points 6 days ago

It's depressing and I hate people that are all giddy about AI generated "artwork"so they can act all superior now that AI can make them feel better than talented artists that went through the whole process of learning their craft. The techbros who created that AI clearly aren't artists and hate artists. Of course, those clients and exploiters who hate to pay artists for their workload are over the moon.

Artists get no respect in general and AI just put a nail in their coffin while exploiting their existing artworks without credits to generate content replacing them without any artistic and personal craft behind.

[–]DeRoeVanZwartePiet 22 points 5 days ago

Artists may be the first, but they will certainly not be the last.

I'm a programmer. And where the likes of ChatGPT are heading too, the future for programmers is looking grim as well. And the worst part is, we are helping those AI to get better and better ourselves. Without realising.

[–]TimSimpson 5 points 4 days ago

First, I want to say that I'm sorry that you're experiencing this.

Your story reminds me a lot of an account I heard a few weeks ago about a young 20-something typesetter in the late 90's. He adored that work, and the advent of digital publishing absolutely crushed his love for that industry, because he really valued the tactile nature of it, and the transition to digital had none of what he loved about his previous job. In the end, I believe he ended up going to be a carpenter and had some success with that.

As an artist who has worked in a bunch of different industries and mediums over the years and is now DEEP into the generative AI ecosystem, I'm not going to sit here and say that you should just embrace the change without consideration, because that would be cruel, and it's entirely possible that particular aspects of your craft that you loved may not make the transition, and I'm truly sorry about that.

However, I'd encourage you to step out of the comparative lens here (particularly comparing yourself to your coworker) and recognize that your medium isn't the end all, be all. Your vision as an artist is. If you get good at using AI in your workflows, it can be molded and shaped almost as precisely as any other tool. These tools are like languages, with certain dialects being better suited to express particular concepts than others. And like languages, some of them are more useful in certain contexts than others for various reasons. And until we get true AGI, I'm very skeptical of the claims that artists will ever actually be fully replaced.

I'd take some time to further explore these tools beyond just what you immediately need for your job and see if there's anything there that sparks your imagination the way that modeling did originally. In particular, there's a whole host of artistic possibilities with Stable Diffusion, its extensions, and the world of fine-tuning. You may find that you just feel limited by Midjourney, and that having more control helps you regain that sense of professional competence that you feel you've lost touch with.

On the other hand, you may find that there's some other intangible aspect of your work that doesn't translate to these new mediums, and you may end up wanting to look for a different job that can still scratch that itch.

At the end of the day, I don't know you, and that's something you'll have to explore and decide about on your own. I just wanted to comment and offer some encouragement since you seemed pretty despondent, regardless of what path you end up taking.

​

P.S. If you want help finding good resources for Stable Diffusion or even just want a lay of the current generative AI landscape (idk how plugged into all of it you are), my DMs are open, and I'll be happy to help you find what you need.

[–]Placeholder5162 2 points 5 days ago

Ah shit MVM is real

[–]Proffecional_Nights 2 points 5 days ago

I think human made things will always be valued. But not on the scale it used to be.

[–]PopcornBag 2 points 5 days ago

Adapt your 3D stuff for printing and deal with physical only products. It's not surefire, but you can skip a lot of the headache that this stuff is causing right now.

[–]0ctoxVela 2 points 4 days ago

wait. what kidn of mobile games are you making

[–]ACertainBloke 2 points 4 days ago

I found your artpage and saw your work https://www.artstation.com/ichbinliese

Im sorry

[–]InfoOnAI 2 points 3 days ago

Wow. I've got no words except that I has to write about this.

https://www.ainewsdrop.com/2023/03/i-lost-everything-that-made-me-love-my.html

We've barely scratched the surface of machine learning let alone genuine AI.
You are right. I've seen what's coming, and it's going to change everything we know about modern day work.

[–]ThingSome1431 2 points 2 days ago

Ah, the lightbulb... it haunts me in my sleep, for it threatens to replace my trade, my livelihood. I am a humble candlemaker, one of the few left in this town, and my craft is in danger. The newfangled invention, they call it "electricity," has brought forth the lightbulb, which shines brighter and longer than any candle I could ever make. And now, I fear, it will take away my work entirely.

I am not alone in my worry. My fellow craftsmen, who work in the gaslight and oil lamp industries, share my concern. We are all mere mortals, who rely on our hands and our ingenuity to make a living. But this new age of machines and automation threatens to make us obsolete.

[–]EzTaskB 2 points 2 days ago

This will probably get lost but if you do see this, I feel for you. But you shouldn't look at it like a loss. Look at it like an opportunity. You have options. You can train a model specifically on your own style of artwork and expedite your work to please your boss. With your new found time, you can pursue your own passion, use gpt4 or some other model to teach you how to make your own game and put your passion to your own project.

[–]maxoakland 2 points 2 days ago

That sucks. This is why I hate generative AI. Civilized countries should ban it

[–]zwburger 2 points 2 days ago

It’s time to find an employer who respects what you do as a 3D artist, as a human, and most of all, as an employee.

As a copywriter and blogger, the future is uncertain on my end as well, but there will still be companies and employees who respect the work you put in.

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