On the Topic of AI

There has been a lot of discussion on the Authors pages on Facebook about the use of AI in the creation of book covers.  But as an unpaid (mostly) writer, the argument goes like this:

Writer:  I want to support other artists!  

Artist:  I want to help you make a book cover because people DO judge a book by its cover.

Writer:  Great!  How much will that cost?

Artist:  $800.

Writer:  Like, per book, or...?

Artist:  Yeah.  Per book.

Writer:  I haven't made $800 yet this year.  Or last year.  Last month, I earned 57 cents.

Artist:  Well, I deserve to get paid for my art!

Writer:  Well, yeah.  No argument from me on that, but I'm too broke to pay you that much, so I'm going to do what I can afford so that I can get paid for my art.

Artist then goes on to say something about how horrible it is that the writer is using AI instead of paying a real artist.  I mean, they might take 20 or 30 hours to create it, not to mention the years of study and practice.

Yeah, same!

And I get it.  AI is basically crowdsourced art.  It uses other people's work to create something derivative that can be used for a book cover or a business card or a t-shirt design.  If I had any kind of artistic bent to be able to create it myself, I would.  

In the past, I have taken photographs and then used those as cover art, but they don't 'read' as a romance book.  It might be a lovely photo of a lake with lily pads and a lonely bench.  It makes great art on its own, but it doesn't tell the reader what the book might contain.

I played with the AI programs a bit to see what it could create.  I have given it several prompts to customize it, and alter it to get the feel I want.  That scene is too dark.  That layout is too complex.  I give it specific commands--make the house white, add a picnic table, replace that motif.  Or I change the look of the people--make her hair short, make him blond, take away the beard.  Make his clothes more noble; less like a peasant and more like a prince.

Or I've written in the entire book blurb and said, "Make a cover that reflects this description."  Then I take that image and adjust as necessary.

But my question is this:  when is the AI art customized enough that it's no longer considered stolen art?  Like making a collage from magazine prints, or incorporating someone else's designs into a larger whole, it can make all new art.

It's like looking at Andy Warhol's soup can art and saying that it's original, when someone else designed the Campbell's labels.  He's copying it and making it his own.

Even medieval artists would copy a master's work.  You look at enough Tudor and Renaissance paintings looking for costume inspiration, you start to notice that several portraits are eerily similar.  The hands and position of the woman are the same but one is holding a fan, while another is holding a feather, or a necklace, or a ferret (weirdly).  The dresses are different colors with different decoration, but everything else is the same.  Or you see the same unusual hat over and over and you realize that the dress is red with gold trim and she's holding a white flower.

So I asked on one of the lists, "If you can't afford the high price tag of independent artists, what are the other choices?"  Someone suggested a company called Get Covers.  They claim that they use licensed fonts, images and software to create covers for super cheap.  Like $10-20 for a simple cover, and $35 for custom work.  I'm going to be honest, the samples they have displayed on the website look very much like AI renderings.  How do I know that they're using legit licensed stuff?  When I have to answer the question on Kindle, 'Are you using AI to create any images?' I would say no if I hired it out, but what if THEY used AI?  Would I get in trouble if it turned out they were and I didn't disclose it?  I wouldn't know unless they admitted it (or if there was a ridiculous mistake, like a character having a third arm...but even then, that could be a legit human error, too, like the example below).  

So where does that leave us, the not-yet-famous writers?

As a hobbyist writer, I would rather save my pennies, use a tool to create the cover I want, and when/if I become rich and famous, I will hire an artist to redesign all the book covers and I'm sure they'll be friggin' awesome!  Heck, most successful books have dozens of different designs for releases in different countries, anniversary editions, or later print runs.  Maybe I'll do a series of covers.  I'd love to do the old-school cloth covers for one run, and a leather-bound, gilt-edged book series for the elite home libraries.  Maybe a third matching set for whole series of books, like J.K. did for H.P.

Not that I've written anything that rivals J.K. Rowling, let alone Jane Austen or John Steinbeck.  But who knows?  It could happen.

Maybe.

In the meantime, don't shame the starving artist for not being able to afford to hire another starving artist.  We're all just trying to get along in this life.

Go forth & be kind.

KayLee