[1lint]

My feeling is that Andy Warhol's creation entailed greater effort, and certainly greater artistic expression, than Goldsmith's act of snapping a photograph of Prince. I guess what I really take issue with is that taking a photograph entitles one to copyright protection, when the image is directly created by a machine (the camera), while all the photographer does is point the camera and click.

In fact the USPTO recently opined against granting copyright for images generated by a machine (AI model) in response to someone's prompt (https://public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2023-05321.pdf). I believe applying this same standard (whether the standard is right is an entirely separate question) to photography should also preclude photos from copyright, because there is more artistic expression involved in prompting than there is in pointing a camera.

[ano-ther]

> what I really take issue with is that taking a photograph entitles one to copyright protection, when the image is directly created by a machine (the camera), while all the photographer does is point the camera and click.

I hire photographers on a regular basis for corporate jobs and have a lot of respect for their skills. They are definitely not just “pointing and clicking.”

It’s about composing, setting the right light, arranging the scene, making your model be comfortable, capturing the right moment, and knowing the technology including processing a picture after it is made.

When they are good, it feels effortless. But it certainly isn’t.

[1lint]

The point I am making is that I believe photography to entail less artistic expression than other forms of art such as painting or in this case, coloring. Saying "pointing and clicking" may be too dismissive, but I am used to hearing this sort of language used to describe AI image generation prompting, which I believe photography is more akin to, than it is to other art forms due to the degree of reliance on a machine.

I understand there can be a lot of depth to photography, likewise there can be a lot of depth to AI image prompting beyond just typing a prompt, both require high degrees of skill to master. But in general, I believe these forms of image generation to entail less artistic expression than the other arts.

[freejazz]

If you think that's what's really entailed in photography, you a) don't really seem to know anything about photography as a science, let alone an art, and b) should read US court cases on photography copyrights, which make all of these points against you. Happy to get you same case names if you are interested.

[1lint]

Yes I will take you up on the offer for these case names you mentioned. I think it will be interesting to read up on them, in light of the current copyright discussion around AI image generation, which I believe to be akin to photography due to the shared degree of reliance on a machine to generate images.

[freejazz]

Cameras don't "generate" an image, if they didn't they'd have the same copyrightability issue that AI generators have. You should read Mannion.

[1lint]

>> Cameras don't "generate" an image, if they didn't they'd have the same copyrightability issue that AI generators have

Please elaborate on your statement above. How would you characterize the method by which cameras produce images, and with respect to copyright law, how does this differentiate camera produced images from images produced by other machines?

[ESTheComposer]

> while all the photographer does is point the camera and click

You sound like every "I have an idea guy" that wants programmers to build their app. "It's totally easy, all you have to do is just build it!!!!"

[ESTheComposer]

Deleting your comment instead of owning your mistake is a bad look

[1lint]

I did not delete any comment. Most likely you cannot see my comment because you flagged it.

[ESTheComposer]

I did not flag your comment and even flagged comments typically appear with [flagged]

[1lint]

In that case I am calling you out for lying to slander me. For the record, what is the mistake and comment you are claiming I made?

[ESTheComposer]

Way to go from 0 to 100, lying to slander you lol. Do you think I don't have anything better to do with my time than lie to slander an internet rando?

In terms of the comment, I don't know what to tell you, if anything it's ironic because my parent comment is the one that's flagged. You may call me out for whatever you wish.

You had a comment about how you obviously don't treat programmers like my parent comment suggested else you wouldn't be on this site, which I replied was not the point of my comment and that you had completely misread it.

EDIT: Turning on showdead on my profile shows that your comment is a dead comment now, so either you deleted it or it got flagged to death by other users as I didn't flag it.

[rcme]

The prompt can be copyrighted, but the generated image can not.

[oatmeal1]

> while all the photographer does is point the camera and click.

In this, and almost every case, there is much more to it than that, especially in a controlled setting where the photographer is setting the background. Exposure, depth of field, framing, etc.

[6gvONxR4sf7o]

If the photograph is such a non-effort, why didn't Warhol just take a photo himself and paint that?

[1lint]

Warhol was specifically commissioned to work on the photograph by a magazine, the photograph was not chosen by Warhol.

[JumpCrisscross]

Grab a copy of Susan Sontag’s On Photography.