[echelon]

> Obsolete… The fucking hubris

There are some real dangers here that need to be navigated.

Junior artists who get their start doing commissions are not going to have that path anymore.

Reddit's job boards for junior artists are a literal desert now.

In a sense, the activation energy gradient to producing good results has lowered such that the economic reward for up and coming artists has deteriorated.

> Why don’t you let the artists maintain their own practice, rather than pressuring your friends to join you in yours?

Artists who get their start in AI early can build recognition and clout within the community. They'll potentially be at a big advantage.

a16z is investing in non-technical artists to bootstrap production and community. There's actually a lot of interesting stuff happening when you dive in to AI art.

[dartos]

For now.

It’s just market forces being unsure about the future of hiring artists.

Companies are like lemmings, they just follow one another.

Artists already know that gen AI is just another tool in the toolbox.

We’re just waiting for MBAs to also realize this.

GenAI making artists obsolete is a dumb idea. No MBA is going to be trying to coax a GenAI model into making an image.

[cruffle_duffle]

> GenAI making artists obsolete is a dumb idea

This is true for just about everything, honestly. The more you play with these tools (and use them in anger to do real shit) the more you push their boundaries and learn what they are good for and what they aren’t. You also quickly realize, like any other computer tool, there is a certain skill you need to have in order to provoke these things into generating the output you expect.

They can be time savers but also time wasters.

But what they aren’t gonna do is make the employees of entire industries vanish overnight. But I will say you’d be a fool to ignore these tools because once you master them they can be a pretty awesome force multiplier.

That all being said, many times it feels like it’s just a fancy, more annoying Alexa that you have to fight with to get the results you want. But alas…

[echelon]

I don't think I made my argument clear. This isn't about companies not paying artists, it's about peer-to-peer opportunities contracting and the market shrinking at the bottom.

https://www.reddit.com/r/artistforhire/

This is hardly the only community for this, and it's evaporated into a ghost town. Prices have decreased an order of magnitude.

This is one of the ways up and coming artists without professional training get started earning money from their skill set.

You should see also how Fiverr has filled up with GenAI artists that are pricing out traditional artists. Fiverr isn't typically a place for highly skilled work - it's for newbies and developing world opportunities. And now the money is thinning out.

[dartos]

Oh yes absolutely.

Contract art for individuals looking for a custom image has been devastated by GenAI.

This makes a little more sense as the bar for quality is much lower than a widespread commercial product and most individuals are willing to compromise on that to get a good desktop wallpaper quickly for free.

Even local events have been using AI banner images.

[jasonlotito]

> Artists who get their start in AI early can build recognition and clout within the community.

The non-artists community? The "I don't have anything I can show I own the copyright to" community? The "I made this with genAI so now the company can't even protect it's copyright?" community? The "tech-bro NFT fraud" community? The "do it for the exposure" community?

Which community?

[camillomiller]

Taking anything a16z does as an example disqualifies any conversation about art. You all can only think as a fuction of capital allocated and possibility to make money. It's ok about technology, it doesn't work about art. You just have the wrong set of tool for the discourse, but the Dunning Krueger is strong.

So disgusting.

[text0404]

> job boards

> activation energy gradient

> producing good results

> economic reward

> build recognition and clout

> big advantage

> a16z is investing

> bootstrap production

you're saying a lot of things about commodification and mass production, which are completely unnecessary to the expression of the human condition.

[echelon]

> you're saying a lot of things about commodification and mass production, which are completely unnecessary to the expression of the human condition.

Read my response here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42368209

I struggle to see how the existing status quo is better than the world that is coming.

[text0404]

but indie films have always existed. there have always been amateurs using film as a medium, since there was film (in high school, we wrote, storyboarded, directed, acted in, and edited our own short films for our final film class projects using camcorders and watched them at a viewing night at a local theater!).

you're saying "you must have a giant budget and tons of time to compete with the studios and AI can level the playing field" but i don't know why an artist would want to compete with a major film studio which is pushing out generic content in the first place?

you don't need a multimillion dollar production budget and $300k props to make art, in the same way a sculptor doesn't need to make statues out of gold or diamonds.

[dotancohen]

That's probably because commodification and mass production are far more viable a path towards feeding one's family than is expression of the human condition.

[52-6F-62]

a16z of all things!

I like technology. I hate how its being used, especially by groups like that.

Software needs a soul revival. Holy shit

[52-6F-62]

You know that people can see you as you sit there sharpening your teeth.

I dont think anybody who has taken up an artistic practice, professional or otherwise, should or would spend much time basing their life decisions around an online job board.

You’re missing the point.

[echelon]

> You know that people can see you as you sit there sharpening your teeth.

I'm an engineer and a filmmaker. I've lived with 5 AM call times and shoots that ended at sunrise. I've rented ridiculous $300,000 glassware, lifted heavy items from the top shelf of the prop house, dealt with talent issues, struggled to memorize lines, had post production drop projects on the floor, and dealt with so much bullshit - that world sucks.

The film portion of this market is bending a little bit differently than illustration, and these changes are presenting a huge opportunity for filmmakers and animators.

Film needed studios historically because (1) distribution was hard (YouTube and Netflix have addressed this) and (2) films are logistically complicated, capital intensive, and require lots of people. Gen AI is changing this last bit in a big way.

Film is basically getting its "Steam" moment. Just like indie devs can make games, indie authors can write novels, or indie musicians can work on a DAW and publish to Bandcamp, filmmakers will soon have the ability to build their own universes and audiences - something that wasn't possible before. (While there are writers, comedians, and animators like Vivienne Medrano, Joel Haver, and Zach Hadel, GenAI makes this happen in a big, repeatable, and sustainable way.)

20,000+ film students attend film and animation school every year. There aren't enough projects currently to have all of them be autonomous or pursue their own vision. That's changing.

And why would you want to build in Disney's ball pit and play by their rules when our own minds are so much more expansive? So many ideas wither on the vine and never see the light of day due to the intense capital requirements and the bland general audience algorithm of the existing regime.

Ask yourself why there are 20,000+ fantasy books but only 50 fairly generic fantasy films and TV shows.

This is all a good thing. Art is going to explode and fill into every niche and interest you can imagine.

The market will grow, not contract, and the artists will have their own brands and audiences.