AI Art Removed From Upcoming Terminator RPG Book

(this is not the art in question)​

AI rears its head yet again--this time it's an artist using Artificial Intelligence and then submitting it to Nightfall Games for its upcoming Terminator 2: Judgement Day sourcebook.

The artist in question initially claimed that the art was not generated by AI. Nightfall Games made a statement yesterday indicating that they had detected the AI art during the development phase of the product, and are already in the process of having it replaced for the book's release. The artist has not been named—but it’s probably not Skynet!

This is the second time AI art has hit the headlines, after WotC updated its AI art policy following false accusations by a YouTuber. It's clear that AI art is going to be a major topic in the months and years to come.

As I mentioned in my last update, we just need to do a few quick things over the weekend to finalise both T2 and RESIST. Jared who is our Indesign guru was working through the files when he noticed that one of the art pieces looked suspiciously AI-like. He pointed this out to Benn and Mark, who have led the production of the project. They both confirmed that the 'art-producer' had confirmed multiple times that he wasn't using AI art generators and instead was producing collages and then over painting and using Photoshop filters to make the art. Mark and Benn trusted this individual as both a long term collegue and friend.

The image was run through an AI art identifying program to discover a 99.9% match with the AI art generator 'Midjourney'. We then identified all other art produced by the individual to discover a 99.9% 'Midjourney' hit on 16 of them.

16x99.9% AI or a program that is 16x99.9% wrong?​

We hoped the identifier was wrong, but our art experts quickly noticed things the less experienced members of our team would never have know. Things like image resolution, go to AI filters etc.. We had been duped and paid out a significant amount of money in the duping.

But why does this matter?​

It matters because AI art is theft. It creates art from a massive, massive portfolio of art and images, that have been created by real people. It then splurges out poor mockeries of these arts without any consideration of the artists and can be done by any Tom, Dick or Hary.

We do not want to cheat artists (we are artists), we don't want to cheat you (our backers and customers). We are a small company, who focus on good and original art and pay well for it. We find this situation abhorrent, upsetting and depressing.

Purge or Die?​

A dilemma indeed. Although, as Data from Star Trek would say, we considered it for approximately 0.0002 milliseconds.

What we have done?​

We have great people in our team and Jared has sacrificed his long weekend to fix this. And he has. We need to get approval for the fixes from the IP owners but we will drive that now. Once given we will be back on track.

Watch this space...​

In the meantime, we as a company will be working with our external artists to ensure that all art is confirmed AI free and we will also be implementing a number of checks before payment is made and art is accepted.

 

[Morrus]

I suspect showing your work, like my math teacher insisted, might become the norm.

It is the norm. Always was.

 

[MGibster]

It is the norm. Always was.

I don't know why, I just assumed the artist delivered the product complete. I should have known, because the few projects I've been involved with featuring art pretty much worked as described in this thread. The artist would provide concepts, we'd pick one, give feedback as the work progressed, and then make a final decision.

 

[Morrus]

I don't know why, I just assumed the artist delivered the product complete. I should have known, because the few projects I've been involved with featuring art pretty much worked as described in this thread. The artist would provide concepts, we'd pick one, give feedback as the work progressed, and then make a final decision.

Art, writing, coding, layout, building a house, decorating your spare bedroom, everything is a collaborative process. Zero collaboration would be a major red flag for me. I couldn't work that way.

I guess there are exceptions with super celebrities--you get what you're given. But you have to be pretty damn famous to get away with that! Like Hollywood famous. And even then, that's just because they can.

 

[MGibster]

Art, writing, coding, layout, building a house, decorating your spare bedroom, everything is a collaborative process. Zero collaboration would be a major red flag for me. I couldn't work that way.

I think I have it figured out. As a youngster, it seemed to be that a lot of the art for the novels I read had only a passing resemblance to what between the pages. As an example I present to you the cover of StreetLethal, a cyberpunk book first published in 1983 but I didn't read it until the early 1990s. The main character is an African American Null-G boxer and, well, I guess that's supposed to be him on the cover. Later editions of the book did feature art with an African American, but this was hardly the only book I bought were the art was tenuously connected to the story. I just assumed all art for books was like that.

 

[Morrus]

I think I have it figured out. As a youngster, it seemed to be that a lot of the art for the novels I read had only a passing resemblance to what between the pages. As an example I present to you the cover of StreetLethal, a cyberpunk book first published in 1983 but I didn't read it until the early 1990s. The main character is an African American Null-G boxer and, well, I guess that's supposed to be him on the cover. Later editions of the book did feature art with an African American, but this was hardly the only book I bought were the art was tenuously connected to the story. I just assumed all art for books was like that.

I can't really speak to the publishing process of novels in the early 1980s. I was a toddler.

 

[MarkB]

I think I have it figured out. As a youngster, it seemed to be that a lot of the art for the novels I read had only a passing resemblance to what between the pages. As an example I present to you the cover of StreetLethal, a cyberpunk book first published in 1983 but I didn't read it until the early 1990s. The main character is an African American Null-G boxer and, well, I guess that's supposed to be him on the cover. Later editions of the book did feature art with an African American, but this was hardly the only book I bought were the art was tenuously connected to the story. I just assumed all art for books was like that.

View attachment 340896

That sort of thing tends to be a collaboration between the publisher and the artist, with the author maybe getting an advisory role if they're lucky. And the publisher will go with what they think will get people to pick up the book on the shelf.

There's an ongoing in-joke in Jim Butcher's Dresden Files novels where the cover art always features the protagonist wearing a cowboy hat, so the author has taken to dropping asides into the text where Harry Dresden mentions that he doesn't own or wear hats.

 

[CleverNickName]

The only time I've ever published anything, I was not consulted for any input whatsoever for the cover art. I didn't even get to see a mockup: the only thing the publisher wanted from me was the finished manuscript--they would handle the rest. I didn't even write the book description that was printed on the back.

I believe this is common practice with newer, lesser-known authors like me.

 

[Shardstone]

Oh well, now we know. Thanks!

If only we’d had you here to smugly solve this industry-wide, no, industries-wide problem earlier.

I wish I was as clever as you.

Many do, and even I sometimes wonder how such genius as my earlier post can be captured again.

 

[Shardstone]

I’m just gonna keep assuming the founder of Midjourney knows more about how AI art works than you, so thanks. The guy who created the program admits he took other people’s art without permission and uses that art in the final results, so…

So if I find someone who is a finder or developer of another AI art program disagreeing with his stance, what happens? I just want to know before I do it, but I'll do it anyway.

 

[Shardstone]

Not sure if this is what you mean, but we have another (several) thread around here which showcases how ChatGPT ripped whole sections out of the PHB, verbatim.

That's expecting to see a pattern there and putting the words there due to the pattern, not literally copy/pasting the words from the phb into an answer to something (even if it is word for word).