WotC WotC: 'Artists Must Refrain From Using AI Art Generation'

After it was revealed this week that one of the artists for Bigby Presents: Glory of the Giants used artificial intelligence as part of their process when creating some of the book's images, Wizards of the Coast has made a short statement via the D&D Beyond Twitter (X?) account.

The statement is in image format, so I've transcribed it below.

Today we became aware that an artist used AI to create artwork for the upcoming book, Bigby Presents: Glory of the Giants. We have worked with this artist since 2014 and he's put years of work into book we all love. While we weren't aware of the artist's choice to use AI in the creation process for these commissioned pieces, we have discussed with him, and he will not use AI for Wizards' work moving forward. We are revising our process and updating our artist guidelines to make clear that artists must refrain from using AI art generation as part of their art creation process for developing D&D art.

-Wizards of the Coast​

Ilya Shkipin, the artist in question, talked about AI's part in his process during the week, but has since deleted those posts.

There is recent controversy on whether these illustrations I made were ai generated. AI was used in the process to generate certain details or polish and editing. To shine some light on the process I'm attaching earlier versions of the illustrations before ai had been applied to enhance details. As you can see a lot of painted elements were enhanced with ai rather than generated from ground up.

-Ilya Shlipin​

​

 

[Vincent55]

I don't see any difference in using Photoshop and digital tools to make something instead of paint canvases and brushes, just that this makes it easier and quicker, mind you it is not perfect but could save time money and resources for those who don't want to spend the money to contract and artist who may not have the exact vision as the writers and creators of the books do. Being an artist my self, i find some of the A.I. work inspiring and provides a great visual idea to draw from if i want to draw my self, also no one is going to complain if i sell an idea from an A.I. art and improve it.

 

[Mecheon]

Wait, so the conclusion is that AI proliferation will lead to mass unemployment, mass death, and the overall destruction of society?

No. The conclusion is AI proliferation will lead to experts in fields losing their jobs and mass waves of false information spreading because you've fired people who can actually research. Case in point, the AI 'statement' up-thread based on "Absolutely nothing". Heck, we're already seeing it in the paleontology sphere. Look at recent discovery of early archosaur Mambachiton. Here's what it probably looked like, and here's a museum twitter using some AI generated schlock that looks nothing like a real animal, but their text pretends it does. Imagine the sheer levels of mis-information you could get to going further. Because employers sure don't care about 'facts' or 'accuracy'. Heck, if you want more comedy, look at the Glorbo incident, where a news website decided than rather to, y'know, actually confirm things, what if we just strip-mine a subreddit for information, throw it into an AI, and post that? Shock and horror, turns out AI don't know anything and they produced an article on a complete lie completely bare-faced. Now imagine that's news forever. That's the world AI proponents want.

There's currently a strike going on in Hollywood at this very moment that includes, among its many reasons, greedy studio execs not wanting to hire people as extras (and give them a foot into the acting industry), instead replacing all crowds with AI shots, just to save a few bucks. Rather than come to a table on this, these billionares would rather starve out actors and artists, have them lose their homes, and force them to accept these conditions

 

[Charlaquin]

Wait, so the conclusion is that AI proliferation will lead to mass unemployment, mass death, and the overall destruction of society?

Quite possibly, if we don’t get on top of regulating it now.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

Here is Ilya’s art of the dinosaurs before he gave them to the AI

 

[bedir than]

No. The conclusion is AI proliferation will lead to experts in fields losing their jobs and mass waves of false information spreading because you've fired people who can actually research. Case in point, the AI 'statement' up-thread based on "Absolutely nothing". Heck, we're already seeing it in the paleontology sphere. Look at recent discovery of early archosaur Mambachiton. Here's what it probably looked like, and here's a museum twitter using some AI generated schlock that looks nothing like a real animal, but their text pretends it does. Imagine the sheer levels of mis-information you could get to going further. Because employers sure don't care about 'facts' or 'accuracy'. Heck, if you want more comedy, look at the Glorbo incident, where a news website decided than rather to, y'know, actually confirm things, what if we just strip-mine a subreddit for information, throw it into an AI, and post that? Shock and horror, turns out AI don't know anything and they produced an article on a complete lie completely bare-faced. Now imagine that's news forever. That's the world AI proponents want.

There's currently a strike going on in Hollywood at this very moment that includes, among its many reasons, greedy studio execs not wanting to hire people as extras (and give them a foot into the acting industry), instead replacing all crowds with AI shots, just to save a few bucks. Rather than come to a table on this, these billionares would rather starve out actors and artists, have them lose their homes, and force them to accept these conditions

Look at the faked Pentagon bombing that was just a single, obviously faked AI photo that dropped the markets 0.5% in just minutes back in May

Billions disappeared because of fake news from a single photo.

 

[Nellisir]

Quite possibly, if we don’t get on top of regulating it now.

Sorry, explain how that'll work? The mass death etc etc part, not the regulations part.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Sorry, explain how that'll work? The mass death etc etc part, not the regulations part.

What do you think will happen if 70% or more of information/knowledge based workers are replaced by automation within a decade?

 

[Erdric Dragin]

A kneejerk reaction against a bad publicity buzzword. This artist created the drawings and used AI as a tool - which as far as I can tell - did not steal from other artists. They used machine learning to improve their art, in the same way a writer might use a spellchecker.

Ok, so the big question is, how did anyone know it was AI art to begin with? Is there a tool that detects this and someone got bored and decided to use it on the book's art?

 

[Nellisir]

What do you think will happen if 70% or more of information/knowledge based workers are replaced by automation within a decade?

Not just roll over and die, for one.
Why 70%? Source for that?

 

[Scribe]

Not just roll over and die, for one.

Just pick up a shovel, and get a few more roommates. Bootstraps ya?