Beware: AI Images on inat

[amelia_ma]

1. Photoshop? The clover looks out of focus but the bee is in focus
2. Looks genuine. The wings are translucent and the shadows of the legs look correct
3. AI - the eyes look big and the photo has a sort of ethereal quality. The legs also look somewhat off.

[lappelbaum]

I don’t think they put AI in my camera manufactured in 2008

[environ]

We had digital image stabilisation and motion tracking in 2008, it was a simpler time when we just called things what they actually were :)

[lappelbaum]

I was using “AI” to mean generative AI that sharpens images and/or removes noise. Since we were already talking about that, I didn’t feel the need to get more descriptive.

Edit: but now I realize your joke has to do with motion tracking. So I guess response from earlier doesn’t really work. Don’t mind me, not a tech person. I’ll just go back to IDing bunnies.

[environ]

Yes, my original quip was just a silly joke about “Open the pod bay doors HAL” brand AI.

But more seriously, the algorithms used purely to improve the quality of images captured by inherently noisy digital sensors are not “Generative AI”. The only difference between what is in your 2008 camera and what is in the best algorithms today, is your 2008 camera uses generic deterministic maths to decide what to do with each pixel, while the newer algorithms use an ‘oracle’ which can be trained on the kind of noise specifically seen by the sensor and optics in that camera - which you could simplistically think of as being a kind of dynamic LUT for scaling each pixel. There’s nothing that even vaguely resembles ‘intelligence’ going on, it’s not learning from each photo you take, but the model which decides what is signal and what is noise was ‘trained’ by the people who made it.

Generative AI is an algorithm which doesn’t try to preserve its input signal at all, it just uses it as a query for creating something entirely novel from the primordial soup puddle it created from the data it was trained with.

This is why trying to talk about “the trouble with (or benefits of) AI” is like trying to talk about the trouble with Enterprise Max Cyber Pro Cloud Plus. Mostly it’s just a marketing appellation that says little or nothing about the actual technique or process being applied.

[shroomysean]

Look at the eyes of the bee in the first image though!

[lappelbaum]

Whatever it is called then (not a tech person), the stuff that people in this thread said were causing lines (markings, fin rays, feathers, etc.) to appear that don’t exist. Or maybe I misunderstood this whole conversation that I’ve been lurking (not a tech person).

Like I said, just going to let this all go whoosh right by my head and get back to IDing bunnies.

[bonesigh]

1. AI, the wing looks really small and oddly oriented, there’s an antenna or something coming out of the thorax, and the flower is way too out of focus.
2. Photoshop: The bee looks real but the shading on the petals under the legs looks a bit off. It also looks like the flower is facing you head on, so I would think the bee should have its back to you, but it’s at an angle.
3. Real: I would think photoshop would be really hard with all those petals and why would you use a fuzzy bee and a funny angle like that. There’s also a weird pink haze on the clover petals that matches a faint pink haze on the bee’s legs and eye. I don’t think AI is creative enough for this one.

[rayray]

#1 is so messed up as AI tends to do with insects

#2 seems photoshopped as I never see anything nectaring on Chicory! haha

#3 I would guess is real