gizmodo.com: The film’s art book recently released, and fans online saw a page featuring New York concept art. Taxis and buildings colliding into each other prompted the allegations of AI use amidst a general confusion of why you’d need the tech to sketch out New York. Most users online deemed this a disappointing bit of news similar to the situation with Supergirl. But for others, this wasn’t as open and shut as it seemed.
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I chose this article because I kept seeing contradicting reports on social media regarding the conspiracy of whether the new Spiderman movie used generative AI, and I wanted to dive deeper into the topic. The rumor was started by reddit users commenting on pages from a book of concept art used for the movie. What really stood out to me from this article was that fact that the publisher couldn’t give fans online 100% assurance that no AI was used in the book. While the publisher was aware of Photoshop tools being used that could have been mistaken for AI, he admitted that some art may have been AI-generated; that it simply passed through all the extensive checks the illustrations went through. In a world where AI is becoming harder and harder to recognize, it was really upsetting to learn that such a reputable brand like Marvel couldn’t completely confirm or deny the usage of AI in this book. What’s even more disturbing to me is that the speculation of AI use that is really upsetting fans is the question of AI use in the movie, not the concept art book, and there was no mention of any investigation into the film itself (at least in this article). The publisher of this book claims that Marvel does not want to use AI for legal reasons, and yet there is no guarantee that this policy was actually followed through on for the Spiderman movie. I believe that transparency and accountability are the two most important weapons against AI accusations in media, but with this case it seems like neither of these values are being displayed.
Having watched the newest Spiderman movie, Brand New Day, and greatly enjoying it, I was shocked to learn that there were AI images in the art book for the movie. This contrasts with what I thought the production team believed in, however I did not know more concrete information than word of mouth until I read this article. I found out how complicated this issue was and how the participation of the possible extents of the internet can cause confusion to someone like me who only hears about a rumor. Reading statements by a designer of the art book and discussion about the media companies that make Spiderman really grounded me in how real journalism is integral to the spread of information and how short form content can create skewed views on information that isn’t even fully exposed yet. I hope that there was not AI use in the process of making Brand New Day however I am glad there is legitimate research being put in to find out the truth.
With the times we are currently in and how aggressive the war with AI currently is I believe it is really important that big companies like Marvel and Disney defend themselves and make a stance. Especially when names like theres hold significant weight and could be a pillar of inspiration and confidence in our suffering art industry. I understand from an economic view that for big companies like Disney using AI to help quicken the process with a cheaper method may save Disney that extra dollar. But in doing so just to save that little bit more of money, I believe Disney is encroaching on their own values which they long time held up. Disney was known for and still is famous for its work in motion pictures films starting with Steamboat Willy. They still teach classes on and although times and the film industry has changed drastically. I truly hope that Disney sticks with the roots that made them success and was a core building block to building there company in to the successful extravaganza it currently is.
I don’t have enough background information on this matter to give the most objective/comprehensive critique. However, after reading the concept art book publisher’s response, I’m not sure whether it was enough to regain the audience’s trust and re-establish the company’s brand image. As the use of AI has become a major issue concerning credit and ownership, and an increasingly controversial topic in the arts because of its conflict with human artistic expression and creativity, it’s important for large companies such as Disney and Marvel, which profit from the arts and entertainment industry and help set its standards in society, to respond appropriately to this controversy. However, StingRe’s response appeared somewhat disingenuous to me. Claiming that the incidents were merely careless mistakes involving Adobe was not the most persuasive. Adobe’s tools have been available for a considerable amount of time, so one would expect the people using them to understand how they work. Furthermore, considering the number of people presumably involved in producing and reviewing a publication for a major company, it seems that someone should have noticed the issue before the book was published. This is why, to me, the response felt more like an excuse that attempted to shift the blame onto the artist. Hence I thought it wasn’t the most effective response because regardless of who made the original mistake, the work was ultimately published under Marvel’s name, meaning that the company should still take some level of responsibility.
I feel like this is a common consequence of the ai generation age we are in, there is a lot of ai speculation going around for a lot of media and while a lot of the times those speculations end up being true I’d say most of the time they are just accusations. A lot of the time human error or mistakes can be mistaken for ai but people will forget that nobody draws or composites things the same way there will always be some variation from image to image. It also doesn’t benefit the team to use ai either the current state of the world is mostly anti ai especially in art so it more ruins their reputation than anything especially since Spider-Man is one of the biggest ip’s right now it wouldn’t be worth the backlash for Sony to encourage them to use ai to speed things along, however that hasn’t stopped a lot of other companies before
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