Did an AI Paint That? – PCMag

DALL-E 2 is such a good artist that most people have trouble telling its art from the "real" deal.
My title is Senior Features Writer, which is a license to write about absolutely anything if I can connect it to technology (I can). I’ve been at PCMag since 2011 and have covered the surveillance state, vaccination cards, ghost guns, voting, ISIS, art, fashion, film, design, gender bias, and more. You might have seen me on TV talking about these topics or heard me on your commute home on the radio or a podcast. Or maybe you’ve just seen my Bernie meme. 
“My kid could paint that” is a frequent rejoinder to art that viewers struggle understand. But “my computer could paint that” may become the challenge to art that has secured its status as a masterpiece. 
DALL-E 2(Opens in a new window), an OpenAI-created system that translates images into art, has taken over social media, emphasis on “media.” The AI and its unrelated copycat, craiyon(Opens in a new window), have been used to create such works as “an ancient Egyptian mural of an Egyptian animal god using a computer” and “a medieval painting of people wearing VR headsets.”
DALL-E 2 has been available to a select few who have moved up from its waitlist, and craiyon is open to the public. The work that has been produced via these programs has caught the attention of many, including Tidio, which decided to pose some questions(Opens in a new window) about it to 842 people on art, AI, and technology subreddits (scroll down for the full infographic).
Tidio showed several images to its audience and asked of each: Did AI make this or did an artist? A surrealist painting from the 80s was judged as painted by a human by 68% of people surveyed—while a DALL·E 2 creation was deemed human-made by 73%. Nine percent of those surveyed said it was easy for them to tell whether AI or a human was behind an artwork, but Tidio pointed out that not all of those people were correct in their assessments of the art they were shown. 
But since beauty is in the eye of the beholder, we should note that the artist-versus-AI debate doesn’t matter to everyone. Almost 67% said AI-generated images are still a form of art. The positives they associated with AI-generated art are an easy conceptualization of ideas (25%), a good source of inspiration (24%), a new means of self-expression (17%), the fast creation of images and cartoons (16%), and a better understanding of our minds (8%). 
But some fear that DALL-E 2 can fool people into thinking that they’ve seen photographic evidence of momentous events in history—like, say, Super Mario getting his citizenship at Ellis Island. Deepfakes and manipulation (41%) were at the top of the list of worries about what text-to-image generators can wreak. They were followed by misgivings that AI models perpetuate biases (27%), artists could lose jobs (18%), and AI could create pornographic content (10%). 
Tidio said that some surveyed pointed out that AI had not created their digital canvases out of whole cloth; the images rely on existing artworks, and those artists are going uncredited and uncompensated. But perhaps stealing from other artists is the most human thing AI can do. 
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My title is Senior Features Writer, which is a license to write about absolutely anything if I can connect it to technology (I can). I’ve been at PCMag since 2011 and have covered the surveillance state, vaccination cards, ghost guns, voting, ISIS, art, fashion, film, design, gender bias, and more. You might have seen me on TV talking about these topics or heard me on your commute home on the radio or a podcast. Or maybe you’ve just seen my Bernie meme. 
I strive to explain topics that you might come across in the news but not fully understand, such as NFTs and meme stocks. I’ve had the pleasure of talking tech with Jeff Goldblum, Ang Lee, and other celebrities who have brought a different perspective to it. I put great care into writing gift guides and am always touched by the notes I get from people who’ve used them to choose presents that have been well-received. Though I love that I get to write about the tech industry every day, it’s touched by gender, racial, and socioeconomic inequality and I try to bring these topics to light. 
Outside of PCMag, I write fiction, poetry, humor, and essays on culture.
Read Chandra’s full bio
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