Can we be against progress? And what we are meaning by progress? Are our human goal of better life is synonymous of progress? Is materialism and technical evolution the only progress we are renowning as legitimate?
There is so many questioning involving the very nature of what we call “progress” and its intended goal into our human universe that it is almost impossible to get a straight answer that will satisfy even our lowest expectation. Yes, we have evolute since the fragile dawn of the humanity from a very frail and dispersed animal specie up to its outstanding materialist achievement but its philosophical meaning of life has still to be explore for most of us. Even our religious convictions have not prepared us to these technical revolutions. Competitions between us and wars of any kinds are still fondamental issues to be addressed for our survival.
And now there is this question about the so-call Artificial Intelligence (AI) which is simply in a way the technical extension of our own intellectual evolution. And this very extension of our intelligence might surely survive to our biological envelopes and assume ultimately our part of eternity (or at least for a longer period of time). And, let's face it, this very progress wont be stopped whatsoever we will try to do against it.
In photography, these advancements are not new in any ways. For example, the automatic exposure metering systems have simplified the photographer interpretation of light intensity for a specific scene in its translation on the photographic recording material. Nobody surely wants to go back into a painful learning curve to be able to get reliable picture rendering. Automated systems have become more and more sophisticated in their ability to select a subject category and apply the good parametric formula.
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Subjects interpretations. What is more recent in automated photometric interpretation is subject reconnaissance. It means that the photographer can simply choose or pick the subject, follow it and the camera will select the best configuration that will suit it. To do this with reliably, the internal camera processing computer have at its disposal thousands of comparative algorithms based on past memorized pictures taken by photographers. The more these memorized data are accurate, the more the automation will set efficiently the photographic device. At that point the human intervention is limited to the subject selection, its composition and the moment of taking the picture although it could be also retro sequential to better select afterword the final decisive moment we want to privilege.
Special & Art Effects. Special effects in photography may be compared to painters techniques in a more sophisticated and automated way. Mastering special effects is now far more easier because the electronic viewfinders (EVF) and the live view monitors can illustrate them right before and during the picture taking moment. That way it facilites the photographer task to get a better composition and to choose the "decisive" moment to record it. Some art effects are more pronounced, others are less intrusive. It is up the photographer to experiment them and fine tune their picture interpretation degree level. You cannot disregard the pertinence of using special effects in photography. We have to judge the pictures that are integrating them the same way as more traditional ones for impact and creativity.
(Post)Editing & Enhancement. This is another difficult debate among photographers and critics of their works. Computer image editing can be compared to the past photo lab finishing and printing with or without retouching. Nobody during the long analog-film era have contested the veracity or the authentic of a fine prints done by the renown photographer Ansel Adams because it reflects the interpretation of the master, just to mention this example from others. Creativity is often the way that the author have chosen to represent his/her subject. At this point of the endless debate about straight photography versus its manipulated representation, we must admit that both positions can be argued, never to be reunited but always be part of our iconographic universe.
The human interventions.When we speak about the Artificial Intelligence as a replacement or substitute of its biological counterpart, we often omit that AI is also the extension of the human mind because of its obvious technical origin and all the basic algorithm that compose it. Yes, AI is a learning electronic device that deduce and create practical solutions that can be or not proposed and applied mechanically. It is our modern electronic Frankenstein which is still very difficult to precisely define for its future potential and impact into our human life. Trying to stop or ignore this particular evolution won't work because of the human competitive nature. Adaptation is may be the key word when we are facing this kind of mutation.
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Now if we accept that artificial intelligence (AI) can generate a legitimate visual representation, we may ask ourselves if these pictures are an expression of iconic creativity of their own without any biological human intervention. Is it technically possible? Is it ethically acceptable? At the first question, we can answer that surely it will be possible in a near future. At the second question, have we any other choice to totally integrated AI photography as a cultural phenomena of our society. In one word it is better to face it then ignore it and be gradually marginalized from a world of progress and advancements. The challenge is already there!
Photos-illustrations Daniel M
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