You can't believe your eyes

Is she real?

 Today I had breakfast with a friend who is also a photographer. We bemoaned the state of Photography.

This has happened before. If you are old enough you remember when film went by the way of the dinosaur. 

Then came "cell phone cameras".

There were other minor revolutions (that's an oxymoron) but those were some of the biggies.

Now you can guess what the next revolution is. I'm sure you can.

We are in the middle of it now. When you see an ad anywhere and there is a person you wonder, "is that person real?" Is that dog real? How did they get that dog to interact with that cat? How did that baby do that? 

It is easier and cheaper to have an AI generate an image. No studio. No lights. Not photographer. None of your time, or much less of to be sure. And you can create images that are on the edge of believeablity.

These new videos that look real, but are not. I was once very much into pouring epoxy. I loved it! But I couldn't sell it and it was too expensive to generate and give away. Online there are many videos of people pouring epoxy. Many are fake. If people tried to do what is in the video it will likely result in expensive mistakes and perhaps damage since epoxy cure is exothermic (it generates heat) and you might cause a fire. The more you pour (the bigger the mass) the more heat, but these videos show people pouring gigantic tables in one pour. To dissipate heat you have to do multiple pours and sand in between each.

But the real problem is that you now cannot believe your own eyes.

If you hear or see something you have no idea if it is real or if it is generated by a computer. Voices, images, inflection, reaction, all are getting better and better. So now you have to discern based upon something outside of what you see and hear.

A well known person looking at a supposed camera and telling us fantastic things. Is this real? Is this truth? How are we supposed to know?

What examples of this new phenomena can you tell us about that you have experienced?

I bet you have much better examples that poured epoxy.

It reminds me of the old saying, "You can't believe what you see and only half of what you say".