Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) are the hottest topics of the day and has been proven that machines are able to create art - an genre fittingly labeled as the "AI Art Movement".
Emerged from this new digital expression is a famous robot artist named Ai-Da, taken after Ada Lovelace, the first female computer programmer from the mid-1800's. Ai-Da has apparently sold more than £1 million of artworks.
Although the subject of AI creativity has been discussed and written about repeatedly in the recent years, it's worth taking a closer look at what really constitutes creativity and whether AI can replace that completely.
Creativity, by definition from dictionary.com, is the ability to transcend traditional ideas, rules, patterns, relationships, or the like, and to create meaningful new ideas, forms, methods, interpretations, etc.; originality, progressiveness, or imagination.
Through the form of AI machine learning, a computer, such as in the form of a robot, is taught to think in a similar way to how humans do: learning and improving upon past experiences. A robot, like Ai-Da, works by exploring data, identifying patterns, and
involves minimal human intervention.
What makes Ai-Da so compelling is that 'she' is made to resemble a human being clothed in human clothing with realistic appendages that are capable of making gestures and movements, such as holding a pencil or paintbrush, and applying the medium to paper.
Can Machines Be Just as Creative as Humans?
The way each of us experience art is subjective but who is to say that the works of a robot aren't original? After all, their artistic interpretation is the result of their learned memory and behavior.
The bigger question is related to originality and whether two machines that are programmed with exactly the same algorithms ended up creating identical works of art? After all, we wouldn't expect that from two human beings. But does that lessen the value of the art created by machines?
Creative Synergy Between Human and Machines
Machines and robots automatically conjures the notion of efficiency and productivity. So rather than disputing whether which one is superior in terms of creativity, why not work together?
A model of the human-machine collaboration is a tool developed by Ahmed Elgammal, a Professor and Director of the Art and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory at Rutgers University.
Elgammel has created an innovative AI software capable of generating original sketches and paintings. By applying AI, artists can feed images of their own works into the system with training models that learn their style and then used the models to generate fresh artworks based on new inspirations. Virtual reality artists can use the AI to generate digital assets for making videos.
Another powerful application for AI and ML is to help video game artists construct virtual worlds for virtual reality (VR) role-playing types of games. Constructing VR worlds is a grueling and repetitive tasks that requires gaming companies to employ a great number of highly skilled programmers and designers resulting in a high business overhead.
Using its ML capabilities, a company like Promethean AI offers technologies that can make suggestions based on an artist’s prior output and replace the tedious work of virtual construction. By applying AI, video gaming companies can drastically lower their costs and free up their staff to concentrate on the more creative tasks.
Blurring the Lines
While humans will continue to debate on the subject of creativity when comes to machines, it's without question that AI is drastically changing the creative process.
Based on the examples of how AI is contributing to our own artistic endeavors, it will be fascinating to see how it may reshape the art world in fascinating ways.
Will machines be able to match up or even surpass human creativity some day? It remains to be seen.
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