Gallery photos: size limit, and should we allow AI content?

Does anybody know the size limit for uploading images to the gallery?

If you upload an image, at some point in the process on the sidebar you get to see this small info box (it's easy to miss):

So 5MByte.
If you embed images in a post directly (without uploading to the Gallery first) the limit is 2MByte AFAIK.
@Sean can confirm.

Thanks, I'm liiting myself to <120k at the moment,for screen display,that seems to be good enough on my screen anyway.

Yes, I agree; the 5Mb limit is frivolous for most screen displays. While I generally 'need' a little more space than you do, I can still make do with approx. 10% of the Gallery upload limit (i.e. 0.5Mbyte) for a typical image.

The size limit is sort of irrelevant if you’re uploading AI generated slop that will be removed.

@0x001688936CA08 that's a different matter; we're presently debating how we'll approach the sharing of AI imagery on Photrio.

AI generated imagery can be quite fascinating

gbroadbridge said:

AI generated imagery can be quite fascinating

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I agree and to me, it is a valuable outlet for real creativity.

0x001688936CA08 said:

The size limit is sort of irrelevant if you’re uploading AI generated slop that will be removed.

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let the images speak for themselves.

RalphLambrecht said:

I agree and to me, it is a valuable outlet for real creativity.

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This is a sentiment that we definitely have taken note of. At the same time, we acknowledge that many people participating in this forum would rather exclude AI-generated content from it altogether. As said, we're discussing how to deal with this issue and the contrasting views it involves.

In the meantime, I'll change the thread title so it encompasses this topic; I think there's a lot more people who would want to have a say on it, so perhaps we should put some focus on it.

A separate tag is an obvious requirement so those who wish to not see it at all can choose to exclude it.

RalphLambrecht said:

let the images speak for themselves.

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Absolutely!
Tags are for the ignorant.

In discussing this, I'd like to kindly but firmly ask you all to be respectful of each other's preferences, also (especially) if they're different from your own. Let's assume that others aren't 'ignorant' and that not all AI content is automatically 'slop'.

We understand that people may feel very strongly about this matter; please assume that this is clear to all involved and that there's no need to use derogatory terms in relation to opposing views to emphasize how strongly you feel about it yourself.

At the basic level I see it as:

A human "takes" a photo (analog or digital)
A human then uses a variety of tools to process the taken image (analog, digitally, even tools incorporating ai tech)

key words- human, taken, edited

Is an ai prompt: "make a photorealistic image of a crying child at a state fair who dropped their ice cream, it should be shot using 35mm kodak gold 100 and look like an old print from the 1970s" remotely the same thing as taking a photo?

That is what I did here, took about a minute:



So what benefit does this have to a photography community? Why does a prompt generated 100% ai photo have anything to do with human taken photography? "But a human prompted it", well, I could write an automated script that generates clever photo prompts 10 times a minute and auto-uploads it to Photrio until all the disk is used up.

It is an interesting debate. I see ai as a tool for editing purposes as this is nearly unavoidable now, but a 100% artificial generated image? How is this "Photography"?

AI image generation is not a photographic process. If you allow it, you should allow painting, drawing and CGI too which do at least require some skills relevant to image generation. It's also not like those wanting to see AI generated images are lacking in places to see them, but does this really need to be one of those places?

"How is this photography?"

Hmmm. Well, Sean, as the originator of this image, used a keyboard and his imagination to cause its creation.

He used no camera, lens, film, and no light or sensor to generate it.

Moreover, the "subject" and composition exists only as a keyboarded description.

It sprang wholly from what is, au fond and in fact, program code.

A bridge too far. IMHO.

Sean said:

I could write an automated script that generates clever photo prompts 10 times a minute and auto-uploads it to Photrio until all the disk is used up.

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I think we need to separate out the practical concern of disk space from the desirability of having AI-generated content as part of the scope of discussion on Photrio. I think the latter is what we should be discussing here; the former is more of a condition we need to meet if we decide to give computer-generated imagery a home here. I agree we need to prevent essentially DDoS-ing the forum by flooding it with AI-genarated content. Note btw that it doesn't take AI-generated imagery to do this and so far it hasn't been a problem, which in my mind emphasizes we should treat that as a distinct problem (and one presently of lesser relevance IMO).

Much more pressing I find the question whether AI-generated content should be considered as part of 'photography' within the scope of this forum. It evidently doesn't involved light hitting a light-sensitive surface. Then again, it does potentially (and sometimes realistically) involve decisions about e.g composition, storytelling etc. as you've illustrated in your image above. I think it could be relevant to discuss that image if the discussion focuses on something like "does this really present the Gold 200 look, and how would we define that look in the first place?" On the other hand, if the question is "does this AI-gen image effectively convey the sense of vacationing on the south coast of Italy", I feel there's a larger distance between that and our present forum focus.

Please note that inherently, we already cater to digital photography and digital editing, and in my mind, adding AI in some form is a logical step. I can imagine we limit the scope within the vast AI arena, as opposed to drawing a border around "AI" as such and keeping it all out of the door. There may be a subset of AI (see example above) that may be relevant to discuss here. Which in my view brings the question how that subset might be defined.

Another issue that comes to mind is that we historically also allow (and welcome, encourage) discussion on processes like chemigrams that may not strictly be photographic either. I don't recall very heated debates on whether that sort of thing is permissible on Photrio. Then why is AI so much more debatable? I assume this is because some of us fear that the AI stuff will somehow replace or flood the classical photography (chemical or digital) that we have discussed so far. If that's the fear, then I wonder if it's such a valid argument to keep it out of the door, since I think there are perfectly effective ways to prevent it from happening. Our website is not really a zero-sum game where we have to choose between either one option, or the other. I think we can potentially have both - if that's what we want.

I'd also like to observe that asking this question of the community as it is now will likely involve a strong bias against anything AI-generated. That may be OK, but I do wonder if that paints us into a corner in relation to a potential audience out there who intend to not draw a firm line between AI and 'real' photography.

No to AI.
Photography has been "Drawing with Light" for 186 years. Don't mess it up now.

Alan Johnson said:

Photography has been "Drawing with Light" for 186 years.

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Chemigrams have been discussed here many times. Nobody every made a problem of it. Not saying you're wrong, but I'd like to better understand why AI is a problem if we were previously OK with a vague definition of photography as a basis for this forum's scope.
Also, in what way do you feel things might get messed up if AI content gets its own place on Photrio?

There may be a subset of AI (see example above) that may be relevant to discuss here.

Yep. E.g., the "patching" of a mssing detail or texture using an AI tool within Photoshop, et al, in a digital (or digitized film) image; eliminating "noise" or adding grain...

Oy vey iz mir! Ample opportunities for Talmudic quibbling, hair-splitting here, or, God forbid, the creation of Committees of Authenticity or Purity ...

koraks said:

Also, in what way do you feel things might get messed up if AI content gets its own place on Photrio?

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Some of us will stop paying a subscription.

Alan Johnson said:

Some of us will stop paying a subscription.

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Others will buy one …

RalphLambrecht said:

let the images speak for themselves.

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You could create a social group for AI art: https://www.photrio.com/forum/groups/
There are some plans to renovate that part of the site in the near future and make it more functional.

koraks said:

Also, in what way do you feel things might get messed up if AI content gets its own place on Photrio?

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If generated imagery or the discussion of it becomes unavoidable then I'd stop participating and subscribing. If it reaches the point there generated posts and responses start turning up in search for info I'd normally see on here, I'd end up just ignoring the links.
In fairness, I've seen no digital photography content in my use of the site so far, after opting out of it, so it's possible that generated content could be just easily avoidede too. I've objection to digital photography in the way that I do for generative imagery, I'm not going to storm off if I see a digital print, it's just not for me.
Generative imagery is a different beast though. I consider that to be stealing hundreds (if not thousands) of years of human artistic endeavour to render a huge swathe of artistic careers worthless, and that's without even beginning to consider the environmental impact.
It's not that it's just "Not for me", I consider "generative AI" imagery to be economically, socially, and ecologically destructive, and it's just not something I shrug and move on from.

@tcolgate thanks for your thoughtful response and giving insight into your reasoning behind this. I assume that @Alan Johnson feels similarly about this; perhaps he can confirm.

I think what you said about digital photography resonates with how I see it - as long as people who object against this can navigate around it, I don't really see what harm it would do if we give it a place. I can see how it would concern people if it would somehow suppress or swamp other content or discussion. However, with digital, we haven't seen that happen so far, even though it creeps in on analog discussions from time to time - but so far that seems to be largely be accepted (think of digitizing film with a DSLR, performance of lenses on analog vs. digital cameras etc.) and/or we can effectively separate the two sufficiently to keep people on board. In my mind, if (it's an IF!) we allow AI in some way, the ground rule would be the same - that it cannot replace/displace/kill the existing spirit of Photrio which is rooted in conventional photography.