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Photos are everywhere. What makes a good one?

<div class="theconversation-article-body"><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/t-j-thomson-503845">T.J. Thomson</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/rmit-university-1063">RMIT University</a></em></p> <p>We upload some <a href="https://theconversation.com/3-2-billion-images-and-720-000-hours-of-video-are-shared-online-daily-can-you-sort-real-from-fake-148630">3 billion images online each day</a>. We make <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1051144X.2023.2281163">most of these photos on smartphones</a> and use these devices to document everything from gym progress and our loved ones to a memorable meal.</p> <p>But what makes a “quality” photo? Many people, even those who make images for work, struggle to answer. They often say something along the lines of “I know it when I see it”. But knowing some dimensions of a quality photograph can help make your images stand out and make you a <a href="https://medialiteracy.org.au/media-literacy-framework/">more literate</a> media maker and consumer.</p> <p>Quality can be relative, but knowing the various dimensions at play can help you draw on those that are most relevant for your particular audience, context and purpose.</p> <p>I identified <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/14648849241253136">six dimensions</a> which will impact the quality of photographs. Here’s what I learnt – and what you can apply to your own photographs.</p> <h2>1. Production and presentation</h2> <p>Think of the factors <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1522637918823261">in front of and behind the lens</a>.</p> <p>If you know you’re being recorded, this can affect your behaviour compared to a candid depiction.</p> <p>You might be more or less comfortable posing for a friend or family member than for a stranger. This comfort, or its lack, can lead to more stiff and awkward poses, or ones that look more natural and confident.</p> <p>Presentation circumstances, like the viewing size and context, also matter.</p> <p>A group shot can make a nice statement piece above a fireplace, but it wouldn’t have the same effect as a profile photo. Be aware of how “busy” your image is, and whether the viewing conditions are well-suited for the nature of your photo.</p> <p>Images with lots of elements, fine textures or other details need to be viewed large to be fully appreciated. Images with fewer, larger and simpler elements can usually be appreciated at smaller sizes.</p> <h2>2. Technical aspects</h2> <p>Technical aspects include proper exposure – meaning the image isn’t too dark or too bright – adequate focus, and appropriate camera settings.</p> <p>Some of these camera settings, like shutter speed, affect whether motion is seen as frozen or blurred.</p> <p>If the image is too blurry, too pixelated, or too light or dark, these technical aspects will negatively impact the photograph’s quality. But some motion blur, as distinct from camera shake, can make more dynamic an otherwise static composition.</p> <h2>3. Who or what is shown</h2> <p>Who or what is shown in the photographs we see is affected, in part, by access and novelty. That’s why we often make more photos during our holidays compared to documenting familiar settings.</p> <p>Some people or locations can be <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1329878X221094374">under-represented</a> and photographing them can lead to more visibility, and, depending on the context, a more empowering framing.</p> <p>Consider in your photography if you’re including people who are typically under-represented, such as older individuals, people of colour, people living with disabilities and queer people. Also consider whether you’re representing them in stereotypical or disempowering ways.</p> <p>As examples, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/22041451.2022.2137237">when photographing older people</a>, consider whether you’re showing them as lonely, isolated, passive, or in need of mobility aids.</p> <h2>4. Composition</h2> <p>Composition includes positioning of elements in the frame, the balance between positive and negative space, and depth, among others.</p> <p>Generally, images that centre the subject of interest aren’t as visually engaging as images that offset the subject of interest. This is what’s known as the <a href="https://www.adobe.com/au/creativecloud/photography/discover/rule-of-thirds.html">rule-of-thirds</a> approach.</p> <p>Likewise, images that have no depth are generally not as interesting as images with a clear foreground, midground and background. “Seeing through things” with your compositions can help increase the visual depth of your photos alongside their visual appeal.</p> <h2>5. The psycho-physiological</h2> <p>The psycho-physiological concerns how the viewer reacts to what is shown.</p> <p>This includes the <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2011-07236-024">biological reaction</a> we have to seeing certain colours, for example the way the colour red can increase our heart rate. It also can include the feeling we have when seeing a photo of someone we know.</p> <p>The most powerful photos use colour and other elements of visual language strategically for a specific effect. Looking at these images might evoke a specific emotion, such as empathy or fear, and influence how the viewer responds.</p> <h2>6. Narrative</h2> <p>Narrative concerns the storytelling quality of the image.</p> <p>Images can show something in a literal way (think a photograph from a real estate listing) or they can tell a bigger story about the content represented or about the human condition (think about some of the iconic photos that emerged during Australia’s <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1329878X211008181">black summer bushfire season</a>).</p> <p>Literal photos help us see what something or someone looks like but they might not have as much of an impact as iconic photos. For example, the well-known photo of three-year-old Syrian boy Aylan Kurdi’s lifeless body on a beach in Turkey <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN14V2MG/">boosted fundraising for refugees</a> 100-fold.</p> <h2>A more thoughtful process</h2> <p>Next time you pull out your smartphone to make an image, don’t just “<a href="https://www.digitalphotomentor.com/do-you-wait-for-the-decisive-moment-or-do-you-spray-and-pray/">spray and pray</a>”. Try to pre-visualise the story you want to tell and wait for the elements to line up into place.</p> <p>Being aware of aesthetic and ethical considerations alongisde technical ones and emotional resonance can all help engage viewers and lead to more standout imagery.</p> <p>To challenge yourself further, consider taking your phone off full-auto mode and play with camera settings to see how they impact the resulting photos.<!-- Below is The Conversation's page counter tag. Please DO NOT REMOVE. --><img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/229011/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /><!-- End of code. If you don't see any code above, please get new code from the Advanced tab after you click the republish button. The page counter does not collect any personal data. More info: https://theconversation.com/republishing-guidelines --></p> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/t-j-thomson-503845">T.J. Thomson</a>, Senior Lecturer in Visual Communication &amp; Digital Media, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/rmit-university-1063">RMIT University</a></em></p> <p><em>Image credits: Shutterstock</em></p> <p><em>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/photos-are-everywhere-what-makes-a-good-one-229011">original article</a>.</em></p> </div>

Technology

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“There were bodies everywhere”: Five people dead in horror pub crash

<p dir="ltr">Disturbing details have emerged from a horror crash where five people have died after a BMW crashed into a beer garden at a pub in regional Victoria. </p> <p dir="ltr">On Sunday evening in Daylesford, north of Melbourne, families were enjoying the last of the weekend at the Royal Hotel when a BMW X5 crashed into the busy venue. </p> <p dir="ltr">The pub was filled with hundreds of patrons in the hours before the crash due to the unofficial long weekend before Tuesday’s Melbourne Cup public holiday in Victoria. </p> <p dir="ltr">Superintendent John Fitzpatrick confirmed on Sunday night about 11pm four people had died at the scene: two men and a woman and a six-year-old boy, while a fifth person, a teenage girl, later died in hospital. </p> <p dir="ltr">Four others were injured, while a boy is fighting for his life in hospital. </p> <p dir="ltr">“I haven’t seen anything this drastic for a long time,” he said.</p> <p dir="ltr">“Any time you have five people die at a particular scene, it’s horrible.”</p> <p dir="ltr">“There are families that have got loved ones that are no longer going to be around.”</p> <p dir="ltr">“We don’t like to see anyone lose their life but to see a child – you don’t ever want to see anything like that.”</p> <p dir="ltr">The driver of the BMW, a 66-year-old man, was taken to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.</p> <p dir="ltr">"The exact circumstances surrounding the collision are yet to be determined and investigations remain ongoing," Superintendent Fitzpatrick said.</p> <p dir="ltr">“We are waiting to speak to him… It’s a very complex scene.”</p> <p dir="ltr">A woman who was working at the business next door to the pub witnessed the horrific moment, recalling how she and her staff saw bodies lying on the pavement. </p> <p dir="ltr">“We’re all pretty shocked,” she said.</p> <p dir="ltr">“It’s pretty bad, I’ve never seen anything so traumatic in my life.”</p> <p dir="ltr">“There were bodies everywhere, it was horrifying,” she said.</p> <p dir="ltr">“I watched the whole crash. The car went up into the sky. I thought it was just dust. It’s only now I know it was bodies.”</p> <p dir="ltr">Infrastructure Minister Catherine King, whose electorate Ballarat includes Daylesford, said the community was “devastated” by the incident. </p> <p dir="ltr">“Five people have lost their lives, and their families’ lives have changed forever. </p> <p dir="ltr">“It will really have shocked a lot of people, and I think we’re really only just coming to terms with what happened today.”</p> <p dir="ltr">“These sort of terrible accidents, the sort of level of trauma goes on for a long period of time, and people will need a lot of support and care, and the police obviously will need to undertake a significant investigation into what’s happened.”</p> <p dir="ltr"><em>Image credits: Nine News</em></p>

News

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‘Everything Everywhere All at Once’ and other Oscars 2023 films show a trend towards linguistic realism in Hollywood

<p>At the 95th Academy Awards, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/mar/13/daniel-kwan-and-daniel-scheinert-win-best-director-oscar-for-everything-everywhere-all-at-once">Daniel Scheinert and Daniel Kwan’s</a> Everything Everywhere All at Once took home <a href="https://variety.com/2023/awards/awards/everything-everywhere-all-at-once-oscars-record-1235544633/">wins in acting, editing and directing categories, and also won the coveted best picture</a> award.</p> <p>The quirky and expansive sci-fi action film is famed for its absurdist take on the idea of a multiverse, yet it is still grounded in realness and humanity: In one masterfully choreographed scene in Everything Everywhere, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2wID9_FFD0">three languages are spoken by three generations of one chaotic immigrant family</a> over dinner.</p> <p>As a linguist, I am interested in how screenwriters and directors use language in film to <a href="https://books.google.ca/books/about/Multilingualism_in_the_Movies.html?id=hfhclpshb8UC&redir_esc=y">do much more than just convey dialogue</a>: Language and subtitles also provide characterization, establish the tone of a scene and ground fictional stories in reality.</p> <p>Increasing use of non-English languages and subtitles demonstrates both a trend toward linguistic realism in Hollywood and also broader acceptance of linguistic diversity in a globalized society.</p> <p>But filmmakers must negotiate the tension between narrative goals and audience engagement. By <a href="https://www.routledge.com/English-with-an-Accent-Language-Ideology-and-Discrimination-in-the-United/Lippi-Green/p/book/9780415559119">examining different ideologies held by filmmakers and audiences alike</a>, we can also still sometimes find long-standing associations between foreign language and villainy.</p> <h2>Languages breaking through</h2> <p>As South Korean filmmaker <a href="https://www.cjenm.com/en/news/director-bong-joonhos-parasite-wins-the-best-foreign-language-film-at-the-77th-golden-globe-awards/">Bong Joon-ho</a> described in his <a href="https://variety.com/2020/film/awards/south-koreas-parasite-crashes-the-subtitles-barrier-1203488979/">Golden Globes acceptance speech for 2019’s Parasite</a>, when audiences move past the “one-inch tall barrier of subtitles” a richer world of film awaits.</p> <p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0963947013519551">Telling authentic stories</a> in a modern, globalized and multicultural world means fairly portraying the languages spoken and signed all throughout our society. Hence, at times, the need for subtitles.</p> <p>In another scene in Everything Everywhere, spoken language is eschewed altogether: Two rocks converse silently while gazing over a barren canyon, with black and white subtitles appearing on a bright blue sky. This simple yet <a href="https://twitter.com/Refinery29/status/1635118157206794243">emotionally resonant scene</a> was somehow enough to <a href="https://www.refinery29.com/en-gb/everything-everywhere-all-at-once-review">move many viewers to tears</a>.</p> <p>Although <a href="https://ew.com/movies/movie-reviews/tar-cate-blanchett-todd-field-nina-hoss/">Todd Field’s Tár</a> did not clinch any Oscar wins this year, star Cate Blanchett notched multiple <a href="https://www.vogue.com/article/full-winners-list-golden-globes-2023">other acting awards</a> <a href="https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2023/01/awards-insider-critics-choice-awards-2023-winners">for her role</a> as the titular orchestra conductor. In some of the film’s best scenes, the maestro uses only German during orchestra rehearsals and subtitles are dropped completely.</p> <p>Non-Germanophone audiences might not understand the words Blanchett says, but they are instead encouraged to focus on the visual aspects of the character’s communication: her facial expressions, physical tics and tremors and the building tension, both visible and audible, between her ego and everyone around her.</p> <p>The Oscar performance of “Naatu Naatu,” from the Indian <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-64935389">Telugu-language blockbuster</a> <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-64935389">RRR</a>, which received a standing ovation, was evidence that performances can cross language boundaries by leaning into creative elements far beyond words.</p> <h2>Two sides of language representation</h2> <p>The flip side of positive aspects of linguistic representation is that filmmakers, free to use the tool of multilingualism to provide characterization and establish tone, and even to showcase threatened languages, are also free to use it to entrench certain linguistic stereotypes, namely the association between foreignness and villainy.</p> <p>The <a href="https://screenrant.com/black-panther-wakanda-forever-talokan-lore-phase-5-complicated/">warriors of the underwater Talokan kingdom</a> in Ryan Coogler’s Black Panther: Wakanda Forever never speak a word of English. In this Marvel Cinematic Universe story, the fictional kingdom of Atlantis was <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-mesoamerican-influences-behind-namor-from-black-panther-wakanda-forever-180981106">repositioned as a Mesoamerican-inspired society</a>.</p> <p>The <a href="https://globalvoices.org/2023/01/05/indigenous-and-proud-a-maya-speakers-reaction-to-black-panther-wakanda-forever/">language of Talokan is the real-world language of Yucatec Maya</a>, spoken by Indigenous people in present-day <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Yucatec-language">Guatemala, Belize and southern Mexico</a>.</p> <h2>Sharing an Indigenous language</h2> <p>Yucatec Maya is stigmatized and marginalized in the geographic areas where it is traditionally spoken, one of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-mexico-how-erasing-black-history-fuels-anti-black-racism-175315">long-lasting consequences of colonization</a>.</p> <p>But Coogler’s creative decision to use Yucatec Maya as the language of Talokan, as well as to borrow heavily from Mayan and Aztec cultures for <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/black-panther-wakanda-forever-ruth-e-carter-oscar-costume-design-1235349112/">visual inspiration</a>, has delighted some <a href="https://globalvoices.org/2023/01/05/indigenous-and-proud-a-maya-speakers-reaction-to-black-panther-wakanda-forever/">Maya-speaking Indigenous moviegoers</a> who say they saw their culture represented and are happy to see the language widely shared.</p> <p>Two strong minor characters, Namora and Attuma, speak only in Yucatec Maya throughout the entire movie, with English subtitles in an elegant blue script.</p> <h2>Archetypes of antagonism?</h2> <p>Yet, these characters are the primary villains of the story, portrayed as powerful and physically otherworldly. Thus, while the characters are not one-dimensional, their language seems to narratively underscore certain archetypes of antagonism, beyond simply showcasing a real Indigenous language of the world.</p> <p>This is especially noticeable when contrasted with the protagonists, the mostly-anglophone Wakandans. Although the <a href="https://screenrant.com/black-panther-movie-wakanda-language-xhosa-explained">language of Wakanda is the real-world language of Xhosa</a>, spoken in South Africa, in Wakanda Forever, it was mostly relegated to greetings and asides. Instead, the protagonists speak a kind of pan-African accented English. Unlike in James Cameron’s <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/avatar-the-way-of-water-vfx-oscar-2023-1235343383/">Avatar: The Way of Water</a>, viewers are never explicitly told that what the audience hears has been “translated” for us.</p> <h2>Refreshing to see, hear more languages</h2> <p>In Avatar, which took the <a href="https://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/oscars-2023-all-the-kiwis-nominated-at-the-academy-awards-this-year/G7PU6REBKFDRVLTOTUZJ4TEM4A/">Oscar for best visual effects,</a> the protagonists all speak Na'vi, the language of <a href="https://gamerant.com/avatar-creation-human-navi-hybrids-explained/">the species living across</a> the fictional Pandora.</p> <p>Most of the language has been “translated” in the mind of the narrator, Jake Sully. In a neat expositional trick, the main character narrates the beginning of the film and explains that he learned the alien language well enough that it just sounds like English to him.</p> <p>This way, audiences won’t have to read for the entire film, and the heroes (and actors) can speak only English without sacrificing the “realism” of the science-fictional universe.</p> <p>It has been refreshing to see, <a href="https://mashable.com/article/minari-korean-language">in recent years</a>, many productions in film achieve critical and commercial success in the anglophone world despite being in non-English languages and <a href="https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/movies/story/2021-03-04/sound-of-metal-deaf-actors-chelsea-lee-jeremy-lee-stone">using subtitles</a>. There’s much more room for films to highlight both linguistic diversity as well as authentic characterization of characters who speak and sign without resorting to potentially harmful tropes.</p> <p>And I’m sure audiences wouldn’t mind hearing more Na'vi in Avatar 3.</p> <p><em>Image credit: Getty</em></p>

Movies

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Drone delivery is a thing now. But how feasible is having it everywhere, and would we even want it?

<p>In recent years, cafes, supermarkets and online shops have started to trial drone delivery in a handful of locations around the world. More than a <a href="https://builtin.com/drones/drone-delivery-companies" target="_blank" rel="noopener">dozen drone delivery companies</a> are now running such trials.</p> <p>Wing (owned by Google’s parent company Alphabet) announced a partnership with Australian supermarket giant Coles to <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-10-26/qld-supermarket-drone-delivery-available-gold-coast-/101573808" target="_blank" rel="noopener">deliver small items via drone to customers close to a Gold Coast supermarket</a>. Wing is already operating in parts of Canberra and Logan, Queensland.</p> <p>Given the technical success of various trials so far, it is worth exploring whether drone delivery might become mainstream and can actually be scaled up geographically.</p> <p>As you would expect, the answer is “it depends”. There are many issues when considering drones around people, such as safety and infrastructure. For example, a recent <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-09-30/food-delivery-drone-lands-on-power-lines-qld-browns-plains/101489670" target="_blank" rel="noopener">crash of a delivery drone on electricity lines</a> in a suburb of Logan left thousands without power.</p> <p>There is also potential <a href="https://theconversation.com/drones-to-deliver-incessant-buzzing-noise-and-packages-116257" target="_blank" rel="noopener">unwanted noise</a> and visual pollution, and a perceived issue around privacy.</p> <h2>Safety first</h2> <p>Adding potentially dozens of small aircraft to the sky above our homes, workplaces and roads each day is a serious business. As you would hope, currently the operation of commercial drones is a highly regulated undertaking in most countries.</p> <p>In Australia, the Civil Aviation Safety Authority <a href="https://www.casa.gov.au/drones/industry-initiatives/drone-delivery-services" target="_blank" rel="noopener">has strict regulations</a> that aim to make the operation of drones as safe as possible. They also prohibit drone use if the craft can’t be used safely in a given situation.</p> <p>In fact, Australia was one of the first countries to have drone regulations. For example, you cannot fly a drone close to an airport, or directly over people.</p> <p>Commercial operators of drones are acutely aware of this and gain a licence to operate – it is not in anyone’s interest to operate unsafely, and it would be bad for business.</p> <h2>A limited geographic market – for now</h2> <p>To satisfy the requirement of operating drones safely, delivery operators focus on flying drones over unpopulated land, generally very low-density areas, and in particular the urban fringe. These are newer suburbs where drone flight paths can be planned to eliminate or minimise safety issues, such as an unexpected crash.</p> <p>It is no coincidence Wing has been running drone delivery trials in low-density areas of Southeast Queensland, and outer <a href="https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/6009932/wings-delivery-drone-service-gets-the-green-light/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Canberra suburbs</a>. These places are ideal for drone delivery and a great place to continue to develop this business, even if the <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-12-11/wing-resumes-drone-deliveries-after-raven-attacks/100689690" target="_blank" rel="noopener">odd bird attack can disrupt things</a>.</p> <p>But drone delivery in dense parts of major cities? This is very unlikely in the medium term, due to extreme difficulty in safely operating drones in dense suburbs.</p> <p>If you live in an apartment building, where would the delivery take place? On the roof? Maybe, if your building was set up for it. This is where scaling up faces the largest difficulties, and the logistics of running potentially hundreds of drones from a distribution centre become truly challenging.</p> <p>However, if there was a high demand for it, and the right investments were made, it is feasible that drone delivery to dense city areas could be achieved.</p> <p>But just because it might be technically possible, doesn’t mean it will happen. The long-term business case would need to make sense, of course. But there is a more critical issue in the near term – the <a href="https://ethics.org.au/ethics-explainer-social-license-to-operate/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">social licence to operate</a>.</p> <h2>A social licence</h2> <p>A social licence is not an official thing, a government body does not issue one. It is more about whether the general public accepts and supports the new thing.</p> <p>At the end of the day, this social acceptance is what often determines the success or failure of widespread uptake of new technology, such as delivery drones.</p> <p>Take nuclear power, for example. Many countries have nuclear power and the public there seem happy with that. Other countries had a social licence for nuclear power and lost it, such as Japan. In Australia we do not have a social licence for nuclear power, but that does not mean we won’t gain it in the future.</p> <p>A social licence is an ever-evolving construct based on the pros and cons of a technology, all of which is influenced by its perceived value. Most people are now seemingly comfortable to be tracked 24 hours a day by their smartphones, as they believe the benefits outweigh the potential negative impacts.</p> <p>It is likely we already have a solid social licence to use drones to <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/d41591-022-00053-9" target="_blank" rel="noopener">deliver emergency life-saving medicine</a> to people in need. In a potential life-or-death situation like that, it is easy to see that normally the benefits outweigh any risks or inconvenience to others.</p> <p>But delivering a coffee or a tube of toothpaste by drone? I think the social licence for that is up for grabs. At this point in time, it could go either way.</p> <p><strong>This article originally appeared on <a href="https://theconversation.com/drone-delivery-is-a-thing-now-but-how-feasible-is-having-it-everywhere-and-would-we-even-want-it-193301" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Conversation</a>.</strong></p> <p><em>Image: Shutterstock</em></p>

Travel Trouble

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AI art is everywhere right now. Even experts don’t know what it will mean

<p>An art prize at the Colorado State Fair was <a href="https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2022/08/ai-wins-state-fair-art-contest-annoys-humans/">awarded</a> last month to a work that – unbeknown to the judges – was generated by an artificial intelligence (AI) system. </p> <p>Social media have also seen an explosion of weird images generated by AI from text descriptions, such as “the face of a shiba inu blended into the side of a loaf of bread on a kitchen bench, digital art”.</p> <p>Or perhaps “A sea otter in the style of ‘Girl with a Pearl Earring’ by Johannes Vermeer”.</p> <p>You may be wondering what’s going on here. As somebody who researches creative collaborations between humans and AI, I can tell you that behind the headlines and memes a fundamental revolution is under way – with profound social, artistic, economic and technological implications.</p> <h2>How we got here</h2> <p>You could say this revolution began in June 2020, when a company called OpenAI achieved a big breakthrough in AI with the creation of <a href="https://arxiv.org/abs/2005.14165">GPT-3</a>, a system that can process and generate language in much more complex ways than earlier efforts. You can have conversations with it about any topic, ask it to write a research article or a story, summarise text, write a joke, and do almost any imaginable language task.</p> <p>In 2021, some of GPT-3’s developers turned their hand to images. They trained a model on billions of pairs of images and text descriptions, then used it to generate new images from new descriptions. They called this system DALL-E, and in July 2022 they released a much-improved new version, <a href="https://arxiv.org/abs/2204.06125">DALL-E 2</a>.</p> <p>Like GPT-3, DALL-E 2 was a major breakthrough. It can generate highly detailed images from free-form text inputs, including information about style and other abstract concepts.</p> <p>For example, here I asked it to illustrate the phrase “Mind in Bloom” combining the styles of Salvador Dalí, Henri Matisse and Brett Whiteley.</p> <h2>Competitors enter the scene</h2> <p>Since the launch of DALL-E 2, a few competitors have emerged. One is the free-to-use but lower-quality DALL-E Mini (developed independently and now renamed <a href="https://www.craiyon.com/">Craiyon</a>), which was a popular source of meme content.</p> <p>Around the same time, a smaller company called <a href="https://www.midjourney.com/home/#about">Midjourney</a>released a model that more closely matched DALL-E 2’s capabilities. Though still a little less capable than DALL-E 2, Midjourney has lent itself to interesting artistic explorations. It was with Midjourney that Jason Allen generated the artwork that won the Colorado State Art Fair competition. </p> <p>Google too has a text-to-image model, called <a href="https://imagen.research.google/">Imagen</a>, which supposedly produces much better results than DALL-E and others. However, Imagen has not yet been released for wider use so it is difficult to evaluate Google’s claims.</p> <p>In July 2022, OpenAI began to capitalise on the interest in DALL-E, <a href="https://openai.com/blog/dall-e-now-available-in-beta/">announcing</a> that 1 million users would be given access on a pay-to-use basis.</p> <p>However, in August 2022 a new contender arrived: <a href="https://stability.ai/blog/stable-diffusion-public-release">Stable Diffusion</a>. </p> <p>Stable Diffusion not only rivals DALL-E 2 in its capabilities, but more importantly it is open source. Anyone can use, adapt and tweak the code as they like.</p> <p>Already, in the weeks since Stable Diffusion’s release, people have been pushing the code to the limits of what it can do. </p> <p>To take one example: people quickly realised that, because a video is a sequence of images, they could tweak Stable Diffusion’s code to generate video from text.</p> <p>Another fascinating tool built with Stable Diffusion’s code is <a href="https://huggingface.co/spaces/huggingface/diffuse-the-rest">Diffuse the Rest</a>, which lets you draw a simple sketch, provide a text prompt, and generate an image from it. In the video below, I generated a detailed photo of a flower from a very rough sketch.</p> <p>In a more complicated example below, I am starting to build software that lets you draw with your body, then use Stable Diffusion to turn it into a painting or photo.</p> <h2>The end of creativity?</h2> <p>What does it mean that you can generate any sort of visual content, image or video, with a few lines of text and a click of a button? What about when you can generate a movie script with GPT-3 and a movie animation with DALL-E 2? </p> <p>And looking further forward, what will it mean when social media algorithms not only curate content for your feed, but generate it? What about when this trend meets the metaverse in a few years, and virtual reality worlds are generated in real time, just for you? </p> <p>These are all important questions to consider.</p> <p><a href="https://twitter.com/OmniMorpho/status/1564782875072872450">Some speculate</a> that, in the short term, this means human creativity and art are deeply threatened. </p> <p>Perhaps in a world where anyone can generate any images, graphic designers as we know them today will be redundant. However, history shows human creativity finds a way. The electronic synthesiser did not kill music, and photography did not kill painting. Instead, they catalysed new art forms.</p> <p>I believe something similar will happen with AI generation. People are experimenting with including models like Stable Diffusion as a part of their creative process.</p> <p>A new type of artist is even emerging in what some call “promptology”, or “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prompt_engineering">prompt engineering</a>”. The art is not in crafting pixels by hand, but in crafting the words that prompt the computer to generate the image: a kind of AI whispering.</p> <h2>Collaborating with AI</h2> <p>The impacts of AI technologies will be multidimensional: we cannot reduce them to good or bad on a single axis. </p> <p>New artforms will arise, as will new avenues for creative expression. However, I believe there are risks as well.</p> <p>We live in an attention economy that thrives on extracting screen time from users; in an economy where automation drives corporate profit but not necessarily higher wages, and where art is commodified as content; in a social context where it is increasingly hard to distinguish real from fake; in sociotechnical structures that too easily encode biases in the AI models we train. In these circumstances, AI can easily do harm.</p> <p>How can we steer these new AI technologies in a direction that benefits people? I believe one way to do this is to <a href="https://research.rodolfoocampo.com/">design AI</a> that collaborates with, rather than replaces, humans.</p> <p><em>Image credits: Getty Images</em></p> <p><em>This article originally appeared on <a href="https://theconversation.com/ai-art-is-everywhere-right-now-even-experts-dont-know-what-it-will-mean-189800" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Conversation</a>. </em></p>

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This common bathroom practice could send germs flying everywhere

<p>No matter how thorough you are with cleaning your bathroom, there's one common mistake you could be making that regularly fills the space with germs.</p> <p>According to home hacks expert Stephanie Booth, that habit is leaving the toilet lid up when you flush. You’ll probably never do it again once you hear what she has to say about it in a TikTok.</p> <blockquote class="tiktok-embed" style="max-width: 605px; min-width: 325px;" cite="https://www.tiktok.com/@stephanieboothrealtor/video/7118543514652331310" data-video-id="7118543514652331310"> <section><a title="@stephanieboothrealtor" href="https://www.tiktok.com/@stephanieboothrealtor" target="_blank" rel="noopener">@stephanieboothrealtor</a> Who’s still flushing their toilet with the lid open? Close that lid to stop all the nasty bacteria 💩from coming out of your toilet and landing on all your bathroom surfaces <a title="tiptok" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/tiptok" target="_blank" rel="noopener">#tiptok</a> <a title="germs" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/germs" target="_blank" rel="noopener">#germs</a> <a title="hometips" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/hometips" target="_blank" rel="noopener">#hometips</a> <a title="bathroomcleaning" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/bathroomcleaning" target="_blank" rel="noopener">#bathroomcleaning</a> <a title="♬ original sound - Stephanie Booth" href="https://www.tiktok.com/music/original-sound-7118543498755885870" target="_blank" rel="noopener">♬ original sound - Stephanie Booth</a></section> </blockquote> <p>"Flushing with the lid open launches all that nasty bacteria from what you just put into the toilet, into the air. And all that bacteria lands on all the nearby surfaces, including your toothbrush," she said.</p> <p>If you're wondering just how true this claim is, it's been backed up by Australia's favourite scientist Dr Karl Kruszelnicki, explaining why it’s such a gross habit in a video of his own.</p> <blockquote class="tiktok-embed" style="max-width: 605px; min-width: 325px;" cite="https://www.tiktok.com/@drkarl/video/7079283645491547394" data-video-id="7079283645491547394"> <section><a title="@drkarl" href="https://www.tiktok.com/@drkarl" target="_blank" rel="noopener">@drkarl</a> Do you need scientific evidence to make your housemates flush with the toilet lid shut? Here you go 😎 <a title="drkarl" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/drkarl" target="_blank" rel="noopener">#drkarl</a> <a title="drkarlkruszelnicki" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/drkarlkruszelnicki" target="_blank" rel="noopener">#drkarlkruszelnicki</a> <a title="science" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/science" target="_blank" rel="noopener">#science</a> <a title="♬ original sound - Dr Karl" href="https://www.tiktok.com/music/original-sound-7079283621965728513" target="_blank" rel="noopener">♬ original sound - Dr Karl</a></section> </blockquote> <p>"If you flush with the toilet lid up a polluted plume of bacteria and water vapour just erupts out of the flushing toilet bowl," he said.</p> <p>"The polluted water particles, they float around for a few hours around your bathroom before they all eventually land, they will land, and some of them could even land on your toothbrush.</p> <p>Putting the lid down before flushing is even more important if your toilet is right next to the bathroom vanity where your toothbrush holder sits.</p> <p>In addition to putting the toilet lid down before flushing, cleaning the toilet on a weekly basis using disinfectant will also help keep the potential for germs spreading down.</p> <p><em>Image: TikTok</em></p>

Home Hints & Tips

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A real princess: Duchess Kate’s special tea party for cancer patients melts hearts everywhere

<p>It was a scene many young children have imagined- a princess tea party with a real life princess.</p> <p>Duchess Catherine attended an important tea party set up for her at the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital during the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s Royal Tour in Pakistan. </p> <p>The mother of three happily obliged to wear a toy tiara when she visited 7-year-old Wafia Rehmani, while Prince William playfully sipped out of a tiny pink cup “brimming” with hot tea. </p> <p>The young patient, from over the border in Afghanistan, is battling a kidney tumour but hopes to be a doctor when she grows up. </p> <p>Wafia showed the Duke and Duchess her own toy medical kit. </p> <p>Princess Diana visited the same hospital over 20 years ago in 1996 and 1997. </p> <blockquote style="background: #FFF; border: 0; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: 0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width: 540px; min-width: 326px; padding: 0; width: calc(100% - 2px);" class="instagram-media" data-instgrm-permalink="https://www.instagram.com/p/B3tCIhCFRfS/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading" data-instgrm-version="12"> <div style="padding: 16px;"> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; align-items: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;"></div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 100px;"></div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 60px;"></div> </div> </div> <div style="padding: 19% 0;"></div> <div style="display: block; height: 50px; margin: 0 auto 12px; width: 50px;"></div> <div style="padding-top: 8px;"> <div style="color: #3897f0; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 550; line-height: 18px;">View this post on Instagram</div> </div> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none;" rel="noopener" href="https://www.instagram.com/p/B3tCIhCFRfS/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading" target="_blank">A post shared by Kensington Palace (@kensingtonroyal)</a> on Oct 16, 2019 at 8:07pm PDT</p> </div> </blockquote> <p>Earlier in the day, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge visited the Badshahi Mosque inside the Walled City for an interfaith meeting to talk about promoting harmony and community. </p> <p>The royal couple also stopped by the National Cricket Academy in Lahore and both stepped up to the pitch. </p> <p>Prince William even managed to hit the ball for a six. </p> <p>The Duchess of Cambridge also gave her first speech of the tour at SOS Children's Village in Lahore, speaking parts of it in Urdu.</p>

Beauty & Style

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"You'll get them everywhere": Snake catcher's grim warning of Aussie plague this summer

<p>A snake catcher has issued a warning for residents across the country to be aware of their surroundings as the weather gets warmer, as there is a high chance reptiles will emerge to get some sunlight after a long mating season throughout the cold winter.</p> <p>Tony Harrison, a snake catcher from Queensland’s Gold Coast, said that September was the month when reptiles are out searching for a companion to mate with.</p> <p>According to Mr Harrison, snakes emerge from bushlands on warm days and are most prevalent during summer.</p> <p>Speaking to <em><a rel="noopener" href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6125895/Prepare-snakes-season-dont-stupid-catchers-say.html" target="_blank">Daily Mail Australia</a></em>, Mr Harrison said: “You’ll get them everywhere.”</p> <p>He added, “When temperatures drop below 23C, you don’t see a lot of them, they slow right down.</p> <p>“They’re not gone, they’re just not as obvious as they usually are but as soon as weather warms up they’re a lot more active, which is what’s happening right now.”</p> <p>Andrew Melrose of Shire Snake Catchers Engadine in NSW said that the peak time for snakes and reptiles is spring, as that is the season when they breed.</p> <p>Christmas time is also an active period as they look for food, and then in April when they prepare for the colder months.</p> <p>“We do get a bit dry towards July – August – toward spring, after this bit of rain as temperatures start to warm up and they start to think about breeding and mating,” said Mr Melrose.</p> <p>Earlier in the year, a Queensland resident, Aaron Bryant was fatally killed by a snake bite after he tried to remove a baby eastern brown snake from his home.</p> <p>Mr Harrison recommends taking a photo and sending it to a snake catcher for identification before attempting to remove the reptile yourself, as many people often misidentify snakes.</p> <p>“For your average person, it’s hard to tell which one's which,” he said.</p> <p>“If you see a snake don’t go and stir them up, take a photo from a distance.</p> <p>“It’s human nature to go and stir a snake up, what will happen is the snake will defend itself, and that snake could put you in hospital.</p> <p>“A lot of people make mistakes and end up in hospital.”</p> <p>According to data from the Department of Health, Townsville Hospital emergency department has seen 103 patients who suffered from snake bites in the past financial year alone.</p> <p>But despite the large number, Mr Melrose said that a bite was usually a snake’s “last resort".</p> <p>He said that when a snake is in unknown territories such as your home or workplaces, they are not there to bite you as that plan of attack is strictly for defence purposes.</p> <p>“The best advice I give to anyone to avoid a bite if you do see it ... the best thing is just leave it alone – call the experts and don’t try to catch or killing it because the snakes will usually (not be interested in) you.”</p>

Home & Garden

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“I feel unsafe often”: Lisa Wilkinson reveals the simple item she carries everywhere to protect herself

<p>Since the rape and murder of comedian Eurydice Dixon, <em>The Project </em>host Lisa Wilkinson has been vocal about rape culture and the reality of being a woman.</p> <p>Now, the 58-year-old has revealed that she has carried a whistle on her key ring “for years”, in a bid to protect herself from a potential attacker.</p> <p>Speaking to <em><a href="https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/entertainment/sydney-confidential/lisa-wilkinson-reveals-she-often-feels-unsafe-and-carries-a-whistle-with-her-everywhere-for-safety/news-story/60584e20edf0d7f291b8bf9dc37861ec?utm_source=Daily%20Telegraph&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;utm_campaign=editorial" target="_blank"><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>Confidential</strong></span></a> </em>at the Logies on Sunday, Wilkinson said: “I feel unsafe often.”</p> <p>“When I was parking at the supermarket the other night, it was 11 o’clock and I was going to park in a spot that was really convenient but it was dark so I went to a spot that was further away with a lot more lighting.</p> <p>“I got out of the car, I had my keys splayed between my fingers and I have a whistle on my key ring.”</p> <p>She said it was important for women to take measures to protect themselves as all it takes is one “madman”.</p> <p>“I’ve had a whistle on my key ring for years,” she said.</p> <p>“I’ve never had to use it but this is all about that one moment when you might be the one that gets picked because every single one of those women whose names we know like Eurydice Dixon – all of those women were chosen at random.</p> <p>“They didn’t do anything wrong but all it takes is a madman to target you and you want to know you have everything in place to defend yourself.”</p> <p>Wilkinson – who has a 20-year-old daughter, Billi – said it was important to pass on these lessons on to the next generation.</p> <p>“It is common sense but the whole point is we need to tell our daughters to be safe,” she said.</p> <p>“We need to look after each other but we also need people to understand what women go through on a daily basis without complaint. We do it just because we are women and the narrative has to change to what do we have to do to make sure that these broken people change their behaviour?</p> <p>“How do we get to them when they are young so that their behaviour doesn’t go in such an evil way?”</p>

News

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Jamie Oliver posts very sweet message to mothers everywhere

<p>Just over a week after Jamie Oliver and wife Jools welcomed their fifth child (a baby boy), the celebrity chef has taken to Instagram to share a special message to mothers everywhere – and one in particular.</p> <p>During a brief moment of peace and quiet, Jamie snapped this sweet photo of mum and bub sleeping side by side and took over Jools’ Instagram page to share the special moment.</p> <p><img width="500" height="500" src="https://oversixtydev.blob.core.windows.net/media/25945/jamieoliver_500x500.jpg" alt="Jamieoliver" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"/></p> <p>“Bless them both sleeping and exhausted together I can't tell you what a wicked mum this chick is,” the chef captioned the cute picture. “I had the best week off readjusting to the new family member a baby boy and I've loved every single minute.”</p> <p>He signed off with an appreciative message for mothers everywhere, writing, “Big love to all the mums out there it's hard graft amazing.”</p> <p>The couple have yet to reveal the boy’s name, but with sisters and a brother named Poppy, Daisy, Petal and Buddy, we bet it’ll be just as unique!</p> <p><strong>Related links:</strong></p> <p><a href="/news/news/2016/08/jamie-oliver-welcomes-fifth-child/"><em><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>Jamie Oliver welcomes fifth child</strong></span></em></a></p> <p><a href="/news/news/2016/08/jamie-olivers-family-take-first-full-family-photo-with-new-baby/"><em><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>Jamie Oliver shows off baby son in new family photos</strong></span></em></a></p> <p><a href="/news/news/2016/08/hugh-grant-reveals-why-he-never-married/"><em><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>Hugh Grant reveals why he never married</strong></span></em></a></p>

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