“Do not follow where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail” — Ralph Waldo Emerson.

This has always been a significant quote that I have held in my mind. It’s popped up in there like popcorn a few times for me to contemplate and meditate upon.

Today it guided me to create this triptych painting with the help of AI.

The Path

It’s calm, pretty, and peaceful. We know where it leads.

I really enjoy working with AI for art. I also like the way that I just worded that. It felt good saying it with the meaning that AI is like a different medium to work with, like clay or paint or AI. To those who haven’t experienced working with it, it seems like cheating, but it’s really just an aid because nothing comes out exactly like you envision it or how you want it. You have to refine both the prompt and then edit the art. Turns out, I enjoy doing both; prompt engineering and photo editing.

Also, I feel like it’s mostly rich people who are against AI for art. It levels the playing field. All of a sudden, if you want to make a short film and have it set on another planet and you need an aerial shot over the planet coming in for a landing, that’s possible for you with AI.

I understand resurrecting the dead with it is a faux paux and stealing someone’s image and likeness to put them in your film or deepfake them in pornography is wrong and unethical. However, it seems like the actors and artists who seem like the biggest pains in the asses feel the most threatened and have been the most outspoken about the technology. They used to feel secure that they earned a lot of money for people so they could have their bad behavior overlooked while thinking to themselves, “who else are they going to get to do what I do.”

The complaining artists don’t like that AI is being trained by and on their works. Even though that’s how everyone learns art. They mimic and copy what they love the most. In Europe, art students stand in the Louvre with their easels and copy the great master’s artworks to learn their style. People go see great actors in the theater or consume their film and television works and learn to say the dialogue with precision exactness to the way their favorite actors deliver the lines.

I guess the problem is misrepresentation of the inspiration and the creation of it.

The following triptych was created by me refining my prompts based on my vision and how it changed based on my collaboration with Gemini AI, which so far is the AI that gives me the best representation of what I envision. The Path and The Bather came out perfect without any photo editing needed. Everybody’s Hunting needed some photo editing for it to be as close to as perfect as it is.

These images are inspired by the painting “The Dream” by Henri Rousseau.

The Bather

This image represents if you veer off the path from the painting above and head into the wilderness on the left side. Then this is the scene that you would stumble upon.

Everybody’s Hunting

This image represents if you veer off the path from the painting above and head into the wilderness on the right side. Then this is the scene that you would stumble upon.

The path is peaceful and we know where it leads. Excitement and danger are constantly close by in the wilderness lurking off the beaten path.