At Tye Morris Photo we are artists first and foremost. We create primarily in the photographic and multimedia mediums under the business name of Tye Morris Photo, however we also have a decades long background in music, theater, writing, and other forms of visual and performance art. We are driven to create in our personal lives when we're not creating for our customers in our business lives.

This need to create, to express ourselves in innovative ways, is nothing short of a primal compulsion on the best of days and a borderline obsession on our worst days. It is so deeply compelling for us that we sometimes find ourselves wholly consumed by the pursuit of it.

I myself have been a creator, collector, and aficionado of art in many forms and mediums since I was a child. I was exposed to music and visual arts at a very early age by parents who saw the wisdom in a fully rounded education which included the arts, creative writing, and rhetorical studies as well as the sciences. They made sure I studied a musical instrument by enrolling me in piano and violin lessons, and I still play the piano and other instruments to this day. I was also exposed at an early age to the classical arts, painters and composers, where I developed an early love for the impressionist and early surrealist painters, as well as for Bach, Beethoven, Shostakovich, and Debussy among others. These studies eventually led to a study in contemporary art and photography in high school and throughout my early adulthood. Since that time I have worked as an actor, a voice actor, a musician, and photographer. While my focus for the last decade has been largely on photography, this background and education has come full circle in my life as I am now a web application software developer at my day job as well as the owner and operator here at Tye Morris Photo. Four decades steeped in the arts continues to inform my photography and fine art to this day, and it has given me a vehicle for self-expression that I would otherwise not have had.

Throughout my adult life I have been and continue to be a strong advocate and evangelist for lifelong continuing public education in the arts, not just as as a complimentary path to technical studies starting in the K through 12 system and beyond, but as a critical form of self-care and mental hygiene. The creative act helps us make sense of our individual and subjective experience with life and how that individual and subjective life relates to and identifies with the lives of others. It helps us order what can sometimes be disordered, enhances our cognitive abilities, flexes our creative thinking muscles, promotes neuroplasticity, builds and refreshes our neural networks, promotes healthy communication, helps us develop and cultivate empathy (and humility when we allow it to), relieves stress, promotes healthy neurotransmitter production, and the list of positive benefits goes on and on. Entire textbooks have literally been written full of supporting data.

Despite the volumes and volumes of documented proof of the myriad positive physical and mental health benefits, education in the arts is in crisis here and the US and throughout the world. Along with the rapidly vanishing support for arts education we find ourselves at a crossroads in time where the technical tools for creating what can be loosely defined as art have become so vastly advanced that at the extreme end of the technical spectrum one need not even have engaged in a single hour of study or practice in order to create a piece of generative "art."

This generative art is created by Large Language Models (LLMs). In non-techie speak: LLMs are, at their most simplistic definitions, computer programs which use complex computational models to learn, model, and generate natural human communication. The most complex and advanced of these LLMs are artificial neural networks. You have, no doubt, heard of several of these LLMs at the time of this writing in late 2024; it’s almost impossible at this point to avoid the news surrounding the latest version of ChatGPT and Midjourney, and if you work in my industry you likely make use of tools such as Github CoPilot to aid in solving complex debugging and code problems.

As an IT professional of twenty years, AI and LLMs have become unavoidable; the cat is out of the bag and we now live in a world which includes AI involvement in our daily lives. AI in and of itself is not inherently bad. I myself have used it to shorten development timelines at my day job as an assistant in problem solving and to copy-edit long or complex communications. AI has already given us answers to medical problems which would have likely taken us a decade or more to resolve without it.

As someone who’s been steeped in technology for the entirety of his adult life I would be dishonest were I unable to admit I could not see where AI can become a powerful tool for good. By that same token, I would be guilty of misleading you were I not to point out the extremely likely potential for its misuse.

We have, unfortunately, seen employment opportunities for creators being substituted for “AI art.” At the time of this writing, AI has already been used to downsize and remove the human element from certain industries for nothing more than the desire to increase corporate profits. Tools like Dall-E and Midjourney, among others, which scour the internet for publicly viewable images which it then “learns” from and then regurgitates elements of, often including not-so-subtle references back to, or queues from, or other elements directly from the source material, to create new pieces of imagery. All that’s required is a language prompt. At the time of this writing, already these tools are being used to eliminate the human element in the illustrative world.

As a visual artist, digital illustrator, and photographer I have over the last year maintained a paid subscription to Midjourney and a couple of other “generative art” LLMs in order to stay current with the industry, educated on the current state of generative imagery, and also to occasionally generate elements for YouTube thumbnails on my electronic music channel. In experimenting with these tools, I can testify as an artist who would normally require years of learning and training to create these kinds of art from scratch, it no longer requires any sort of dedication or talent other than the patience to iterate through language prompts to create entire works of generative “art.”

These tools are unable to generate images on their own; they require existing imagery to “learn” from. The images these tools create have been, for the overwhelming most part, generated using existing art and images for which their respective creators have not been compensated in any way. Let me rephrase that for additional clarity: these LLMs have been, by and large, “learning” from, and in most cases stealing from, existing works of art without paying the original creators and without licensing any kind. Nearly without exception, the overwhelming majority of AI generated imagery relies on the uncompensated work of real human artists (one notable exception: according to statements by Adobe, Adobe Firefly and other Adobe AI image generators make exclusive use of Adobe Stock images, for which the original creators are compensated, and from public domain content who’s copyrights have expired).

For the time being, AI generated imagery is not protected by copyright law in the United States. What worries me as an artist is that this could change, given the predictable propensity of the US government to give deference to big business and short term profits over the needs of the people. Sad experience has taught us that, when given a direct choice between the two, the US government will nearly always side with short-term profits and the greed of the wealthy, to the detriment of small business owners and work-a-day taxpayers. Unfortunately, State and Federal governments here in the US have, at the time of this writing, declined to take significant action with regards to any form of legal regulation of AI.

On top of all this, there are still major unanswered questions regarding how do deal with blatantly unethical and dishonest uses of AI generated imagery, audio, and video. We have seen first hand direct examples of AI being misused to create believable fabrications and fictions which can then be maliciously used after the fact. Unfortunately, until the time comes when we demand our elected representatives take direct and specific action to update outdated laws to take into account AI fabrications and hoaxes, we will very likely see the occurrence of their use increase.

At Tye Morris Photo, we know from direct experience that perfecting a craft or an art takes years, decades, or even a lifetime of dedicated pursuit, education, learning, and practice. We firmly believe creators should receive fair compensation for their years of dedication, development, practice, and education.

We also believe that when you use AI to create “art” an artist would have otherwise created, you’re taking more than just their livelihood; you’re potentially robbing future generations of the opportunity to be exposed to the overwhelmingly positive side effects and health benefits of participating in a creative pursuit. The sad fact is we live in a society and economic system which places near-deific significance and reverence on the profit motive, where, if the potential to earn a living or profit from creative acts is diminished or removed, those who control our public and private education systems will place less and less importance on an artistic education. It’s been slowly happening for years as the arts have been commodified and reduced to side-hustles and gas money hobbies instead of valid careers, and with the advent of AI we fear this will only accelerate.

We do believe that AI can be used ethically and responsibly, however we do not see image generation or fabrication as replacement for human creativity as ethical and responsible use and we adamantly oppose its use as such.

It is for this reason that we at Tye Morris Photo we have decided to draw a line in the sand here: when AI is used to reduce the time it takes to complete a menial task that a human being would still be working on, AI becomes a valuable assistant and partner (debugging code, meta-analyses, data compilation and charting, or copy-editing, reducing turnaround for complex problem solving, are some examples); but when AI is used to eliminate human creative jobs, to downsize workforces in the name of corporate profits, or to create works of content for free which have used the work of human creators without compensation/licensing, or when an AI program now does a job formerly belonging to a creative human being with a family to feed that we take severe issue with the use of AI. This is where we as artists must make our stand.

We have heard many opinions differing from or contradictory to ours, some of whom argue that this step into AI is nothing more than an expected technical advancement similar to the advent of digital photography. These opinions are woefully misinformed and more often than not lack the knowledge and experience with one or both sides of their comparisons requisite to forming an informed and valid opinion. To reference the technological advancement similar to digital photography argument, take it from someone who started as a visual arts and photography creative before most big business could even dream of affording the available digital imaging technology of the time (when I was first paid for a piece of photography, digital cameras available to the general public were still a pipe dream), who is also very likely more educated on the inner workings of LLMs than all but the actual engineers creating and improving them, that this advancement is a far greater leap than the jump from film to digital. It’s far more of a leap than what Adobe Photoshop originally brought. These technological advancements in art are insignificant stumbles compared to the dramatic leap forward that AI has introduced.

If I can be forgiven a slight bit of melodrama: I don’t believe it would be incorrect or inappropriate to state the rate at which AI has developed in the last two to three years alone is a leap far greater in advancement, importance, and significance than all of the computational advancements humanity has achieved to date combined. We likely won’t look back to the invention of the microprocessor as a significant event in history (without Googling it, can you even tell me when it was invented, where and by whom? I didn’t think so…), but we will reference the advent of AI for generations to come because it will eventually be seen as an inflection point for all of humanity. I feel confident in making the prediction that the leap to AI will only be eclipsed in importance and significance by the eventual leap to quantum computing. I also am confident in stating that we will not fully feel the complete ramifications of our unconditional embrace of AI for at least a generation. Our children and their children will have to live with the consequences of our actions.

Artificial Intelligence is here to stay. Pandora's Box has been opened and it cannot be shut again, therefore it us up to us as artists to help define what constitutes the ethical use of AI for artistic creation.

At Tye Morris Photo we consider the creative act to be a feature of the Human condition. We believe and stand by the idea that Art is created by sentient beings with individual and subjective experiences obtained and collected over the course of living a life. While it may be possible to create generative images which some may deem to be “art” with Artificial Intelligence, we do not recognize AI art as art having the same intrinsic worth as art generated by an individual who’s art incorporates influences, feelings, experiences, desires, pains, joys, and sorrows derived from living an individual subjective experience with life, all factors that AI cannot at this time experience, account for, nor learn from.

As such, we do not engage in “AI art” at Tye Morris Photo, and we do not consider the use of “generative AI art” for profit, be it visual or audio, to be an ethical use of AI.

While we do make use of some pieces of software which include options making use of “Artificial Intelligence” (for example, we make extensive use of Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Lightroom and a program which helps us apply our signature photographic style and edits in a more timely manner), we commit and pledge to never misuse AI or use AI in any way which may at any future point in time cause our integrity or artistic abilities to be called into question. We also pledge to only make use of AI to accomplish and shorten the timeline of tasks which we normally would have done manually (i.e., blemish/object removal).

We also commit that we will not under any circumstances use AI to generate any delivered product, in part or in whole, or generate new elements or add elements of any kind to any photographic piece which a customer has paid us to create. We also commit that we will never under any circumstances, with or without the use of AI, fundamentally alter the location, setting, or circumstances of a photo shoot in any way shape or form (i.e. we will not fulfill any requests similar to “put me on the beach”, “put me at the Taj Majal”, “photoshop me at [LOCATION]”, “I have beef with this person, remove them from my wedding party”, “replace the sky with something more attractive,” “improve the weather” ).

As we occasionally engage in documentary and journalistic endeavors, we also unequivocally pledge that AI and other generative tools will never be employed by us in any work purported or implied by us to be “documentary work” or works of photojournalism, even should such things become part of the accepted norm in the future. We further pledge that any editing of our documentary or photojournalistic works will be strictly limited to minor stylistic changes such as color correction/color grading.

We respectfully decline in advance any such requests which would ask us to do any of the above actions or functions, including any which would otherwise ask us to contradict any part of our Mission and Statement of Values.

We hold our integrity and trustworthiness far above any contract or job.

As a parting thought for you, dear reader: whether you are one of our customers, a collector or art aficionado, or merely have a passing interest in all this, I, as an artist and technical professional, ask you to please spend some time today educating yourself about LLMs and AI. I would ask you to spend some introspection time pondering how future AI tools might affect your own employment and ability to provide for your loved ones. I would ask you to think about how you would want AI to be used with those topics in mind. If your job were impacted or eliminated by AI, if you were informed tomorrow that what you do today to earn your living would now be done by an unskilled or inexperienced person who merely had to type an LLM prompt to accomplish what you likely spent a years or a lifetime learning how to do, how would you then define the ethical use of AI?

Thank you for your time.

Respectfully yours,

Tye Morris

Owner/Operator,

Tye Morris Photo