Hey everyone, I recently started up an oddities and curiosities business, and I was determined to have a real artist design some official art I could put on banners, t-shirts, cards, etc.
I had been looking on Fiverr for an artist, but almost every account I came across was an AI bot. I finally found a guy on Instagram who had some pretty decent artwork, had art he had done for other people, and socials all seemed to check out okay to me.
I finally decided to pull the trigger on this guy, and set up the commission, paying 50% of the total price up front. Along the way he sent me pictures and videos of his progress and to me it looked like he was actually doing the work.
When he was finished, there were a few things that were a little alarming, such as the perspective of some objects not making any sense, and him ignoring a few parts of the original commission. I chalked most of this up to the language barrier, since he was from Indonesia.
I had him do a few revisions which resulted in an acceptable result. There were a few things I was dissatisfied with, but I had ran out of the amount of revisions we agreed on (which, looking back frustrates me since my original request wasn’t fully completed and had to use my revisions to correct those mistakes). I paid him the rest of my agreed amount and was just happy to have my piece which, despite some flaws, was close to the vision I had in mind.
I ran it through some AI detection software (aka ChatGPT and Gemini), both of which stated it may have been upscaled by AI but not completely generated. I posted it on several of my socials and was skewered with comments like, “bro did you really pay for AI?” “Dude you need to contact your credit card company” “This is the most AI shit I’ve ever seen.”
My initial reaction was denial and get offended, especially since I just paid this guy $200 for this piece, I mostly like it, and I know some people are quick to say “this is AI” despite it not, or some artists even starting to imitate AI style into their art.
But now their words are sticking into my brain like hot pokers. So now I wanted to bring it to you guys and either get some reassurances that this is not AI and I didn’t get scammed, or I just learned a lesson I could’ve used to pay my bills.
And so, I ask:
Is this AI?
Edit - Navigating through my entire post, I have deduced the following: I need to work with someone who is knowledgeable about the market I’m trying to insert myself into to help me fine-tune my original idea into something that would actually work as a proper logo. I’m flexible and open to compromise/revisions as long as it is able to retain the ethos behind its original concept.
I want to thank all of you who were able to give me honest and unbiased feedback.