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Nano Banana 2: Google's latest AI image generation model

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Re: Nano Banana 2: Google's latest AI image generation model

#461

Post by squidsoup »

selridge wrote: post #413
squidsoup wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's like you assigning to humans divine capabilities :) . Hyperbolizing a little, humans also only copy and mix - where do you think originality comes from? Granted, AI isn't at the level of humans yet, but they improve here. Every human being is unique, both biologically and experientially. Until an AI can feel and have a lived experience, it can not create art.

Will smith eating spaghetti is art, sorry.

If everything is art, then nothing is art. Conceptual art, and everything that followed in Duchamp's wake, is mostly meaningless nonsense, sorry.

Re: Nano Banana 2: Google's latest AI image generation model

#462

Post by vunderba »

dialogbox wrote: post #460
vunderba wrote: post #76

I've only had a brief opportunity to try out NB Pro 2 (`gemini-3.1-flash-image-preview`), so I haven't had a chance to update GenAI Showdown. Here's some of my captions that tend to trip up even state-of-the-art models. https://mordenstar.com/other/nb-pro-2-tests So far it does feel more iterative than an entirely new leap in terms of capabilities, but I haven't run it through the more multimodal aspects such as edit…

Nice test. Nitpicking. Isn't it NB Pro and NB 2? Not NB Pro 2.

You're totally right. THROW THE WHOLE THING OUT!

Seriously thanks - will update the site.

Re: Nano Banana 2: Google's latest AI image generation model

#463

Post by squidsoup »

selridge wrote: post #414
squidsoup wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Demonstrably wrong. The most highly regarded AI artist today is Refik Adanol. His work was recently described by Jerry Saltz as a "glorified lava lamp".

Why should anyone care about either of those two people?

The art establishment clearly does. Refik has a show at MoMA at the moment. Saltz won a Pulitzer for his art criticism, so I guess the Pulitzer committee cares.

Re: Nano Banana 2: Google's latest AI image generation model

#464

Post by pluralmonad »

javier123454321 wrote: post #420
slumberlust wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not understanding how consciousness is created doesn't make it divine. Do you think it's an impossible task or just one we need more time to figure out?

Being alive is divine. It doesn't matter if you understand it or not. It's a beautiful thing to have a consciousness in this world, and to have the ability to create, to love. It takes a huge intellectual effort to try to trick yourself out of believing something so intuitive as that.

What is intuitive to you, may not be to others. Might you be engaging in intellectual self trickery?

Re: Nano Banana 2: Google's latest AI image generation model

#465

Post by squidsoup »

KPGv2 wrote: post #372
avmich wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mostly disagree. > 1... The narrative/life of the artist becomes a lot more important. When I watch a movie, I don't care about the artist's life. I care about character life, that's very different. > 2... Originality matters more than ever. By design, these tools can only copy and mix things that already exist. It's like you assigning to humans divine capabilities :) . Hyperbolizing a little, humans also only copy…

> When I watch a movie, I don't care about the artist's life. I care about character life, that's very different. The target audiences for art and film are not the same. The latter is far more pop culture. You can't apply them the same way, and the narrative of the artist has been extremely important for decades. People will watch slop movies. They don't pay $30K for slop art. They're paying that for historical impor…

> They don't pay $30K for slop art

I beg your pardon, but have you heard of Jeff Koons or Kaws?

Re: Nano Banana 2: Google's latest AI image generation model

#466

Post by testing22321 »

yakattak wrote: post #47
testing22321 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I’m trying to figure out if there’s any justification for using it in a business world outside of: “We don’t want to pay a human.” You could easily say the same about anytime computers or robots or automation have taken a job away. We’ve been going down this road for decades.

Those industries (computers, robots) created other jobs though. This doesn’t seem to.

The people who work at google, building this

Re: Nano Banana 2: Google's latest AI image generation model

#467

Post by CamperBob2 »

screye wrote: post #314
keiferski wrote: post #237

Some random predictions about what AI image generation tools will do/are doing to art: 1. The narrative/life of the artist becomes a lot more important. The most successful artists are ones that craft a story around their life and art, and don't just create stuff and stop. This will become even more important. 2. Originality matters more than ever. By design, these tools can only copy and mix things that already exis…

> The narrative/life of the artist becomes a lot more important We are 50 years into post-modernism. Can't imagine it can get any more important. I predict emergent design will be the next big thing. Czinger[1] is a great example of what it may look like. Rick Ruben-esque world, where the creator is more a guide. [1] Czinger uses stochastic optimization to converge to designs - https://www.czinger.com/iconic-design

Post-modernism says that the artist isn't important. Dead, in fact. Art is something that happens when we perceive it, not when the author creates it.

Re: Nano Banana 2: Google's latest AI image generation model

#468

Post by ByThyGrace »

fasteddie31003 wrote: post #59

I'm building my personal home right now. The AI image models have been a game-changer in designing the look of the house. My architect did an OK job, but the details that Nano Banana added really bring the house up a notch. I just do hundreds of renders from the basic 3D models and I find looks that I like and iterate from there. We are implementing the renders from Nano Banana over our Interior Designers designs. We…

Is any of this intrinsically a strength of Nano Banana, while not of other models/generative tools? Have you tried doing the same with say Klein, ZIT, etc.?

Re: Nano Banana 2: Google's latest AI image generation model

#469

Post by coldtea »

williamcotton wrote: post #95
coldtea wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Art is about pushing limits of what's possible That's engineering, if that. Art isn't, and has never been about that.

Sure it has. See the modernism as a whole.

Modernism wasn't about "pushing limits of what's possible" either. It was first and foremost a period style itself. That style included experimentation and "pushing some limits" but art in general wasn't that, then, before or after (which is also why those limits went right back, and literature for example returned to far more classical forms after modernism's era passed - it didn't kept pushing at limits).

Re: Nano Banana 2: Google's latest AI image generation model

#470

Post by jplusequalt »

ACCount37 wrote: post #380
tmountain wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Art is a reaction to life. AI is thereby incapable of producing anything with any degree of authenticity unless it conveys the experience of being an agent to the world.

What is AI if not "a reaction to life"? With how much data goes into the frontier systems, and how much of it gets captured by them, an AI might have, in many ways, a richer grasp of human experience than the humans themselves do. You were only ever one human. An LLM has skimmed from millions. You have seen a tree, and the AI has seen the forest it stands in.

The AI has not "seen" or "experienced" anything, as it's not a sentient life form.
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