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Photography in the Age of AI, with Stephen Shankland

Release Date: 02/29/2024

NYC Artist Lofts & Brooklyn Rooftops, with Joshua Charow & Josh Katz

B&H Photography Podcast

How much do you know about New York City’s 1982 Loft Law, which established a process for artists to obtain legal occupancy of the raw industrial spaces they inhabited, while also providing rent stabilization and protection from future eviction? Or the pigeon fanciers who were once a fixture across the rooftops of Brooklyn and remain valued as neighborhood sentinels? If these poetic vestiges from Gotham’s storied past have you dreaming about the good old days, then you won’t want to miss our with gen-Z New Yorkers (and good buddies) Joshua Charow and Josh Katz. Their ambitious,...

Picturing World Cultures: Maxim Dondyuk - Ukraine

B&H Photography Podcast

The dictionary defines culture as “the way of life for an entire society.” But sometimes larger forces create rifts within the whole, inevitably leading to a confrontation between factions. A prime example of this cultural struggle is playing out today within the cities and villages of Ukraine, the focus of today’s episode. Above photograph © Maxim Dondyuk In this sixth installment of our monthly series, Picturing World Cultures, we speak with Ukrainian photographer and visual artist Maxim Dondyuk, and his wife and artistic manager, Irina. Our conversation stretches beyond the...

Lynn Goldsmith’s Prince Portrait and its Legacy in Case Law

B&H Photography Podcast

For anyone familiar with the photo industry, the mammoth lawsuit between The Andy Warhol Foundation and renowned music photographer Lynn Goldsmith should be no secret. This complex battle over the rights to her 1981 portrait of the artist formerly known as Prince lasted seven years and went all the way to the Supreme Court. But do you know the circumstances behind her original portrait session with the famously reserved musician, and were you aware of all the misinformation about this case that was disseminated in both legal documents and the press? Lynn is a longtime friend...

Picturing World Cultures: Rita Leistner - Canada

B&H Photography Podcast

Professional tree planting is back breaking piecework—a combination of high intensity sport and industrial labor that requires both technical finesse and remarkable physical and mental endurance. Using techniques more often associated with high-performance athletes, experienced planters (commonly known as high-ballers) leap up and down through uneven and debris-strewn terrain, armed only with a shovel and 30-kg bags of seedlings on their backs. In recent years, tree planting has become a rite of passage among young Canadians not afraid of hard work and dirt under their fingernails. ...

Still Photography & the WWE, with Brad Smith & Rich Freeda

B&H Photography Podcast

Cozy up to a ringside seat for a behind-the-scenes tour of the wildest shows in sports entertainment, during our insightful chat about the still photos produced for World Wrestling Entertainment, (otherwise known as WWE). In 2023 alone, the WWE photo team traveled the globe, covering close to 170 live events, and producing 2.6 million stills to serve the organization’s various platforms. You might—incorrectly—assume that WWE’s still images are generated from video screengrabs. Well, this couldn’t be further from the truth. In this week’s podcast, we get the full scoop...

Ecliptic Visions—with Rebecca Boyle, Gabriel Biderman, Atlas Obscura & B&H

B&H Photography Podcast

Where will you be on April 8, 2024? If you don’t already know, you’d better figure it out fast, particularly if you’ve got an interest in observing—and ideally photographing—the awe-inspiring phenomenon of a total solar eclipse. To get you up to speed on essential eclipse details, tune in to our chat with science writer Rebecca Boyle and Gabriel Biderman from B&H’s Road Marketing team. Boyle shares tidbits about Earth’s silvery sister gleaned from research for her book Our Moon, while Gabe discusses preparations (and practice!) for your eclipse photo session, plus...

Picturing World Cultures: Daniel Rosca - Romania

B&H Photography Podcast

There are many different ways to look at culture, and today we take a geographic approach, to distinguish people who live in rural mountain and hilly settings from those of the wider plains and urban areas. Our focus is the country of Romania, where we’ll explore the rustic landscape of small farms, hand tilled fields, and local communities that still identify with the working methods and traditions of the past. Along the way, we’ll follow the cyclical work of farmers and shepherds, gain insight into the Orthodox faith, explore vibrant holiday celebrations, and reveal unique rituals with...

Photography in the Age of AI, with Stephen Shankland

B&H Photography Podcast

How much can you edit a photo before it stops becoming true? That’s the question CNET tech reporter Stephen Shankland recently asked in the opening lines of his story, . The article, which examines digital photography and advanced smartphone image processing in the era of AI, reaches beyond the polarizing visual minefield of generative AI by delving into aspects of this technologythat’s been quietly pre-baked into most every camera on the market these days. The sophisticated processing under the hood of your digital camera is our jumping off point for a wide-ranging...

B&H Podcast: Chat with Inventor of the CMOS Chip, Professor Eric Fossum

B&H Photography Podcast

How did a space-age invention become ubiquitous in today’s digital imaging landscape? Learn all about it here in our latest podcast, featuring pioneers of photography and digital imaging. In 1993, noted physicist and engineer Eric Fossum led the invention of the CMOS active-pixel image sensor as part of his work for NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). Then, as part of JPL’s mandate to seek commercial and consumer applications for emerging technologies, he was active in the transfer of the CMOS sensor’s “camera-on-a-chip” technology to industry. In our informative...

Picturing World Cultures: Joshua Irwandi - Indonesia

B&H Photography Podcast

While Joshua Irwandi was born and raised in Indonesia, the early pictures he made during his first visit to the region of Asmat, in the province of West Papua, were less than satisfying to him. Yet his fascination with the people and the place stuck, inspiring him to embark on the long-term project Not a Blank Canvas. In this third installment of our monthly series, Picturing World Cultures, we speak with Irwandi about his experiences documenting the people and landscape of Asmat, which offers a window into long-held traditions and the sweeping changes he’s observed there over the past 10...

More Episodes

How much can you edit a photo before it stops becoming true? That’s the question CNET tech reporter Stephen Shankland recently asked in the opening lines of his story, How Close is that Photo to the Truth: What to Know in the Age of AI.

The article, which examines digital photography and advanced smartphone image processing in the era of AI, reaches beyond the polarizing visual minefield of generative AI by delving into aspects of this technologythat’s been quietly pre-baked into most every camera on the market these days.

The sophisticated processing under the hood of your digital camera is our jumping off point for a wide-ranging discussion with Shankland that touches on many aspects of the digital workflow, before scaling the slippery slopes of generative AI.

A few of the many points we cover include: Comparing the three primary generative AI platforms and discussing their differences, an assessment of AI manipulations and deepfakes, the ways in which a proliferation of camera phones can serve as a buttress against fakery, and the factor of a social contract in weighing the veracity of an image.

Today’s AI landscape seems to be morphing by the minute, a reality that’s reflected here with bonus content! Barely a week after our original discussion, Open AI’s new text to video application, Sora, was released to a tidal wave of interest, so we got Shankland back on mic. Stay to the end to hear our first impressions of this new technology and listen closely to discover how an AI bot got the last word in our chat.

Guest: Stephen Shankland

Top shot © Allan Weitz, https://www.allanweitzdesign.com

Episode Timeline:

2:22: How much can a photo be edited before it stops “becoming” true? Plus, the digital processing that goes on under the hood of your digital camera.

7:06: The sophisticated processing in your camera phone and how the resulting images compare to pictures made with a 35mm digital camera.

13:02: How much digital editing is too much and what’s the least amount of image adjustments possible before a photograph stops “being true.”

18:22: The matter of generative AI manipulations and deepfakes, the democratization of altering images, and how the proliferation of camera phones can serve as a buttress against fakery.

23:24: Comparing the three big generative AI platforms Stephen has worked with—Open AI’s Dall-E, Google’s ImageFX, and Adobe’s Firefly—and discussing how they differ, plus Allan’s impressions about working with Adobe Firefly, and how much of an AI-generated image is truly one’s own.

31:58: Prompt engineering, the bias of training data, the role of having fun when assessing the creative aspects of generative AI, and the factor of a social contract into reading the veracity of an image.

40:22: Episode Break

41:30: The potential for career opportunities in prompt engineering, new educational programs to arise from these new technologies, plus reasons why illustration is the creative area most threatened by AI.

48:27: The democratization of creative tasks due to computer technology, and the value of having a unique style or vision to creative success, plus the advantages of AI for stylistic

52:08: Ethical considerations, intellectual property rights, and copyright concerns in relation to AI generation.

57:03: In-camera authentication, content credentialing, and following the provenance of an image to be assured of its trustworthiness, plus whether this technology will ever show up in camera phones.

1:04:24: Episode bonus: Stephen’s first impressions of Open AI’s new text to video application, Sora.

Guest Bio: Stephen Shankland has covered technology, computing, and digital imaging as a principal writer and reporter for CNET since 1998. He’s also a professional photographer who’s particularly intrigued by new trends in AI. Stephen stumbled into journalism as a fledgling science reporter covering the Los Alamos National Laboratory. His first, and biggest, scoop was about radioactive kitty litter discovered at the town dump.

Stay Connected:

Stephen Shankland’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stshank/

Stephen Shankland’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/stshank/

Stephen Shankland’s Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/people/Stephen-Shankland/

Stephen Shankland’s Flickr:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/shankrad/

Stephen Shankland’s MuckRack:

https://muckrack.com/stshank

Stephen Shankland’s CNET profile:

https://www.cnet.com/profiles/shankland/

Stephen Shankland’s CNET article on AI: https://www.cnet.com/tech/mobile/features/how-close-is-that-photo-to-the-truth-what-to-know-in-the-age-of-ai/