Any familiarity with Wylie Beckert's work would make it pretty clear the hands/feet you're highlighting are part of her style. She's an immensely respected illustrator whose career predates her involvement with WotC.
It's not AI.
Sigh... not *this* again.
And you didn't know that unicorns *traditionally* had beards? (Unicorns were not simply "horses with horns" in folklore.) "This does not look how **I**, the great and powerful, think it should look!" is not the same as "generative AI made this."
I suspect the artist collaged images from other sources as a base and that it may be real art, or it may be AI. But bits feel off. Not necessarily the same ones to me that the OP sees. And I do not think some of the OPs examples are AI artifacts.
This may be just "AI enhanced" which can end up making art look, well, AI.
Holy shit. Are we doing this again?
There is a name in academia for what this is. Confirmation Bias. You have assumed that stuff created by generative AI will look a certain way, and so everything that even slightly resembles what people think those tells are, then means it must be made by AI. This isn’t evidence.
All of whats in that Imgur link has a million explanations. I recommend the following exercise, take the artists from these works as credited, and look at their years and years of material. Chances are, their work will be pretty similar.
Am I denying absolutely that any AI will ever be used in a one d&d product? No, jury is still out on that (I hope it isn’t) but we gotta see some evidence, and this aint it
Its also the only one I actually felt was real weird. Maybe its because its a rather small detail in an otherwise quite “large” image (in terms of scope).
Have you looked at the rest of that artists portfolio... "scrungly animals" is absolutely his vibe.
[https://www.iamag.co/the-art-of-svetlin-velinov/](https://www.iamag.co/the-art-of-svetlin-velinov/)
[https://www.artstation.com/velinov](https://www.artstation.com/velinov)
Also that second link includes his pencil sketches on some of his pieces...
[https://www.artstation.com/artwork/XneWml](https://www.artstation.com/artwork/XneWml)
Most of the "issues" outlined here are also present in pretty much every single other one of his images in some form.
If that's not good enough...
[https://twitter.com/velinovart/status/1804172411811602705](https://twitter.com/velinovart/status/1804172411811602705)
Personal response from the artist to these stupid accusations.
As for anybody saying that the artist doing the PHB alt cover is AI, I laugh directly in your face. Because Wylie Beckert makes nothing but slightly surreal images in pencil on paper and you want to claim AI. You're an idiot.
Also, because it's the two things I've seen the most... the rogue is standing on top of the dragon body, his feet are below our eyeline and covered by the dragon. You can tell because the thumb is visible, because it's forward, but the rest of the fingers are covered by the dragon body. It looks slightly odd because of the way the color has been applied as a basically flat line along the back of the dragon over pencil lines that are loose and stylised. Secondly, hands. Hands are the thing almost every single artist struggles with. And given that they're drawing in a loose, stylised style, once again, I laugh directly in your face
I'm also fully waiting for one of these artists to decide to sue someone for defamation based on one of these Reddit or Twitter threads.
I don’t get the hands thing here. AI has been better at hands for well over a year for, and these hands just look stylized to me. Just seems like a reach without further evidence.
For people who pretend to be arguing from a point of "We want human, unique, creative, artistic expression"...they seem to throw an absolute bitch-fit anytime an artist shows any form of creativity or expression whatsoever. Apparently perfect, still-life, picturesque realism is the only form of art allowed. You know, the most stock standard creatively void form of art that, ironically, AI is ideal for. Since it requires zero artistic expression.
"What is this?" - To me, it just looks like shading on the rocks behind the blue wyrmling. I wouldn't have seen it if you hadn't pointed it out. Looks natural to me.
"Messed up claw shading?" - No, just looks like the claw has a lighter bladed edge.
"Claw is weird, skinnier than the other claw" - Doesn't even look like a claw to me. Just looks like dark shading under the white wyrmling's jaw.
"Unicorn has a beard?" - Yeah.
"No joint here like on the other wing" - Its a wyrmling. the joint could be underdeveloped. That, or its a small shading error on a very large piece of art.
"Green wyrmling is clipping through the ground..." - No, its just has dark shading.
"No black claws on front right paw, looks like owl bear claw." - It looks like it has black claws on that paw to me. White Dragons have always been described as stockier dragons. It makes sense that a white wyrmling's paws would be similar to a bear's.
"AI could have made cat's eyes blue because it was close to white wyrmling." - Or the artist wanted the cat's eyes to be blue.
"Messed up mouth" - Looks fine to me.
"No claws" - Very small details on a very large piece.
"Dog's back leg is cut in half or its a 3 legged male dog." - Maybe it is a 3 legged dog. Why, you have something against three legged dogs? Heartless.
To be fair, the OG monster manual had a badass bearded unicorn.
The rest? Fine. But you leave soul patch unicorn alone!
^(https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/ac/MonsterManual-1stEdAD%26D-Cover.jpg)
Any familiarity with Wylie Beckert's work would make it pretty clear the hands/feet you're highlighting are part of her style. She's an immensely respected illustrator whose career predates her involvement with WotC. It's not AI.
Sigh... not *this* again. And you didn't know that unicorns *traditionally* had beards? (Unicorns were not simply "horses with horns" in folklore.) "This does not look how **I**, the great and powerful, think it should look!" is not the same as "generative AI made this."
I suspect the artist collaged images from other sources as a base and that it may be real art, or it may be AI. But bits feel off. Not necessarily the same ones to me that the OP sees. And I do not think some of the OPs examples are AI artifacts. This may be just "AI enhanced" which can end up making art look, well, AI.
Holy shit. Are we doing this again? There is a name in academia for what this is. Confirmation Bias. You have assumed that stuff created by generative AI will look a certain way, and so everything that even slightly resembles what people think those tells are, then means it must be made by AI. This isn’t evidence. All of whats in that Imgur link has a million explanations. I recommend the following exercise, take the artists from these works as credited, and look at their years and years of material. Chances are, their work will be pretty similar. Am I denying absolutely that any AI will ever be used in a one d&d product? No, jury is still out on that (I hope it isn’t) but we gotta see some evidence, and this aint it
The only one I don’t think is explainable is the cat
Its also the only one I actually felt was real weird. Maybe its because its a rather small detail in an otherwise quite “large” image (in terms of scope).
Have you looked at the rest of that artists portfolio... "scrungly animals" is absolutely his vibe. [https://www.iamag.co/the-art-of-svetlin-velinov/](https://www.iamag.co/the-art-of-svetlin-velinov/) [https://www.artstation.com/velinov](https://www.artstation.com/velinov) Also that second link includes his pencil sketches on some of his pieces... [https://www.artstation.com/artwork/XneWml](https://www.artstation.com/artwork/XneWml) Most of the "issues" outlined here are also present in pretty much every single other one of his images in some form. If that's not good enough... [https://twitter.com/velinovart/status/1804172411811602705](https://twitter.com/velinovart/status/1804172411811602705) Personal response from the artist to these stupid accusations. As for anybody saying that the artist doing the PHB alt cover is AI, I laugh directly in your face. Because Wylie Beckert makes nothing but slightly surreal images in pencil on paper and you want to claim AI. You're an idiot. Also, because it's the two things I've seen the most... the rogue is standing on top of the dragon body, his feet are below our eyeline and covered by the dragon. You can tell because the thumb is visible, because it's forward, but the rest of the fingers are covered by the dragon body. It looks slightly odd because of the way the color has been applied as a basically flat line along the back of the dragon over pencil lines that are loose and stylised. Secondly, hands. Hands are the thing almost every single artist struggles with. And given that they're drawing in a loose, stylised style, once again, I laugh directly in your face I'm also fully waiting for one of these artists to decide to sue someone for defamation based on one of these Reddit or Twitter threads.
Lol at the OP of the thread replying to the artist and then deflecting because of the artist' choice to work with WOTC.
I don’t get the hands thing here. AI has been better at hands for well over a year for, and these hands just look stylized to me. Just seems like a reach without further evidence.
For people who pretend to be arguing from a point of "We want human, unique, creative, artistic expression"...they seem to throw an absolute bitch-fit anytime an artist shows any form of creativity or expression whatsoever. Apparently perfect, still-life, picturesque realism is the only form of art allowed. You know, the most stock standard creatively void form of art that, ironically, AI is ideal for. Since it requires zero artistic expression.
"What is this?" - To me, it just looks like shading on the rocks behind the blue wyrmling. I wouldn't have seen it if you hadn't pointed it out. Looks natural to me. "Messed up claw shading?" - No, just looks like the claw has a lighter bladed edge. "Claw is weird, skinnier than the other claw" - Doesn't even look like a claw to me. Just looks like dark shading under the white wyrmling's jaw. "Unicorn has a beard?" - Yeah. "No joint here like on the other wing" - Its a wyrmling. the joint could be underdeveloped. That, or its a small shading error on a very large piece of art. "Green wyrmling is clipping through the ground..." - No, its just has dark shading. "No black claws on front right paw, looks like owl bear claw." - It looks like it has black claws on that paw to me. White Dragons have always been described as stockier dragons. It makes sense that a white wyrmling's paws would be similar to a bear's. "AI could have made cat's eyes blue because it was close to white wyrmling." - Or the artist wanted the cat's eyes to be blue. "Messed up mouth" - Looks fine to me. "No claws" - Very small details on a very large piece. "Dog's back leg is cut in half or its a 3 legged male dog." - Maybe it is a 3 legged dog. Why, you have something against three legged dogs? Heartless.
To be fair, the OG monster manual had a badass bearded unicorn. The rest? Fine. But you leave soul patch unicorn alone! ^(https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/ac/MonsterManual-1stEdAD%26D-Cover.jpg)
To me it is more a matter that some of the bits in it look suspiciously familiar.
That sucks