NO AI image generation used on this website

Earlier this week, I received the following via the contact form on our Wayfarer Images website. I have not included the person’s name here to protect their privacy at this time:

Not only was the person very sure of the fact that the image is AI generated, but chose then make a broader allegation about “why we use AI images” (plural). It is unfortunate nowadays that many genuine and hard working artists and photographers are being unfairly accused of using AI to make their images. The problem is that the lines have now been irrevocably blurred by practitioners out there who actually DO pass AI off as their own work. You Tube is chock full of videos exposing individuals doing so.

I have yet to receive an apology from this person to whom I immediately replied to clarify the fact that the image was taken some time in late 2017, early 2018 by John. The image has been selling on our website since early 2018, which is more than 8 years now. I offered two links to the Wayback Machine which showed snapshots taken of the image in use on our website, from January 2018 forward – long before AI generated images became ‘a thing’.

I can understand why the person may have mistakenly assumed it was AI, as that particular image did have a painterly filter applied to it. We were ambivalent about the filter at the time, but found that customers who were buying our cards and canvasses in Nzique (Petone) and Craftworld (Auckland) rather liked it, so we left the treatment in and continued to sell the image in various formats.

I stated to this person and reiterate here, that we DO NOT use AI to generate images for use in this way on our websites or any of the products that we sell.

I do hope that this person has not been circulating this baseless accusation further than the message I received today. Please let us know if you do hear of anyone making these allegations as though they are fact.

Thanks,

Melody Anderson