Machine Learning & Creative AI

In 2016 I began using machine learning (ML) to train/build novel tools for making art. In this body of work I curated custom datasets using my own photography and computer graphics outputs exclusively, and then trained bespoke ML models to employ as artmaking tools. The start of this work pre-dates 'text prompting' (Midjourney, Dall-E, Stable Diffusion) by five years. Here is a selection of experiments, works and other posts related to these explorations.

Mar 092022
 

Imitation Game AI Exhibition Poster, Vancouver Art GalleryEntangled II at The Imitation Game

I am excited to have an entire room dedicated to my artwork at the recently-opened feature exhibition at the Vancouver Art Gallery, “The Imitation Game – Visual Culture in the Age of Artificial Intelligence.”

the venerable Vancouver Art Gallery

The groundbreaking show gives insight into the development and impact artificial intelligence is having on art, creativity, and wider visual culture. I have a collection of large pieces in the show as well as a series of development ‘sketches’ that are being shown in public for the first time. If you’re near Vancouver definitely check it out, the show will be running until October 23, 2022!

Caffeinated Diversions, drawings processed by custom neural networkCaffeinated Diversions, 2019

Scott Eaton's machine learning experiments at the Vancouver Art GalleryA wall of displays showing Scott’s machine learning video works

Scott Eaton's Humanity (Fall of the Damned) at the Vancouver Art Gallery Humanity (Fall of the Damned)

Feb 202024
 

TITLE: Spherical Enumeration
MEDIUM: Laser-fused polyamide
DIMENSION: 33x33x30 cm
DATE: 2022


Exploring the idea of a spherical zoetrope (a physical impossiblity). Here animating an abstracted figure cyclically standing, kneeling, and raising arms, abstracted through one of my experimental ‘geometry’ neural networks (used also in Intersections. The sculpture above is an excerpt from the animation.

Nov 102023
 

Still from Scott Eaton's AI video artwork - Entangled II

TITLE: Entangled II
MEDIUM: Digital (photography, high-speed video, machine learning / AI)
RESOLUTION: 4k, vertical
DURATION: 5:00
DATE: 2019

Investigating the proposition that the sinuous, overlapping curves of viscous fluid flows match the folds, contours and overlaps of the human figure. The work takes high-speed video of paint in water and processes it through a custom neutral network (my “BODIES” network) to elicit continually evolving, rebirthing, almost human forms. The work plays with preception and our human-brains’ wiring for pareidolia – seeing and recognising things, especially human forms, in random objects.



ENTANGLED II, excerpt

Jan 022023
 

Meta AI

I recently completed a year-long artist residency with Meta’s Fundamental AI Research Lab (FAIR). While I’ve always had mixed feelings about corporate Meta (formerly Facebook), I have nothing but respect for the research that FAIR does in AI and machine learning. It was a privilege to spend time within that organisation pursuing a number of interests in art, creativity, and machine learning.

The work was largely experimental, often extensions of explorations I had started prior, but I appreciated having the time and resources (read: compute) to investigate more deeply. The work included investigations into human pose estimation and tracking, interpretability of vision models, geometric abstraction, color theory, etc. The focus was not so much on advancing any state of the art in machine learning, but more on utilizing and extending existing ML tools and techniques to make new creative works. I will post a few of the more interestesting experiments here when I find time.

Perpetual Now II, installation by Scott Eaton, large outdoor screen, reflecting in watera still from Perpetual Now II, Living Canvas, Dublin, 2022

One of the moving image pieces created during the residency recently finished a three month run on the Living Canvas in Dublin Ireland (the largest outdoor cultural screen in Europe, approximately 4x20m, see above). A second work, Intersections, will premiere in New York City later in 2023.

Nov 242021
 

link to gallery

For the last couple of years, I have been fortunate to be curated in Nvidia’s AI Art Gallery. There are a couple of recent works featured there (which are already familiar to anyone who has explored this site) but each has additional background and context. You can also find a couple of recorded discussions I’ve had with other amazing artists creating in this space. These are available for viewing at the bottom of the gallery page (link here).

Jun 102020
 

CogX 2020 – Artist Vs Machine

I will be participating in a three-artist discussion panel at CogX 2020 on the future of creativity and art in the age of AI, VR, and AR. I will be joined by Jonathan Yeo, contemporary portrait painter, and Patrick Morgan, an artist exploring the boundaries of VR/AR in his work. The conversation will be wide ranging, but focused around how these emerging technologies might enable new creative horizons for aritsts in the coming decades.