📸 Midjourney 5.1

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👀 Today’s Thing: Midjourney 5.1

🤖 Everybody’s favorite AI image generator just got an upgrade. Midjourney released version 5.1 of their generative AI app earlier this week, and it’s already making the world a little more surreal.

🎧 Fascinated by AI-generated imagery? Check out my podcast on the future of Gen AI and gaming with Ubisoft’s Yves Jacquier.

📖 Backstory

☞ In their own words, Midjourney is, “an independent research lab exploring new mediums of thought and expanding the imaginative powers of the human species.” The company is small, with 11 full-time staff and “an incredible set of advisors.”

☞ Midjourney has been a favorite of AI-fueled creative types for some time now, but gained widespread notoriety this past March when a photorealistic image of the Pope decked out in designer drip went viral.

☞ Soon after the Pope wearing Balenciaga image made the rounds, Midjourney announced they were cutting off free trial access to their services. Founder and David Holz announced the change in late March, citing “extraordinary demand and trial abuse.” No specific mention of the Pope image, or the Trump getting arrested image (also made with Midjourney), was made in the announcement.

🔑 Keys to Understanding

🥇 What’s new in Midjourney v5.1?

Major improvements in Version 5.1 include:

• higher coherence,

• increased accuracy to text prompts,

• fewer unwanted borders or text artifacts, and

• enhanced sharpness

An ‘unopinionated’ mode called ‘RAW Mode” has been introduced for those who prefer the default settings of Version 5.0. The company reassures that Version 5 will still be available for use.

(via Photutorial)

🥈 Midjourney is, by most measures, the most popular AI image generator on the market, having surpassed Stable Diffusion and OpenAI’s DALL-E 2 in terms of user interest.

🥉 Use of the word “pope” is now banned on Midjourney (!)

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Until the next thing,

- Noah

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