In July 2022, I wrote a post about MidJourney AI art. That was version 3. Recently, MidJourney released its latest version 6. I thought it would be fun to check the progress of this “artist.” I ran the same prompts I used before, and these are some of the artwork it generated: 

For “oil painting, still life, bronze vase, light pink roses, curtain, table, realism, expressive strokes, zorn palette:”

For “kandinsky with expressive bold strokes, fish, abstract colors:”

For “André Masson drawing, colored pencil, street musicians, metro, gloomy:”

I am not an AI artist, and there are now more perimeters to manipulate for better results. What I have here is definitely not the best MidJourney could do. However, we can still see how far it has become and the direction it goes. It has a better understanding of human language and more accuracy in rendering. If you go to any AI art community, you’ll see the strength of these tools lies in realistic and fantasy art. While it can mimic many other mediums and styles, I wouldn’t necessarily see the V6 Kandinsky and Masson pieces as progress. 

In comparison, this is what DALL-E (OpenAI) created in response to the same prompts for rose:

With my limited experience, DALL-E is a lesser artist, but it can understand human language much better. Instead of thinking about writing “prompts,” you can just rant. So, if you are to create an illustration for a story, give the story to it, ignore the picture it generates, ask for what prompts it uses, and give those prompts to MidJourney with some modification. That’s how I got the “Winter Evening” and “Solitude:”

By the way, DALL-E refused to work on the Kandinsky and the Masson prompts because they are against their content policy. I look forward to all the discussions and lawsuits in the AI realm. 

Finally, a very Happy New Year brought to you by MidJourney and Photoshop, with a poem by ChatGPT (based on the painting):

Twilight hues and earthenware, 
Berries red as the first blush of the year. 
Glass and glaze in silence share 
The quiet hope of joy sincere.

In this still life, time’s gentle pause,
Apples ripe with the future’s gaze. 
A tableau set without applause,
Whispers of the New Year’s haze.

Let vessels, stark, in patience wait, 
For mirth to fill them to the brim. 
In silent grace, they contemplate 
The dance of days about to begin.

LOL