Japan launches its first-ever AI-generated comic. The author admits that he has “absolutely zero” drawing talent. And also claimed that he has never drawn by hand. Thus he relied on machine learning to establish the dystopian saga. The name of the AI-Generated Comic is “Cyberpunk: Peach John.”
The comic beautifully depicts the hero, Momotaro, story. The comic’s hero is believed to have been born from a giant peach. The author wrote the storyline and dialogue. However, the characters in the comic were not handmade. They were made of artificial intelligence.
It took the author only six weeks to complete the AI-generated comic. “Cyberpunk: Peach John” is over 100 pages. Six weeks is significantly less time to create this many pages. Usually, a skilled artist would take a year to complete that many pages.
The world is moving towards technology. First, the release of Open AI, and now the first-ever AI-generated comic, has taken the world by storm. The comic is the japans first AI-generated comic. So, it has raised several concerns. Will the AI-drawn Comic threaten the jobs and copyrights in the country’s multibillion-dollar comic book industry? We will get to this later in the article. Let us see how Rootport made this comic.
The making of fully AI-Generated comic
Shinchosha is the publishing house behind the AI-generated Comic. And the publishing house of the newly launched comic believes “Cyberpunk: Peach John” is the Japan’s first complete AI-generated comic. And it went on shelves in Japan on Thursday.
The comic book is made using AI tools. The imaging tools, such as Midjourney, DALL-E 2, and Google’s Imagen, were released last year. They are many such tools online now. However, they are still in their early stages. It needs to be perfect. But it is a beautiful tool for creating comics.
The AI-generated was made with Midjourney. Midjourney was produced in the US. It is a software that is capable of generating images based on text prompts by the user. Rootport entered the text into the software to create images of the characters. But he has to do it multiple times to get the desired images of characters without errors. And also, that matches his storyline. The software is straightforward to use and generates results quickly. But sometimes, the text-to-image converter shows creepy results. With text hints like “pink hair,” “Asian lad,” and “stadium jacket,” AI-generated comic author was able to create images of the story’s main lead quickly.
Midjourney was released in the year 2022. However, the author sometimes struggles to create “the perfect image for a specific scene.” Also, the hands were the tricky part. The author said that he has to compromise on the character’s hands. The author has to limit some scenes.
“Cyberpunk: Peach John” characters were created using AI technology. The author was able to draw each character using Midjourney. The author also used Stable Diffusion and DALL-E 2. Midjourney has sent the art world into a frenzy. The author stated the process was fun. He compared it to having fun playing the lottery. The author then put the best frames in comic-book format to create the comic. The comic had already grabbed the reader’s attention. The release date of the comic was March 9.
The existing mangas are generally black and white. On the other hand, AI tools create colored images. However, the same character’s face can appear slightly different on every page. Rootport said he felt fulfilled when his text commands, which he explains as magical “spells,” produced an image that matched his imagination.
Is it the same satisfaction as drawing it by hand from scratch? Most likely not.”
The author has added additional ten pages to the comic. These pages state how to create a comic using AI. Nonetheless, the author claims that AI image generators have opened the door for individuals without artistic talent to make their way into the comic industry if they have good stories.
Debate on AI-Generated Comic
There is an ongoing debate after the release of the first AI-Generated comic. According to experts, copy infringements are highly unlikely to occur as images are created with simple text commands. A few people in Japan are concerned about artists’ rights. Some are concerned that AI technology will eliminate jobs for artists. It takes a lot of time to create one comic by hand. Following are some of the views of Japanese people.
Madoka Kobayashi, a manga artist, has worked in the company for over three decades. According to her, AI is a great companion instead of a threat.
Another manga artist claims AI is an excellent tool for visualizing a character. But then it is better to enhance that imagination without any tool.
Eiichiro Oda is the author of the ‘one piece’ series. She has asked for motivation for AI for his sequel.
However, Some people believe that AI drawings are a new way to create comics. They can save the time of the author. And the author can mainly focus on the storyline to grab more readers. Apart from everything, some just like handmade drawing better.
Netflix launched a short story in January 2023. To make the background for the animated movie, they used AI tools. The people raised questions about not having to hire human animators. There is a possibility that ai will take over comic creators. Nothing is clear till now. To enhance the vision, AI is a great tool. Handmade drawings are in every way better than the ones made from the tool. To know how the AI comic proceeds, we have to wait.
Conclusion
The AI-generated Comic is impressive. Nonetheless, the rise of AI-generated art will undoubtedly impact the manga industry’s future. It will enhance the quality of comics. There is no doubt about it. But ensuring it does not violate artists’ rights or displace workers is necessary. Finally, the key is to balance AI’s power and human artists’ creativity to create unique, captivating, and thought-provoking work. The entry of artificial intelligence into the comic world can do wonders. The authors can save time by using AI software. And can indulge their time to create unique storylines. But we can not say it will eliminate the need for handmade drawings. Artificial intelligence is unable to create hands and feet properly. Undoubtedly, Humans have humor and are more capable of creating a unique character for the readers.
About author
Shaheera Khalid is the author of this article. She has been writing informational articles for about two years.
