The Rise of AI in the Art World What do you think of this image? It's very pretty at first glance, isn't it? Does it make you immediately want to seek out the pattern to make them yourself? You're not alone. I took this image from a random page on Facebook that showed up on my newsfeed. I have no idea who originally made it. It's being shared by pages that appear to be run by bots, as the caption is always the exact same. So What's the Problem? The problem is these crochet parrots are not real. That is not real crochet. The photo is generated by AI. How can you tell? Firstly, they are too perfect. Creating crochet birds that could sit like that on a perch without falling over would be challenging. The direction of some of the stitches doesn't make sense. If you zoom in, you can see the stitches on the head especially do not look like crochet stitches. The yellow feathers on the left bird's head look like real feathers, which you wouldn't be able to rep...
Crochet Basics Welcome to the first part of my first series of blog posts on the basics of crochet for beginners. I will cover what you need to get started and some tutorials so you can learn the basic stitches and get started on a few easy projects. This is perfect for crochet beginners who want to learn how to crochet and get into this amazing hobby. Word of warning: it is addictive! Once you start and you realise just how flexible crochet is and what you can make, it's going to take over your life. It's not an expensive hobby to start, but it can become so when you see the variety of yarns and projects available to you. So, a little about my background with crochet. It's something my mum does, and has done for years. I have a couple of blankets that she made when I was a baby, and I still have them. I got into crochet by a kind of circuitous route - when I started getting into cosplay I learned how to knit to make legwarmers and began collecting magazines on knitting and...