AI art generators are a controversial new creative tool, and many are unsure about what role they'll come to play. But sometimes a fun creative experiment comes along that seems like just the thing they can serve for.
Skimming through TripAdvisor reviews can be enough to out anyone off travel forever. Almost every destination seems to have at least a couple of scathing reviews that make it sound like hell on Earth. But what if the place really was that bad? Well, someone's used AI to show what some popular tourist destinations would look like according to their worst write ups, and they look bad (unsure of how the technology works? See our guide to how to use DALL-E 2).
England's most prized prehistoric monument (Image credit: My Favourite Cottages)
Many of us will have been disappointed by the reality of certain popular tourist destinations compared to the postcard images we saw before our trip. Some people really vent that frustration in colourful online reviews, which can often put potential future visitors off.
So Holiday Rental Company My Favourite Cottages has reimagined the UK’s top tourist attractions according to one-star reviews, with the help of the AI-powered text-to-image generator DALL-E 2. It used text prompts comprising each attraction’s name and keywords from their worst TripAdvisor reviews. Then the image generator did its thing. So, what do some of the UK's top tourist attractions look like in the eyes of their harshest critics? Here are some more examples.
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Reviewers described Anthony Gormley's Angel of the North beside the A1 as “rusty old junk” that “needs painting” (Image credit: My Favourite Cottages)
One of the most popular attractions in London. “Pure chaos,” with “screaming children everywhere.” (Image credit: My Favourite Cottages)
The Needles are a famous natural landmark on the Isle of White. It's just a shame they built that chairlift(Image credit: My Favourite Cottages)
People complained of being "crammed" around this “green puddle", the main attraction here in Bath(Image credit: My Favourite Cottages)
Some tourists were unimpressed to find "hordes of people" climbing over this "pile of odd-shaped rocks"(Image credit: My Favourite Cottages)
Brighton Palace pier was described as “slippery”, “littered,” and suffering from “full bins”(Image credit: My Favourite Cottages)
Unsurprisingly, the images suggest that the main complaint in TripAdvisor reviews is crowds, but then we all know you need to get up at 5am or use some serious editing in Photoshop to get those clean images of landmarks free from crowds. But it's a nice use of AI as a tool to imagine what things could look like rather than to try to create a finished work of art.
For more on AI art, see how the best AI art generators compare. And if you want to edit you're holiday snaps to get rid of scenes like this, it's worth noting that there's an Adobe Black Friday deal on Creative Cloud right now (see the prices in your area below).
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Joe is a regular freelance journalist and editor at Creative Bloq. He writes news, features and buying guides and keeps track of the best equipment and software for creatives, from video editing programs to monitors and accessories. A veteran news writer and photographer, he now works as a project manager at the London and Buenos Aires-based design, production and branding agency Hermana Creatives. There he manages a team of designers, photographers and video editors who specialise in producing visual content and design assets for the hospitality sector. He also dances Argentine tango.
