Masterclass: Making comics with AI
On June 17, 2022, I gave a masterclass on making comics with AI at the Internationaler Comic-Salon Erlangen. Starting from some basic concepts of algebra and statistics, I moved on to principles of machine learning and ended with explanations of GANs and comic book image generation. It was an intensive entry-level master class of 1.5 hours, but I had the impression that the comics festival visitors were enjoying it. More than 30 people listened very concentrated and seemed to share my enthusiasm (although I am not entirely sure because at that time people in Germany were still wearing face masks). Anyway, here are some slides and below you can find the teaser text from the festival program.
Teaser text
Comics are a truly human creation. We have no knowledge of any other species on earth making stories with funny little drawings. That's why humor and graphical art have always been considered as the exclusive territory of the homo sapiens. Before the end of this decade however, machines will also be able to make comics in an entirely autonomous way. Witty scripts and stunning drawings are allready today no longer a secret for algorithms with acronyms as GPT3 and Dall-E2. But how do algorithms work? Is it pure magic? Is it the alchemy of the 21th century? In this masterclass, you'll learn the basic concepts of artificial intelligence and machine learning. With a focus on the creation of comics, you'll discover how a neural network functions, what's the curse of the dimensionality and how you can make a walk in the latent space. Enough knowledge to impress your family members the next time someone drops the two-letter word AI.