AI in belly dance : initial review of common tools

I have to say I was initially very sceptical on how AI could be useful to creatives, I only focussed on the potential harms to industries (which are real!) however, since they are not going away, I figured I would try them and  started playing with these tools. (I also have completed a micro course in generative AI with the Institute of Technology via TAFE and with cyberwardens to help me get a better idea of it's uses)

My discovery:

AI can be used as a creative foundation. Particularly early on in the design phase.

“ This collaboration of human ingenuity and AI can create captivating and innovative visuals that mesmerise viewers” - Generative AI TAFE NSW course

Canva AI options of red headed belly dancer - I like how it isn't sexist in it's interpretation.

Picture generation has been hit and miss. Grok for example started making an image of a belly dancer for me and then greyed it out and said that material was not appropriate! Wordpress inbuilt blog picture generation made bizarre images that were only usable for humour as they had the wrong number of fingers and anatomy in the wrong place. WIX built in AI makes some seriously scary faces on children and really can’t get the idea of people dancing that is not ballet or playing that is not a board game however it is probably marginally better than the wordpress version. Starry AI was pretty good as it made beautiful images but did seem to struggle with 2 characters and different depths (see previous AI blog). Pollo AI made a great breast cancer awareness themed costume on a dancer. Canva has some free image generation that made some pretty decent belly dancer images, not amazing but perfectly usable.

What kind of image are you thinking of Grok? Clearly not what I had in mind! (Unless it was my spelling mistake that caused the issue - is there some lewd meaning of 'charcters' that I am unfalmilar with?)

Writing

I tried using chatGPT to write my breast cancer blog piece in the voice of my previous blog posts over the last 12 years, inputting the research sources I had found while scouring scholarly databases but it proved to be total waste of time. It did not use the linked articles but referenced made of up research that sounded similar to what was on the linked pages. 

It also made my voice a little flakier than I would like to think it is! So I wrote it myself but used the aforementioned AI image from Pollo as imagery.

I have found AI helpful in helping me organise my kids course in a better way. I wrote the course myself in 2017, before any AI was available to the public but it helped me identify topics that I might want to expand more on and how to better group material together so it flowed more logically. So it functioned well for giving me editorial notes so to speak. 

The Napkin AI program though is incredible! If you have to present information on any topic in a more colourful way then it is super useful, it is so easy to use and by far the most reliable practcal and useful AI tool I have used. I inputed lists, sequences, ideas I had written and it popped out simple infographics and flow charts etc.

Napkin is amazing at taking your writing and making visuals out of it - this is it's interpretation of one of my paragraphs in my teaching children's dance course.

Idea elaboration / collaboration

When I used chatGPT inputing a creative idea I had about a scene, it was pretty great at fleshing it out and making suggestions I hadn't thought of, so this is the best use of it I have found so far in terms of belly dancers using it to their advantage. Inputing some idea for a costume or choreography or show and having it assist in coming up with interesting details.

Music

I have only briefly tried the music generating AI’s I tried Suno and 1 other of whose name I have forgotten and neither was able to provide a piece of music with an arabic beat or sound on request. It does not seem to be a genre that is covered as yet however it could be that I did not find the right prompts to use. Songsens however looks intriguing for song translation but I have yet to check it against a native speaker - let me know if you have and what your results were.

"AI-Generated art and music

AI's involvement in creative processes raises questions about copyright ownership and infringement.

AI's capability to generate art and music also stirs ethical and legal debates. An example is the AI-developed artwork "Portrait of Edmond de Belamy," created by Obvious, a Paris-based collective, which sold for $432,500 at Christie's. This event sparked discussions about who should be credited as the artist – the AI, the developers, or the dataset's creators." Generative AI TAFE NSW course.

This is a rapidly evolving space and a bit of a wild west at the moment. It will be interesting to see how issues of copyright and creativity are handled in teh future.

This is my initial response to these tools. If I find great uses of any of them on more in depth inspection then I will post again. So much depends on learning the best prompts for each system to get the best results and I have only scratched the surface of each of these. Be sure to subscribe if you are wanting to know more!

What are your thoughts on using AI? What questions would you like answered? What AI tools have you found useful to your belly dancing ? Comment below.