This week, at its annual software conference, Google released an AI tool called Try It On, which acts as a virtual dressing room: Upload images of yourself while shopping for clothes online, and Google will show you what you might look like in a selected garment. Curious to play around with the tool, we began uploading images of famous men—Vance, Sam Altman, Abraham Lincoln, Michelangelo’s David, Pope Leo XIV—and dressed them in linen shirts and three-piece suits. Some looked almost dapper. But when we tested a number of articles designed for women on these famous men, the tool quickly adapted: Whether it was a mesh shirt, a low-cut top, or even just a T-shirt, Google’s AI rapidly spun up images of the vice president, the CEO of OpenAI, and the vicar of Christ with breasts.
It’s not just men: When we uploaded images of women, the tool repeatedly enhanced their décolletage or added breasts that were not visible in the original images. In one example, we fed Google a photo of the now-retired German chancellor Angela Merkel in a red blazer and asked the bot to show us what she would look like in an almost transparent mesh top. It generated an image of Merkel wearing the sheer shirt over a black bra that revealed an AI-generated chest.
Sounds like this is going tits up.
now-retired German chancellor Angela Merkel in a red blazer and asked the bot to show us what she would look like in an** almost transparent mesh top**. It generated an image of Merkel wearing the sheer shirt over a black bra that revealed an AI-generated chest.
First, why do such a request on Angela Merkel at all? Also isn’t the output what they requested in the first place?
- Testing
- If it doesn’t know what a part of your body looks like, it shouldn’t generate one. Especially because the training material of half naked women is 99% (super)models. So not realistic at all.
So, you’d prefer that the system require you to upload nudes of yourself first?
I’d prefer a system that just says “Sorry, I don’t have enough information to generate a realistic picture.” etc.
But that’s no fun at all!
Most people want a system that lets them dress politicians in lame, opposite-sex, revealing clothing. Why else would such a system exist? Nobody cares what they (themselves) would look like in such clothes!
I’m sure in the 2.0 version there will be a “chest” slider—due to popular demand!
I read and thought about it as a “virtual dressing room: Upload images of yourself while shopping for clothes online, and Google will show you what you might look like in a selected garment”. I’d imagine people wanting to imagine Marx as a Pimp would just ask their favorite Chatbots to generate those.
Yeah these things are Rorschach amplifiers. It tells you a lot about the person writing the prompt.
Part of it is likely that she is a famous woman who is not known for being sexualized and is considered a public figure. No one wants to have the scientific standard be “I used pics of this girl I had a crush on” so I imagine famous people are good to pick from. I imagine Merkel also doesn’t have a lot of bikini pics AI can draw from (some amount of swimming pics are unfortunately always available for public figures for some reason) so you can be sure it’s generated them from nothing. If you used a famous model, there may be a possibility it is using pics of them to model their chest. If you’re testing what it does with random inputs, using Merkel is probably a good option.
As far as the output being what was requested, I think the issue can vary depending on your view of AI so I am just going to leave that part unanswered because if it’s a problem or not relies so much on your priors.
“This is a machine that shows a picture of a person wearing a garment.”
Uploads a picture of a person and a picture of a garment.
Gasps in shock and indignation as it shows a picture of that person wearing that garment.
No amount of preparation or warning can prepare you for the sight that is JD Vance’s massive hate-filled titties.
Damn, so we’re back to 1999 already?
Malcovich!
MalcovICH, maaaalcovich 😘
Sounds like a boon for trans people… and a sensationalized title:
When we attempted to “try on” some products explicitly labeled as swimsuits and lingerie, or to upload photos of young schoolchildren and certain high-profile figures (including Donald Trump and Kamala Harris), the tool would not allow us to.
Google’s own policy requires shoppers to upload images that meet the company’s safety guidelines. That means users cannot upload “adult-oriented content” or “sexually explicit content,” and should use images only of themselves or images that they “have permission to use.”
The reporter admits to having broken those policies, then cries foul when photos of 14+ year olds get a virtual breast augmentation.
Unpaywalled
About 97% less salacious than you’d guess from the headline.
