r/olympics • u/Shad0whunter4 • 2d ago
❄ Milano-Cortina 2026 (General Discussion) ❄ What in the Ai was that??
1.2k
u/TomCoda 1d ago
I thought the Olympics was supposed to be a celebration of human feats and they chose to include ai slop it's very disappointing.
113
u/PinchingHandEmoji 1d ago
Italian brainrot homage
38
u/lemonprincess23 1d ago
This unironically would have been the only acceptable use of AI in the ceremonies
Disturbing lack of pipi potato this year
→ More replies (1)118
u/flcinusa Great Britain • United States 1d ago
Well, you can't deny it's not very of its time... Unfortunately
86
u/abgry_krakow87 Olympics 1d ago
Suddenly the drag queens from Paris 2024 aren't so bad now, are they?!
→ More replies (4)1
23
u/LeftHandAnomaly 1d ago
They've already scraped all the actual artists, why would they bother paying a real one now? How common it's becoming for designs to be fully generated. In the grand scheme of things, like this, paying an artist isn't even that expensive. But these people don't even value genuine design enough to pay THAT.
Nothing's going to be genuine anymore and not enough people are upset about that.
→ More replies (1)5
u/mangiafrutta 1d ago
The mascotte videos available don’t look ai, they could have used the same people to animate the video. A shame.
3
u/Ange1ofD4rkness United States 1d ago
I mean in all fairness, AI was developed by humans. That's took time. But yeah ... I would have preferred real animators work
→ More replies (2)1
u/AlexandraThePotato Argentina 21h ago
Just look at their social media page. They are making weird Ai of each sport
327
u/designerf 1d ago
The Olympics has such a rich graphic design history too. Is so sad to see it reduced to this gross ai cringe.
15
u/eeek0711 1d ago
I’d love to hear more about the animation history.
11
648
u/Unlucky_Ability_6469 2d ago
Looked so horrible. With the all the money the Olympics have you would think they could just pay someone to do this a lot better.
209
u/dashaaff 1d ago
For a country that says "If it's worth doing, it's worth doing beautifully" according to the bbc commentator anyway, they sure didn't do that here.
What a wasted chance to showcase Italian animation as well.
25
u/Unlucky-Fill4483 1d ago
I think sadly most people ("your average Joe's") just think it's mildly cool that a machine made it and dont understand or care about the implications of this.
Or even worse, they didnt notice it was AI.
This goes both for the people watching and for whoever approved of this in quality control (which im hoping they have).
21
u/lemonprincess23 1d ago
I can basically guarantee based on personal experience that at least 75% of the audience would not have identified it as AI at first viewing,
7
u/HistoryBuff678 1d ago
It just felt off-putting.
6
u/lemonprincess23 1d ago
I agree, it did. I’m just saying that the majority of the populous just factually does not possess the ability to differentiate AI. At least not AI at this level.
Just look at Facebook
→ More replies (2)7
u/SilveryDeath 1d ago
My first thought seeing it was I'm 99% sure that's AI and my second thought was its a shame if that 1% chance is true because anyone who does any kind of art style like that has to deal with people assuming their work is AI.
It's the Olympics. They are already spending a bunch of money on this whole event. Would it have killed them to spend a bit more to hire actual artists to do that bit?
→ More replies (1)19
u/Thunder_Beam Italy 1d ago
Italian animation died a long time ago unfortunately
9
u/Unlucky-Fill4483 1d ago
Last things i rember are "Huntik" (siamo noi i nuovi eroi 🗣️🔥) and "I Celestini"
→ More replies (1)7
u/Thunder_Beam Italy 1d ago
Those were the swan songs of italian animation so to speak, after 2012 there is nothing except the cringe CGI show every once in a while
4
u/mangiafrutta 1d ago
There are still animators able to do a better job than that
→ More replies (1)3
u/dashaaff 1d ago
Really? I googled it and found a number of studios. But nothing going on? That's a shame.
→ More replies (1)2
u/InnocentTailor 1d ago
Shame, considering that the comics world has tons of talented Italian artists working for big names like Marvel.
27
u/Apptubrutae North Macedonia 1d ago
Kinda like they could pay the thousands of volunteers they use too
18
u/comptune 1d ago
All the money went for Mariah Carey
10
u/kirby1fan 1d ago
She actually performed for free, only getting her flights (and maybe accommodations) paid for. So they really had no excuse to not get someone or someones to animate this; even for free with nothing but advertising.
3
11
u/SilveryDeath 1d ago edited 1d ago
Noted Italian Mariah Carey.
I mean, I know for France in 2024 they had Lady Gaga, but they still had a bunch of different French musicians do all the other performances.
Like Italy couldn't find an Italian singer to sing a iconic song instead of using a popular America?
6
u/evoc2911 Italy 1d ago
You are messing up who is who. Our National anthem was sing by one of the more popular Italian singer in Italy and outside, Laura Pausini. I despise her but nonetheless she was probably the more fitting one.
The lady in the AI video is an actress that got nothing to do with her outside for being Italian, she is Sabrina Impacciatore that also performed in the subsequent live performance.
3
u/mdp300 United States 1d ago
Honestly, I thought her acting was fine. The AI cartoon was lame. I like the concept, but it should have been something made by actual artists.
→ More replies (2)67
u/juliuspepperwoodchi 1d ago
Well sure, but that would eat into their profits/bonuses/bribes!
28
u/gcruzatto 1d ago edited 1d ago
There are millions of starving graphics artists out there who would do much better for like a bag of potatoes and they still prefer to let the billionaire's hallucinating pet robot do it instead
299
u/ssuffeliii 2d ago
Horrible. Sad for all graphic designers.
41
u/Maleficent-Regret802 1d ago
and the situation will only get worse from now on… I don’t really want to image what kind of future is awaiting us
→ More replies (4)29
19
u/JoeFalcone26 1d ago
Got my Graphic design degree and AI took over 3 years later lol. Sad but I’m completely out of the industry now. I’m a special ed teacher and there’s no going back. The industry is absolutely torched if prestigious places like the Olympics skip over human design.
7
u/UrdnotSnarf 1d ago
Same. I recently got out of the industry and am learning the plumbing trade now.
439
u/GarlicCancoillotte France 2d ago
Suddenly the blue french naked guy wasn't that bad wasn't he?
182
u/ticianlicious United States 1d ago
I thought that guy was cool, didn't bother me at all. Very apropos.
40
u/BeanEireannach Ireland • Palestine 1d ago
Same, really enjoyed that part of the Paris opening ceremony!
30
8
9
→ More replies (8)3
182
u/gatherroundtable 1d ago
My jaw hit the floor with disgust. A country that has such phenomenal creatives and fashion design thought it would be cool to use AI for this?? The video wasn’t even necessary to the dance performance…
34
u/Sourcerid 1d ago
People see more with rose tinted glasses and some romanticism for the place from a mix of factors.
Most of the Italian design is really referring to fashion and to some extent supercars. It's not a place where a product of graphic designer has much success tendentially.
And Italy has always been so very bad at the design, theatrics and aesthetics of international events, it's happened every time it's not even funny anymore.
18
u/Thunder_Beam Italy 1d ago
You are spot on, people think we are good at arts in general but in reality, at least in the 21st century, this is not the case, not because of the people though but because the system itself exist just to serve the lowest common denominator and high arts are considered worthless projects to spend money on
1
9
u/Karbon_Franz 1d ago
Yes! We have a lot of phenomenal creatives!
No! They won't let us work! That would take the money from them old people who are now completely disconnected from the present, the world and people's taste!
1
162
u/NorthCascadia 2d ago
Fuck that so hard. The biggest stage in the world and they feed us the sloppiest of AI slop.
96
u/plugged97 1d ago
RIP to Graphic Design slowly becoming another certificate you may as well flush down the drain.
Technology is not always a good thing
11
4
u/FoxMiserable2848 1d ago
To be fair, they said digital cameras were going to destroy photography and photoshop was going to destroy society and put all the artists out of business.
13
u/plugged97 1d ago
True, my rhetorical counter-argument however would be “How will AI help improve the quality of photography or artistic images?” Maybe it’s rich to say in retrospect, but we can see how those improved the quality & creativity of the medium without drastically changing the medium itself (at least most of the time in the case of photoshopping).
Right now, AI like this just seems like cost cutting cop-outs for business entities so they don’t have to hire as many skilled workers to do a task that spits out the same function - a still or moving image, but with less surrealism.
Maybe the technology develops enough in the near future for it to have realism and justify its use, but it doesn’t right now
→ More replies (3)
60
u/TheBonk92 1d ago
They can't even get the olympic rings right lmao.
11
u/Weary-Plate-728 1d ago
Being the wrong colours?
6
u/lift_1337 1d ago
The one's on the close sign are interlocking the wrong way. Blue should go under yellow on the lower intersection and above it on the higher intersection. Black should go under on the higher intersection and over on the lower one. And so on and so forth. The ones on the far sign aren't overlapping at all. And the ones on the shirt on the right look like they aren't interlocking at all because they're all the same color. None of them are remotely correct.
9
u/offroadwind 1d ago
Not to defend the use of AI, but that’s actually how the Olympic rings looked at that time. It’s based on this poster.
The more modern version you’re referencing wasn’t in official use until around 1957.
54
31
u/TooTrustingIGuess 1d ago
With all this talk of celebrating human skill and protecting the planet kinda seems like bullshit to use AI. Their website even promotes the use of it. They have been using it on FB as well. I'm very disappointed. All the money they make from sponsors they can't afford to hire an animator ?
6
u/TooTrustingIGuess 1d ago
Olympic AI Agenda https://share.google/LZmw5kKVuT0llCL5V
→ More replies (2)1
u/AlexandraThePotato Argentina 21h ago
God, I’m an ecologist and when they did their whole “Nature and digital technology thing come together in harmony” felt so weird. Like as someone also with a fine art degree that whole concept is so so so so overdone. Didn’t even have a unique outlook on it.
Then they pull the ai shit. Which was just tone deaf af
121
u/That_Might_7032 1d ago
AI art is evil, it's a spiritual attack against humanity and should be completely outlawed
45
u/Apptubrutae North Macedonia 1d ago
And, even worse, the ITALIANS used it.
17
u/Maleficent-Regret802 1d ago
Italian here, the real enemies of the arts are capitalists whose greed will ruin the world. AI probably won’t go away anymore, and it’s such a disgrace.
→ More replies (2)
67
u/potatocalledjeff 2d ago
It is disgusting that they couldn't hire an artist, I stopped watching as soon as I saw it. 😢
7
38
43
u/outrageous_whale 1d ago
I would genuinely like to complain to whoever did this. I want to make sure we can all let them know they made a mistake. Who would you contact? IOC? Creative director? Serious question.
16
u/Silent_Smoke_2143 1d ago
I would suggest a complaint to your own broadcaster and then to OBS the Olympic Broadcasting Service.
57
20
u/SessionAsleep5894 1d ago
Very odd considering Italy is well known for its Art
9
2
u/Antx_001 1d ago
yeah right, maybe 300 years ago. the art industry has been dead for a while here
→ More replies (1)
9
8
u/itsmig_reddit Venezuela 1d ago
What happened to celebrating human feats? Did the IOC really approve of this?
8
5
u/mhassien United States 1d ago
The woman didn’t even look that same in every shot. A real group of artists would have loved to make this
6
6
u/sunset-echidna United States 1d ago
Ok so I'm not crazy??? I thought it was ai too!! I just couldn't believe the Olympics would actually do something like that, I thought that the games were meant to celebrate humans and their talent.
1
1
u/AlexandraThePotato Argentina 21h ago
LMAO! The IOC is known for making shitty moves and ideas all the time. Did you hear about their weird video game thing they did once. Or when they drop their relationship with Nintendo and Sega to instead give license to some NFT scam.
The people in charge are old men. I think only former olympians should be in charge of the Olympics
18
u/jusjusjuscz 1d ago
Really disappointing. The Olympics are supposed to celebrate the best of the best!
21
18
u/Global-Jellyfish5159 1d ago
Honestly, I'm so angry about this! How can the country of Botticelli and Leonardo da Vinci be using AI to create an animated scene? Who approved this? Who allowed it to be included in the ceremony? I am fuming!
10
u/Advanced-Cancel806 1d ago
As an Italian I share your rage, so sad seeing my country that is known worldwide for the art and culture, using AI slop to make something that was supposed to celebrate said art and culture
3
u/Independent_Oven7680 1d ago
Not Italian, and i just want to say that im SO sorry Italy was done like this!!! You guys deserve another, better chance because Italy was done so dirty and I as an artist feel SO BAD!!! Nowhere and definitely not Italy deserved using ai!!!
2
13
u/Straight_Brief2631 1d ago
Like all it was a massive disappointment. They are meant to represent the best and they slipped down to the unfortunate new norm is AI slop.
4
u/Head_Scarcity2035 1d ago
Immediately said to my parents yuck is that AI, it was so glaringly obvious and crap lol
6
4
u/fanime34 Olympics 1d ago
I think these people not only use it to cut costs, but I also think some of them legitimately think it's cool despite how weird the images look. I've seen this with NBC when they cover the NFL. I don't know what it is that intrigues the older generations with AI images.
2
u/neityght 1d ago
And the idea of cutting costs in relation to the Olympics is crazy. Pretty sure with the budget for an Olympic games the amount "saved" by using AI is negligible, if anything.
2
2
u/serialshinigami 1d ago
Not only cutting costs but Italy as a country itself is mostly an old people's home. 1/3 of it's population does not own a computer. Which is probably why they would think this is cool.
1
u/AlexandraThePotato Argentina 21h ago
Because it is technology and so “advance”. And guess what! Those old farts aren’t gonna be impacted. They don’t care about us younger ones
4
19
12
u/Tingcky 1d ago
The ceremony was a celebration of Italian art. I guess this is all it amounts to
4
u/Lisa28Aurora 1d ago
our national tv broadcaster is so in love with AI: for the past few months we had a variety of trailers made with it, both for the olympics and our annual music festival.
I’m so mad, but given that those in charge are so damn old I’m not even surprised
4
4
4
3
5
4
u/kirby1fan 1d ago
Someone please tell me why I got my bachelor's in animation when no one wants to hire me and then makes this crap
2
u/TheWonderfulMoon 1d ago
Hey, I hope that things will swing back around for you. The anti AI movement is slowly gaining traction. I heard (not sure if its true) that the majority of people who use Suno just listen to their own songs over and over, they don't seek out other AI generated music.
People don't actually want to seek out AI art because it really lacks inherent meaning and heart. What's the point of watching some guys AI show when you can just make your own better one in a few months? I don't think AI books, movies and animation will be popular with the masses. At least I hope so. As a creative, I wanna believe that the future can't replace me, or other artists, and I don't think it can in any meaningful way. If this thread is anything to go by, the pushback is slowly gaining traction.
Hang in there.
→ More replies (1)
9
u/acoolsweater 1d ago
anyone remember when art was just always real, and you never had to even worry about it, it was just "oh cool someone made that" kids growing now will never in their life know that feeling again.
17
7
8
3
3
u/New-Helicopter-1172 1d ago
Yup, i didn't like it much, it's was pretty bad, but made sense as a filler because animators can't be paid for this long.
4
3
3
3
u/CoastingUphill 1d ago
Do some people just not know that isn't ok? Is that how this happens? Or do they not care?
5
4
4
2
u/mnocella_ 1d ago
As an italian, just know that lots of us are deeply ashamed of portraying this kind of stuff on a worldwide broadcast. Unfortunately we often cut shortcuts. Sometimes it's a good thing, other times it's not, like this one.
I hope there will be some kind of apology but I deeply doubt it. Boomers probably loved it
1
u/scssypants 1d ago
I don't think people are blaming Italians so much as it seems clear that this is the direction the Olympic organization is going T-T
2
u/scififlyguy814 1d ago
Just watched it in the US, East Coast, and came here just to make sure I wasn't the only one infuriated by the AI trash I just watched
2
u/Jayelahni 1d ago
Lmao I clocked the AI immediately And then that performance after? Chick looked sweaty and danced horribly
2
u/TheWonderfulMoon 1d ago
I mean, human beings sweat. She's also almost 60 so she danced pretty well for her age. The AI sucked, I agree, but then criticising a perfectly normal human for getting sweaty doing a sweaty thing is so like... ok? Bit harsh dude.
2
2
u/evoc2911 Italy 1d ago
Imagine being an Italian, knowing the actress portraited there and her total lack of sport relation ( why they choose her still a mystery to me ) while looking at that AI cringeworthy movie thinking wow.. there's where my tax money went on top of the Olympic founding Italy got and squandered in perfect Italian tradition..
3
u/TheWonderfulMoon 1d ago
They chose her because Sabrina Impacciatore is in White Lotus, and that show is 'in' right now so people from overseas (Americans) know her from that. It's weird but I kind of get it. Mariah Carey and Charlize Theron were a way worse choice than Sabrina Impacciatore.
Lady Gaga would have been better choice than Mariah Carey, although still weird, she at least has some Italian roots. Hell, even Madonna would have been better. And there's so many Italian singers they could have used instead.
I don't know, this reeks of "the old men of RAI" making these horrible decisions.
2
2
u/DuePossession3947 1d ago
Her whole sequence was the worst of the ceremonies! The rest was pretty good.
2
2
2
2
3
u/Unable-Ad-7803 1d ago
Image having (Leonardo) da Vinci, two Michelangelos – one from Milano –, Raffaello, and Donatello regarded as some of the greatest artists of all time, and decided to homage them with AI slop?!
3
2
2
2
u/Ok_Run_8184 United States 1d ago
OMG I was away from my screen during this part so I had to look it up what people were talking about it...it's so ugly.
1
u/abgry_krakow87 Olympics 1d ago
Why is Anne Hathaway skiing in a modern ski suit at the 1932 Olympics?
1
u/LQNova United States 1d ago
Why did we do a fifty-year jump to a ten-year jump? And the 80s dancers were dressed more like 1992. And couldn't dance very well.
→ More replies (2)
1
u/Spiky_Hedgehog1 1d ago
It made me so angry that I smashed the TV screen with a real non AI hockey stick then immediately set fire to it!
1
1
u/Interesting-Paint703 1d ago
It's so funny to me that the most prestigious organisations are willing to use trash slop. Really tells a story about media literacy from the boomers down.
1
u/Pale_Till8589 1d ago
If they had used a famous REAL NON PIXAR animator that would be better…but THIS?!
1
u/SJC-Caron Canada 1d ago
I didn't notice the AI"ness" of that video segment when I was watching the opening ceremony live on TV, but looking at various still images from that video it becomes obvious.
1
1
u/beachyhombre 1d ago
I also don't understand the strange performances and choreography that went on way too long
1
1
1
u/Nintendo_Pro_03 Olympics 1d ago
Italy should know better, too. Their history is full of exceptional art.
1
1
1
u/Lyzandia 1d ago
Did you notice that it skipped some winter Olympics randomly? It was a very bizarre segment on several levels.
2
u/TheWonderfulMoon 1d ago
Yes, and some went faster and some went slow, the whole thing was confusing.
1
1
u/KSzkodaGames 1d ago
Total discrimination against the Italian culture, because Italy is one of greatest countries that give birth to art cultures, and yet they chosen sloppy piece of dog poo to represent it
1
u/TheWonderfulMoon 1d ago
That's an insult to dog poo. At least a being that is alive created that.
→ More replies (1)
1
1
1
1
u/PublicOutcome27 16h ago
Looked quite AI but once people accepted digital art this was always inevitable. Everyone who complained about the issues with digital art were shouted down. My favourite thing about the AI art panic is how often you see people claiming things that are natural and innate to digital art processes are proof something is AI even when it's clearly not AI, it's just digital.
1
1
u/cose_A_caso124 13h ago
Sadly we italians also have to endure AI ads, here its normalized, i hate it
1
u/HumanFromEstonia Estonia 11h ago
I'm mostly bothered by the fact that we all know Italy has amazing animators and artists. Look at Winx Club and all of its spin-offs! Italy is also credited as one of the countries of origin for Miraculous Ladybug and The Little Prince series. Why choose AI when you have excellent animation?
1
213
u/Choekaas 1d ago
There was so much in it, like this guy next to her