Midjourney, the venerable purveyor of digital wonders, has unveiled its latest creation: the External Editor. This potent tool, heralded as “a powerful new instrument for unlocking the vaults of your imagination,” was unleashed upon the world on a fateful Thursday. Reserved for a select few at this juncture, the AI-driven wizardry of this editor empowers users to import their own images and then sculpt, metamorphose, and transmogrify them into an array of artistic incarnations.
In days of yore, denizens of the digital realm could submit a reference image to Midjourney via its alpha web abode or through the hallowed halls of its discord sanctum. Alas, these humble supplicants were at the mercy of the generation model, unable to make any alterations to the original source image. But lo! With the advent of the External Editor, a new age dawns. Henceforth, intrepid souls shall possess the power to append, tweak, relocate, resize, expunge, and revive specific elements within their images. Furthermore, they may clothe the entire tableau anew in a diverse panoply of styles – transforming it from a mere photograph into pointillism, impressionism, or even anime. It is whispered that this mystic art also works its arcane wonders upon doodles and sketches.
The coveted mantle of the new tool does not rest upon every shoulder as of yet. In a proclamation scribed upon the annals of their blog, the company declared that this marvel shall be granted solely to those who have gallantly subscribed to their service for a year or more, or those who have begotten 10,000 images through the Midjourney platform – the custodians of loyalty. Such measures, it is hoped, shall stem the tides of copyright transgression that once inundated the dominions upon the unveiling of xAI’s Grok 2. Yet, there are whispers of a rogue soul named Halim Alrasihi, who dared to transmute the visage of a model using the External Editor, reaffirming the intractable nature of AI-generated imagery.
Let it be known that those who would venture into this realm must first meet the age stipulations laid forth by the company. Furthermore, they are bound to adhere to the strictures of all applicable laws, their Community Guidelines, and sundry other policies. The company, in its wisdom, retains the prerogative to cull content at its discretion, cautioning that even seemingly innocuous prompts may find themselves entangled in the web of their filters.
David Holz, luminary architect of Midjourney, espoused further wisdom upon the realms of discourse within the annals of the company’s Discord demesne. “All these novelties are but nascent, and we aspire to furnish the community and our human custodians a gentle transition…” he mused. Indeed, users have embarked upon a cavalcade of creations, both awe-inspiring and disquieting. Behold the works of Dreaming Tulpa, who imbued the Mona Lisa with the vestments of gothic aesthetics – not the lofty epoch of European artistry, but the realm of Hot Topic mall goth.
A zeitgeist of altered reality has descended upon the digital tapestry, as exemplified by the incorrigible near. Here, a cake surrenders to a phalanx of GPUs in the visage of Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. “Yesterday saw the last vestiges of reality vanish into the ether,” near proclaimed, a harbinger of the shifting landscapes wrought by these chimerical enhancements. Whether this perturbation will yield naught but defaced masterpieces or spawn a legion of memes remains shrouded in the mists of uncertainty.
Behold, for Midjourney stands not alone in this realm of metamorphic sorcery. Gemini, ChatGPT (emissary of Dall-E), Grok, and Copilot all bear the standard of image generation and manipulation, each offering their own tapestries woven with the threads of AI.
