Winning photo turns out to be made by AI

A photographer wanted to provoke discussion, put it to the test and submitted a photo taken by Ai. He took first place without the judges noticing.

Jury consternation

A surprising entry from the photographer Boris Eldagsen, Pseudomnesia | The Electrician, spectacularly won first prize in the Free category at the Sony World Photography Awards. To the dismay of the jury, the German photographer declined the prize. Especially when they heard why. Because what he had submitted was not a photo at all, but a lifelike image composed by a generative AI. And as such it did not qualify for the competition, reason for Eldagsen to reject the award.

Photography in the world of AI

Boris Eldagsen, a 52-year-old photographer from Berlin, was confronted with the rise of AI like so many in creative professions. To provoke discussion, he had an AI create an image that looked lifelike and submitted it to the Sony World Photography Awards photo competition.

Expert jury denies

This was of course humiliating for the expert jury, who clearly did not realize that the entry in question was a product of an AI. They claimed afterwards that they did realize that this was an image generated by an artificial intelligence.

That story is of course not very plausible, why would they award first place to an AI image if there is clearly a photography competition? It is a pity that they did not openly admit that they had been fooled.

World famous in one fell swoop

Eldagsen has proposed donating the prize money, about five thousand euros, to a photography festival in the Ukrainian city of Odessa. And as for global fame, Eldagsen has even made it to the BBC and numerous other media outlets with audiences of millions. This publicity probably dwarfs the exposure he would have had from winning the award.