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Captured or AI Created? Tech Ethics of Photography - Noah Wetzel (EP 40)

Captured or AI Created? Tech Ethics of Photography - Noah Wetzel (EP 40)

The In-Between Tech and Trust Podcast vor 1 Woche

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35:05

️ Noah Wetzel, Photographer

What happens to AI trust when the most real photographs are the
ones people refuse to believe? Noah Wetzel spent nine months and
600 hours preparing to capture 84 seconds of a total solar
eclipse - then had to prove the result came out of a camera. This
one is for anyone whose genuine work now meets default suspicion,
and anyone deciding where AI belongs in a craft that has to stay
real.

Episode overview

Noah captured a wingsuit athlete flying through totality in
Spain: flashes triggered from a mile away, a subject moving at
150 miles per hour, two frames per athlete, no second takes. The
conversation follows what came after the shutter - viewers at his
own shows assuming the work is fake, magazine editors auditing
every edit in his raw files, and a disclaimer on Instagram
stating his photos are camera-captured. He is blunt about his own
AI use: hundreds of hours on ChatGPT planning the shot, AI saving
him days in processing, and a hard line at the frame itself.
Where that line sits, and whether it survives cameras that can
generate content on demand, stays open until the end.

Key themes

Why extraordinary authentic images now read as fake by
default, and who ends up carrying the burden of proof

Where AI strengthens a craft and where it disqualifies the
result - the captured versus created distinction Noah refuses to
blur

What "the ethics of photography" means when every edit is
contestable and everyone draws the line differently

What happens to that line when the camera itself can add what
was never there

How you perform inside 84 seconds when preparation is the
only thing left to trust

About the guest

Noah Wetzel is an adventure and action-sports photographer, and
the person behind what may be the most complex photograph ever
attempted: a Red Bull Air Force wingsuit athlete crossing a total
solar eclipse. The detail that matters for this episode is what
he does after the work is done - he attaches a statement to his
published images confirming they were captured by a camera,
because the audience's default assumption has flipped. He argues
the case for craftsmanship from inside a working life that uses
AI daily.

Chapters

[00:00] 600 hours for 84 seconds

[04:33] Trusting preparation when nothing can be paused

[16:30] What generative AI changes about believing a
photograph

[24:02] Why real work now carries a disclaimer

[31:41] Where the in-camera line starts to dissolve

Links

Noah Wetzel's website / portfolio — ⁠www.wetzelgallery.com⁠

Noah Wetzel on Instagram, ⁠www.instagram.com/noahwetzel⁠

Noah Wetzel on Facebook: ⁠www.facebook.com/noahwetzelphoto⁠

[LINK: Related episode — suggest a Pillar 1 episode on trust
in AI systems, Eva to match to episode number]

Eva Simone Lihotzky on LinkedIn -
https://www.linkedin.com/in/evalihotzky/

Documentary Released on PBS Recently - April 8th 2024
Total Solar Eclipse in Hill Country Texas. The film has received
17 film festival awards and been aired 1700+ times in the last
month across 39 different states in the United States. You can
watch the documentary online here:

https://www.pbs.org/show/eclipse-outlaw-chase/