Flower Hour,  Flowers,  London,  Photographic techniques,  Themed galleries

Gallery: flower power AI style

October 23, 2025 / 39 Comments

You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.

Abraham Lincoln

Photography can be a tricky medium. To all intents and purposes, it appears to provide a faithful representation of a true scene. But ever since it was first invented photographers have found ways to fool the viewer. Creating double exposures in the darkroom, adding details by hand or removing them … There were many tricks and many reasons for using them, including propaganda and even the rewriting of history.

In recent years digital photography has made manipulation much easier, and much harder to spot, although it often still required skill and patience. But most recently, AI has made it arguably too easy, with the result that it is possible to produce an image that might well ‘fool all the people all the time’.

I just invested in the 2026 (yes already!) update to my Photoshop Elements software. It has some potentially very useful features, and also some that I suspect I’ll use less often. One of the latter is an AI-driven capacity to add an object to your image by simply circling the area you want it to appear and writing a brief description. I’m not generally a fan of manipulating images to that extent, and certainly don’t like the idea of passing such a shot off as all my own work. But I thought it would be fun to play with, and to share the results with ‘full disclosure’.

Insects and flowers

For this post I’ve used some photos taken last weekend in my local park, Walpole, where there is currently an inspired wildflower-style planting of cosmos, sprinkled with a few other species. I initially edited them in my usual fashion: some cropping, brightening, perhaps a soft-focus vignette. I then went further and asked AI to add an insect. Where necessary I then gave the resulting image a final touch-up to ensure the new addition seemed at home in the environment. This mainly involved blurring the insects slightly as they looked unnaturally sharp compared with the rest of the image.

I’ve used the ‘image compare’ block to show you both versions, so you can see what is real and what is not. Look carefully; one of the flowers also has a real insect! I’m linking this to Terri’s new Flower Hour challenge, as the flowers themselves are all definitely real.

Would I use this feature on a regular basis? Almost certainly not. Much as I enjoy editing and ‘playing with’ my photos, adding something that wasn’t there seems a step too far. And even if I wanted to play such tricks, it’s hard to achieve a believably natural look to the resulting image. But, never say never!







39 Comments

  • Klausbernd

    October 25, 2025 at 15:25 Reply

    Dear Sarah
    When we look at a picture, the picture is important. It doesn’t matter how it is produced. And for us, an AI-produced picture is neither better nor worse than a conventional picture.
    For us, it is important if a picture makes us look a little bit longer at it, and makes us think. Therefore, we like non-representational art. But what we see it’s that most AI-produced pictures on the net are horribly kitschy.
    Happy weekend
    The Fab Four of Cley
    🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

    • Sarah Wilkie

      October 25, 2025 at 17:30 Reply

      Thank you, that’s an interesting way to look at AI. For me it is fine to produce an AI image as long as you tell people that’s how you took it. Adding a bee to a flower is harmless enough, but it can too easily be used to create false information, e.g. by placing a person somewhere they were not. I do agree that totally AI-created photos tend to be kitschy and are usually very easy to spot!

  • Annie Berger

    October 25, 2025 at 00:18 Reply

    Sarah, How scary to think how easily photos and we, too, can be manipulated! Your feature photo is my favorite – I’m old fashioned, I guess, and prefer the unadorned image.

    • Sarah Wilkie

      October 25, 2025 at 10:53 Reply

      Thanks Annie, and yes, that’s partly the point I was making 😀 I’m glad you like the feature photo – don’t those flowers make a lovely slpash of colour in the late autumn park?!

  • Anne Sandler

    October 24, 2025 at 12:34 Reply

    Very interesting experiment Sarah. I’m wondering what my comment would be if you hadn’t told us you were using AI in the beginning and just told us at the end. I think the placed insects look out of place and don’t fit with the original composition. But then I knew they were AI additions. You might want to do a post where we need to guess which is AI and which photos aren’t.

  • Sue

    October 24, 2025 at 10:22 Reply

    As Margaret said “Well, it’s all very clever, but really … what is the point? ” But I’m sure you knew that’s what I would say! Well done for having a bit of a play and I get that you wouldn’t do this generally so that’s fine by me…..

  • thesimlux

    October 24, 2025 at 04:52 Reply

    I’m with you on this one. The little buggies look convincing at first blush, but upon closer look they don’t pass the eye test. I think you and I try to capture the moment, and use post as a means to just tweak the levels, colors, focus just a touch where we or the camera was just a bit off.

    • Sarah Wilkie

      October 24, 2025 at 09:09 Reply

      Exactly – it’s that closer look that exposes the fakery! I sometimes do a little more than tweaking but this would be a step too far for me. However it’s interesting to experiment as that helps you to understand where your personal limits fall in this respect.

  • Jane Lurie

    October 23, 2025 at 22:08 Reply

    Terrific post showing the before and after, Sarah. Fun to experiment. The result, as you said, is a bit unnaturally sharp compared to the rest of the image. For those of us that have been photographing for decades, this new world is jarring and fascinating. I am amazed by LR’s AI ability to take out unwanted elements with excellent results.

    • Sarah Wilkie

      October 24, 2025 at 09:08 Reply

      Thanks so much Jane 😊 Yes, experimenting was fun but even if I felt the need to trick people like this, which I don’t, I don’t think the results are quite convincing enough (although I suspect it would be possible to fiddle more in order to make them so). However using AI to take out an unwanted element feels less like ‘cheating’ and I’m sure I’ll use it that way. After all, I already do that with cropping or cloning a patch!

    • Sarah Wilkie

      October 24, 2025 at 09:06 Reply

      I’m not surprised to hear you say that Jo 😀 I promise you, from now on any insects you see in my flowers photos will be ones that I saw too when taking the photo!

  • Anabel @ The Glasgow Gallivanter

    October 23, 2025 at 16:14 Reply

    Lovely flowers and interesting experiment. Some of those are very convincing, others less so. It’s a bit scary that AI might get so good that we can no longer know what is real so I’m quite happy that it hasn’t got there yet!

    • Sarah Wilkie

      October 23, 2025 at 16:27 Reply

      Thanks Anabel 🙂 I found it difficult to make these very convincing because of the super sharpness of the insect images. Maybe I should have told the programme I wanted ones with a slightly soft focus!

  • Monkey's Tale

    October 23, 2025 at 16:03 Reply

    I was quite surprised to see ‘AI’ in your title. While it’s fun to play with sometimes, like you and Margaret said, it’s not the point. It is quite amazing how advanced AI has become though isn’t it? Maggie

    • Sarah Wilkie

      October 24, 2025 at 09:03 Reply

      You’re right, it’s quite amazing how much it has advanced in such a short time. There are other AI features in this software that I may well use from time to time (like helping to remove stray people who have wandered into the background of a shot) but even if they looked more natural I don’t think I’d ever want to play tricks like this on anyone with my photos, and if you tell people you’ve added the element, what’s the point?!

  • Willlow

    October 23, 2025 at 15:30 Reply

    I’m not a professional photographer, but I think it’s fun to play in photoshop. So something like this would be interesting for someone like me who does it for personal reasons. IMHO. Thanks for sharing, Willow

  • margaret21

    October 23, 2025 at 14:25 Reply

    Well, it’s all very clever, but really … what is the point? I find it difficult to, say, get a good shot of an insect on a flower, and when I do manage it, I feel justified in giving myself a pat on the back. If I came home without the shot I’d hoped for, what would be the satisfaction in getting AI to do the business for me? Your play-around has resulted in some nice images, but not all of them convince on closer inspection. You knew I’d say that, didn’t you?😉

    • Sarah Wilkie

      October 23, 2025 at 15:01 Reply

      I feel exactly the same Margaret when I manage an insect plus flower shot, and I totally agree with you that there’s much less satisfaction if you can fake it and also that these shots aren’t always convincing. I’d hoped that my text would make it clear that although I found this an interesting experiment, and am sharing it as such, it’s not an approach I would normally take for exactly those reasons!

Do share your thoughts, I'd love to hear from you! And please include your name in case WP marks you 'anonymous' - thank you