It was pretty obvious to me... however, as AI improves, it's going to be very difficult.

I don't bother with them because they look too perfect. I just use them for ideas only.

I noticed the very same things when I got back to crocheting a year ago!!

Some of the AI ones, apart from being too smooth and similarly lit, if you look at those which are on hangers, there seem to be some artefacts from the AI process on the hooks of the hangers as well, which could help identify some less obvious fakes out there sometime. Loved your demonstrations with the whale - and how an unscrupulous company/individual might choose to illustrate and advertise these fake patterns. Thanks for such a great video!

I'm honestly not surprised that the stitch count was off so much: ChatGPT is horrible at math. I'm very familiar with AI imagines so none of these were hard for me to guess, but I'm gonna walk through my thoughts on how they can be easy to spot with familiarity. 1) Biggest thing you’ll notice across all AI generated “crochet” pieces, when they don’t feature people or realistic backgrounds, is that they have the same lighting. It’s usually a single light source, it’s coming from the side, attempting to have that “realistic” touch with the lighting and shadows, but that’s not how real world photographs look when the average person takes one. People either use flash and things get washed out or a bit weird, or there are multiple light sources (lamps and natural light from windows) or it’s taken outside and it’s a bit too bright and things get washed out. And when photos of work get taken a bit more professionally, the crochet piece is going to be properly and fully lit from the front or at least artistically lit from the side, but will never have deep obscuring shadows. Just look between the two penguins. Why would the penguin on the right be a good photo when half of it is practically in shadow? 2) Backgrounds - as in there aren’t any when it’s just objects on their own. The “surface” the object is sitting on and the background are the same. A blurry ombre of a color in soft focus that mergers from the horizontal to vertical. There’s no real wall or table or object it’s on. It just exists in a fake space. Professional photographers can set up draped paper to get a similar effect, so it just “existing in space” but when professionals do it the objects are fully and properly and brightly lit. AI images just don’t even try. Possibly to hide the bad details in the stitches. 3) If you can’t tell that the object is fake, if there’s any object around that isn’t the crochet object itself it will help give it away. The bookmark one was easy to spot because the writing in the book was fake and unreadable. With the sweater the buttons weren’t real buttons, they were fake, fuzzy “crochet” buttons. With the shawl on the hanger the hook itself was small, fuzzy and it was impossible to figure out what the white shiny blob it was hanging on was. It wasn’t hanging on a real wall, it was hanging out against another fake ombre vertical surface. 4) The texture. Not just the stitches that are impossible, like some of the examples, but when there are “real” stitches there’s something a bit off, a bit unreal and that’s the yarn. AI cannot replicate yarn texture. There’s no real fuzz, no plies, no halo. The birthday hat had the impossible stitches at the bottom, but the passable double-crochet stitches, or whatever they were supposed to be, had a very flat, crushed, almost melted look. And when you actually look at the stitches of the penguin: lack of a consistent texture to the yarn between the body and wings, and on the body the stitches don’t actually look like single crochet, they’re really blurry and not in the same way a really fuzzy yarn is, but in a weird sharp way. And they’re very V shaped with unrealistic gaps (good tight amigurumi does not have gaps that big), and blackness behind the stitches instead of the white fuzz of a poly-fil stuffing is confusing and off. 5) Not just the absence of a video, but there’s only ever one image. No secondary images in another color way or from another angle. AI is really bad at recreating the same thing more than once. 6) And as you pointed out: the colors. They always pop, but they’re almost always the same from image to image. The same sort of saturation and vibrancy that you don't find in real yarns. And when you do find them...they'll look like actual yarn, and not fuzzy-sharp stitches where you couldn't begin to guess the fiber.

I am capable of taking professional looking product photos on a clean background but this is telling me I should purposfully take them in a more cluttered unstaged background just to appear less corperate and more grounded lol and not be mistaken for AI

🧶🧶🥰🥰🥰

Thank you for sharing this, i didn't no that they sell AI patterns. I am glad that i only crochet youtube tutorials pattern amigurumi. But i will search more of this kind AI projects 😘 Thank you

I noticed that my breathing became deeper and more regular, and I became more peaceful.

For me, what gives penguin B away is the too-smooth gradation under the chin. No yarn can do that, unless maybe you managed to custom-dye it for a specific pattern and it worked out perfectly with the stitches, but probably not even then. Or possibly painting the final project with dye. It’s also got the too-smooth look of many AI crochets.

Also be careful of seeing an actual pattern of pixel art that claims its done all by crochet. You cant get smooth square shapes with crochet. You can Crochet a base color then cross stitch a design on top. Im just remembering the whole Stardew Valley chicken and egg pillow drama on Tiktok.

I learnt knitting in school but began after almost 30 years to calm my mind. Worked wonders. I feel crochet is like maths though. Can't seem to get it right.

That whale made me bust out laughing when I saw it. Best laugh I've had in a long time. Thanks for the amusement. And great tips for identifying AI imposters! This is the first one of your videos I've seen, but the algorithm gave me a good one. ❤

Real talk though, I unironically love the little whale!! I think maybe part of the reason AI generated crochet patterns are so wonky is because the AI software takes snippets of several different patterns all over the internet and just mashes them together in a way that makes zero sense. Also I think ChatGPT gave you a dolphin fin for the top because it can't tell the difference. Love your videos and all the great work you do for the knit and crochet community!!

AI is poisoning every field. Before getting into crochet I would have never thought it would affect it so much and yet here we are 🤦‍♀️

I don't buy anything online anymore unless I already know the business, or people I know to be real people recommend it. AI people are shitting all over creators and artists.

often I find that the yarn doesnt look fuzzy in the right way with AI images, or with clothes you often can see that the metal part of hangers are weirdly generated. Or like with the bookmark, the text within the book will be garbage words thhat can not be read. Its often hard to see much wrong in the Crochet when you dont know anything about it, so it helps too look at everything that comes with it. Also like most People said..the lighting is too good/ or off. The Crochet itself too crisp..

Why do so many granny squares have such horrific color combinations? I use magic knot then there are no ends to weave

Still midway thru watching and the problem with ai generating patterns is even if they work,that just means theyre stolen :( I hate ai art so much.

Thanks so much for the advice, I hadn’t realised AI generated fake patterns were a thing! Knowledge is power 😉🥰

This is a fantastic video and will hopefully save a lot of beginners from the pitfalls of AI-generated patterns. The video quiz at the end was super fun as well.

Most of those AI generated pics weren't standing on a table or so, also some of them hadn't had a background and appeared to just exist. That's why I try to look at the item as well as at the background.

i thought that it was only me with the "roughness" of the Wobbles crochet hook. I changed to a 3.5mm hook and it went smoothly.

I eventually want to learn both but I think I'll start with crochet as I'd like to make toys for my kids 🧶

That’s a nice looking goldfish you ended up with 😂

being a 100% cotton hater, i was so terribly disappointed to see one be the best-selling on amazon. i use it occasionally when it's practical, but I need some stretch!!!

Before throwing away a top, or any item of clothing that has seen it's day, remove the buttons, and keep them. I have lots of buttons from this, or when I found them on sale, and I keep them in glass jars, with matching, and other sets of buttons.

I use zipper make up pouches/bags, that came with free items with certain purchases. They are a perfect size to keep crochet hooks stored in. I keep my most used sizes in one. I may put other supplies, like needles in a pill bottle, and some stitch markers in it as well, for a quick go bag to take with me. One note- the plastic stitch markers that can be expensive, thinking you are getting quality, can and do snag the yarn. Your other suggestions are much better.

Awwww Elise! You got my blushing over here. I could say the same about you and more. I'm so inspired by what you've done with your business and channel in the short time I've known you. You're gonna take it to the moon and beyond, I just know it!! Can't wait to see your Open Book Wrap :-)

OH NO I bought a few crochet patterns from Etsy ! They were so cute, if they were fake how do I get my money back ?? Thank you for alerting us to this scam !!!! 😮

Crocheting helps me keep regulated and it calms my anxiety. Unfortunately, my father always talks down on it, but that doesn't deter me altough it makes me a bit sad

It is not difficult to recognise anything AI-generated, usually the image is too good to be true. On the other hand, it is fun and challenging to re-create an amigurumi from an AI-generated image, trying to fix non-existent stitches.

I don't do crochet so I don't know much, but to me all the AI images were so obviously AI. I don't know if its just a me thing but all the AI images look just so perfect. Like, for that penguin one, it looked so firm it seemed fake, like how would you put that much stuffing and not have any yarn fuzz AND have it be that stiff?? Also, everything is so detailed and there's no or very little blurriness. To me it's almost immediately recognizable. I genuinely hate this AI art thing, I didn't know it was also harming the crochet community! Hopefully this sort of thing dies down

Great post, even if the topic is something none of us want to see! I went to look for an image of a similar amigurumi whale, didn't find one exactly like it, but one image I clicked on triggered my security software and wouldn't open the site. So it's perfectly possible that these AI generated images and pattern links have malicious code behind them too. What is the world coming to?

It looks like a shark not a whale!

I got all the answers on the quiz right! I don't crochet, but I like watching ComplicatedKnots so I guess I must have learned what really crochet looks like from her. I also noticed in the AI pictures that, if the pattern is on or by a book, to look at the "writing" very closely. It's all just a jumbled mess of nonsense and letters morphed together. Great video!

B

The real one is A.

The whale you made was so cute! he deserves all the love and support 😂🥺 Also i really appreciate that you didn't set the AI pattern up for failure and used your own common sense but also didn't completely change it to just make it work. Very well done!

I can't stop thanking you for making a video on this and educating us

THANK YOU!! I never knew i needed this but i love to crochet so this is definitely important for me too,

Great video! It’s important to understand how AI currently works. You know how when you’re texting in your phone and the app suggests the next word? That’s what AI does, only it looks to text or photos published on the internet to predict what the next word in its sentence should be. It is not THINKING like a human being thinks to come up with a pattern, it is merely constructing an amalgamation of stuff that already exists. Thats why the crochet instructions don’t work!! I am stunned that people are being conned into wasting their money on this type of thing when it is essentially a scam. Shame on the Etsy accounts that are doing this! Great tips on how to spot the AI generated crochet projects!

Do Not Buy the KXK lasted 3 months silver finish wore off in 2 projects

Loved the KXK crochet hooks BUT lasted 3 months. The plastic holding the hook broke and the whole set is useless! You cannot buy another replacement handle. I was extremely careful tightening the hooks Buy a good hook! I loved the row count. The silver Finish wore off after 2 projects!

I do think AI has a use, but as inspiration fodder. I can imagine someone wanting the impossible blue dog at 10:23 and spending way too much time figuring how to make it real. Like all the people who learned impossible guitar solos only to find out later that in the original it was actually two guitars and a bass.

I used the 24/7 cotton for beach coverups. I did them with a 6 hook for an open weave look. Much easier to crochet in a mesh stitch.

I'm a cross stitcher and even before AI became a problem, you could tell which patterns weren't designed by a person that was a picture or photo that had just been dropped into a cross stitch program and generated - there would be too many colours and the finished product would have too many stitches in it. (It is possible to make them, but you'd spend a long time doing it, and spend a lot of money on the thread.) Real patterns are designed. At first glance, the AI images look too perfect whereas a real crochet object would have imperfections in it.

Unfortunately you can't really call it out to alert others. I got deceived by a scam and lo and behold, after I started making a fuss in the comment sections of their posts, I was quickly blocked. If they control the content (their webpage, their channel, their facebook page) then you're not going to have much luck. A video like this is much better because they're going to have a harder time removing your own content on your own channels and such.

Just ZOOM IN and you'll undoubtedly notice it's AI.

Artificial intelligence has become a big problem in EVERY community. Impossible cakes, interior design, artwork, cars, etc. they should all be labeled.