But are you willing to pay full price? Photograph: South_agency/Getty Images
But are you willing to pay full price? Photograph: South_agency/Getty Images
Is this the end of the British school photo?
For generations, professional photographers have captured the country’s pupils in all their awkward glory. But an increasing number of parents are using AI to avoid paying them
Name: School photos.
Age: Around since Victorian times.
Future: Uncertain.
Surely not. The school photo is a grand British tradition, and one that shall not be given up without a fight. Yes, but have you seen the price of them recently?
No. My kids just had theirs done. It’s £20 for one photo, but if you want extras – for the shot to be turned into a magnet, keyring or snow globe, say – then prices can run up to about £100.
Changed my mind. No fighting. Let it end. Well, you could let it end, or you could just do what some parents have been doing.
Which is what? Getting the low-res preview shots from the photographer’s website, then using AI to upscale them and remove all the watermarks, as the Times reports.
Are people actually doing that? Oh yes, and apparently in such numbers that the photographers are starting to notice.
Or could it be that photos are so expensive that parents just aren’t buying them any more? Possibly, but the AI hack is everywhere too.
Those poor photographers. Well, yes and no. The average spend on these things is £25. A big primary school with two classes of 30 kids a year group could pull in £10,500, which does sound like a fortune. But once you knock off expenses such as printing, mounting, shipping, the cost of cameras and lights – and the school’s commission, don’t forget – the net take will be a lot less. And that’s before you get to wages …
And isn’t it immoral to take something without paying? That too. And besides, the school photograph is an important document of your youth. Where else are you going to keep a record of all your bad haircuts and adolescent skin complaints?
I dunno. Selfies? Yes, but they don’t have the hallmarks of a school photo. There’s no self-consciousness with a selfie, no sense of being trapped within an oppressive institution.
So we’re agreed that using AI is bad. Of course we’re agreed. Using AI for anything is bad, especially making posters for restaurants. Nobody wants to look at unconvincingly rendered AI images of plasticky-looking sausages. It isn’t appetising. When will people learn?
You’ve strayed from the subject a little. Fine. But the same goes for school photos. Using AI to remove watermarks is bad and will put people out of work, but next you’ll be using it to make your child’s teeth whiter and their hair shinier, and soon you’ll have a row of pictures of grinning deathless mannequins on your mantelpiece. Avoid it altogether, I say.
Do say: “Watch the birdie.”
Don’t say: “Say ‘ChatGPT’.”
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