Latest news with #Flux
Otago Daily Times
15-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Otago Daily Times
Artist's story takes flight
Three special screenings of the 2022 film, Geoff Dixon: Portraits of Us, are being shown at the St James Theatre in Gore this weekend and next Tuesday . Glenis Giles and Clare O'Leary's documentary invites us into Dixon's cluttered studio as he prepares works for his next exhibition, transforming children's toys and hard enamel paint into surreal collages of spacecraft and birdlife. The Bluff-born Dixon, who lives in Cairns, has long held a fascination with endangered birds. Southland's own takahē often feature prominently in his work alongside many other threatened species as a metaphor for the destruction of the natural world. The documentary, which debuted at the 2022 NZ International Film Festival, features a series of portraits of Dixon which were shown at the Eastern Southland Gallery as part of Euan Macleod's recent exhibition "Flux". That exhibition, which finished on Sunday, featured a series of more than 400 portraits of his friend Dixon, created almost daily over FaceTime since 2021. The film unravels Dixon's past — growing up in Nelson and his formative years at art school in Christchurch where he met Macleod — dissecting his seemingly contradictory obsessions with science fiction, space travel, nature and extinction which have shaped his unique artistic style and vision. His work is both confronting and celebratory, revelling in the marvellous splendour of the natural world while also mourning its seemingly inevitable loss. As he describes them, the works are a "portrait of us" and an unnerving look into the future. Dixon said he just started wanting to paint endangered birds, and yet they were hard to find in the nineties. "You'd look them up and they're not endangered ... but now, so much is in a critical situation environmentally, I can paint them all. "That's how it all happened. That's why I became a bird person." — APL
Fashion United
14-07-2025
- Business
- Fashion United
Desigual embraces artificial intelligence to expand its creative universe and optimise its operations
The emergence of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in the fashion industry has been as rapid as it has been provocative. First came astonishment, then experimentation, and finally, a more critical stage in which many brands are asking themselves: what role do we want to play in a creative ecosystem increasingly mediated by this technology? In this new scenario, a hybrid logic is beginning to prevail in which the human and the artificial do not compete, but complement each other. It is a delicate balance, especially in a sector where aesthetics, emotion and innovation make all the difference. The key question is no longer whether to use AI, but how to do so without losing the soul of the brand. FashionUnited spoke with Roser Bagó and Minerva Garcia —co-founder and expert respectively— of the creative start-up Neural Fashion and Sergio González, AI Lead at Desigual. This image was generated using artificial intelligence by Neural Fashion for Desigual's latest campaign. Credits: Desigual x Neural Fashion. The Barcelona-based firm, immersed since 2019 in an ambitious rebranding process, has found in AI not only a creative tool, but a way to consolidate its market positioning. One of the pillars of this integration has been Awesome Lab, the open innovation programme with which Desigual has been collaborating with technology start-ups for years to accelerate its digital transformation. In its latest edition, focused exclusively on generative artificial intelligence, the company has explored applications ranging from product design to personalised marketing. Among the most prominent projects is its alliance with Neural Fashion, a start-up with whom they have created their first editorial campaign with real garments generated entirely with artificial intelligence. Using a combination of tools such as Flux, OpenAI models and upscaling systems, the brand achieved an interesting visual proposal. But beyond the result, what has been relevant is the approach. Desigual does not use AI as a simple aesthetic resource, but as a coherent extension of its visual language. A tool that amplifies, not substitutes. Creative experimentation without fear Desigual does not conceive of AI as a simple one-off solution, but as a structural lever that cuts across multiple areas of the company. Although the brand has only been working with this technology for a little over a year, it has already left the exploration phase behind and is fully in application mode. The commitment goes far beyond marketing. As González explains, in the marketing department, for example, it is used to generate visual concepts, write creative proposals or experiment with new narratives. In the product area, AI enriches the design phase. Other departments such as IT or finance benefit from the automation of repetitive tasks and the optimisation of workflows. 'We were asked to be as creative as possible and not be afraid to make mistakes,' says González, stressing that Thomas Meyer, the brand's founder, has driven this philosophy of fearless experimentation. Behind every image generated there are human decisions. Careful prompts, art direction, studio management, retouching. 'AI is just another tool in the hands of imagination that also helps us free up resources to invest in larger traditional campaigns. We are not looking to replace anyone, but to expand the possibilities,' explains González. Technological limits The path towards the total integration of AI is not without its obstacles. While Desigual is moving forward firmly, other brands have had more complex experiences. This is the case of the Dutch brand Labfresh, which after four seasons decided to abandon the use of AI in its campaigns. The reason: low performance on social media and technical difficulties such as inconsistency in the generated models. From Neural Fashion, the creative and technical team that has helped Desigual to materialise its latest campaign generated with artificial intelligence, recognise these technical challenges, but offer an alternative and proactive view in the face of such obstacles. They do not deny that there are challenges such as the aforementioned inconsistency in generated faces. In fact, they openly acknowledge it as one of the most demanding aspects of working with generative AI in fashion. However, their approach is not to avoid the problem, but to rethink the rules of the creative game. Rethinking the rules of the creative game According to them, the secret is not to force AI to replicate traditional processes to the millimetre, but to build campaigns from the limitations and strengths of the technology itself. In other words, it is not about expecting AI to produce a perfect photoshoot, as a human team would do in ideal conditions. It is about using it to create something different, even unexpected, that connects with the audience in a different way. This philosophy has guided their collaboration with Desigual: if they knew that generating ten identical images of the same face was technically unstable, they opted for visual narratives that did not depend on that precision. This image was generated using artificial intelligence by Neural Fashion for Desigual's latest campaign. Credits: Desigual x Neural Fashion. In addition, Garcia, an expert from the Neural team, stresses that we are dealing with a technology in full evolution. What seems like a limitation today may be solved tomorrow with a new tool or technique. Therefore, their working model is not based on a single platform or AI engine, but on a dynamic integration of different models and resources, which are adapted to the specific needs of each campaign. This ability to move with agility within a changing environment is what, they assure, allows them to continue obtaining results that combine the best of technology with a profoundly creative vision. Where other brands may see frustration or underperformance, Bagó, co-founder of Neural, invites us to see untapped potential. For them, AI is not here to replicate what we already knew, but to open up new ways of imagining, telling and showing fashion. Always with one caveat: those who approach AI expecting an exact, closed and definitive solution will probably be disappointed. Those who do so with an open and curious mind will find fertile ground for fearless experimentation. This image was generated using artificial intelligence by Neural Fashion for Desigual's latest campaign. Credits: Desigual x Neural Fashion. Now one of the projects in development is the generation of images for product pages with consistent models, exploring the possibility of using digital twins that allow maintaining visual coherence between multiple images of the same face. H&M, for example, has already begun to implement this technology by creating digital replicas of real models for its marketing campaigns and social media posts, always with the consent and compensation of the models involved. In this context, the brand underlines the importance of being transparent with the user: all realistic images created with AI must be presented to consumers duly labelled, thus avoiding misunderstandings and earning the public's trust. Far from hiding the technological origin, Desigual makes it part of the creative discourse. The case of Desigual is an example that the future of visual communication will not be exclusively human or completely artificial. It will be hybrid. An ecosystem where technology amplifies creativity, frees up time and resources, and allows brands to tell more stories without losing their essence. In this coexistence, the key is not to ask AI for what only a human being can offer: sensitivity, intuition, emotion. And, at the same time, to take advantage of its potential to push the limits of what is possible. This article was translated to English using an AI tool. FashionUnited uses AI language tools to speed up translating (news) articles and proofread the translations to improve the end result. This saves our human journalists time they can spend doing research and writing original articles. Articles translated with the help of AI are checked and edited by a human desk editor prior to going online. If you have questions or comments about this process email us at info@
Otago Daily Times
09-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Otago Daily Times
Art seen: July 10
"Flux", Euan Macleod (Eastern Southland Gallery) "Flux" features en plein air paintings, alongside large-scale studio works, made in response to the landscape experienced on Haupapa Tasman Glacier. Many of the landscapes are populated with single shadowy figures or multiple figures linked together by climbing ropes. They are climbers traversing rocky mountain landscapes or icy crevasses. Sometimes there are monumental figures in the landscape that are indistinct from the land. Human scale and connectivity are placed within a real representative sense of an observed changing landscape. There is an affective sense of movement and light in these works, that, for the artist, are also about exploring an emotional state. In the adjacent gallery space is a floor to ceiling wall installation of over 400 small-scale portraits of the artist's friend Geoff Dixon. The project began informally as daily conversations over FaceTime during a Covid lockdown. Dixon had recently lost his partner and the work revolved around one friend supporting another at a time of grief. Here the genre of portrait painting is also inherently reflective of human connectivity. This exhibition comes to Eastern Southland Gallery from Australia, and is an Orange Regional Gallery and ANU Drill Hall Gallery partnership show. Macleod is represented by King Street Gallery on William in Sydney. "Shoemaker-Levy 9", Danny McNamara (Forrester Gallery) Shoemaker-Levy 9 was a comet that collided with Jupiter in 1994. It was discovered orbiting Jupiter from the Palomar Observatory in California by Carolyn and Eugene Shoemaker and David Levy. Under observation, the comet was seen to be fragmented, having been broken apart by the gravitational effects of its proximity to Jupiter. It was estimated that the comet's fragments would collide with Jupiter's southern hemisphere and this generated a lot of interest across the field of astronomy. It caught the interest of Oamaru-based amateur astronomer and astrophotographer Danny McNamara (1947-2012) and this exhibition, where science meets art, includes a selection of McNamara's photographs of the event. To contextualise the images on show, there is a photograph of the 12 inch Beverly-Begg reflector telescope, refitted with a Canon AE-135mm SLR, that McNamara used to document the collision events. Over the course of about a week there were an observed 21 separate impacts. The glossy dark images with jewel-like images of Jupiter are each dated with a timestamp. For example, "Negative #3 20/07/1994, 10.32pm Konica Super XG 400", includes a relevant description of the specific event: "impact site of Fragment N rotating into view". Said to have been more visible than the Great Red Spot, one of the photographs documents the impact marks of the entire sequence of collisions. "George Burns Memorial Art Exhibition" (Forrester Gallery) Once a year, the George Burns Memorial Art Exhibition showcases art by the Waitaki District's young artists. The work on show is from local preschools all the way up to representative work from the region's high schools. A vibrant array of art in a range of media and subject matter fills four gallery spaces of the Forrester Gallery. George Burns (1903-1970) was born in Oamaru, became a journalist, then a Parliamentary reporter, and was New Zealand's first Fulbright Scholar. Burns was also champion of children's art and in the decades before 1970, in his role as editor for the Christchurch Star-Sun , he established the Christchurch Star-Sun Schools Art Exhibition that toured the South Island. In memory of this work, an annual art exhibition was established in Oamaru and has been running now for 55 years. The exhibition spaces are packed with colour. Art-making tables are set up in the main gallery with featured interactive elements to the work in other gallery spaces as well. Much of the work is made collectively and attributed to individual schools while some of the works are individually labelled, like the portfolio work from high school students. This celebratory and joyful exhibition runs until July 13. By Joanna Osborne
Forbes
26-06-2025
- Business
- Forbes
Beyond Prompts: Agentic AI And The Dawn Of Self-Directed Intelligence
Daniel A. Keller, CEO and President of InFlux Technologies Limited and Flux. From a conceptual perspective, agentic AI represents a shift from traditional AI or even the more recent and widely adopted generative AI. In what may be the shortest timeline in the history of proliferative technology, AI systems have evolved from struggling with essential speech recognition to executing complex, well-defined tasks with intelligence levels that often surpass human capabilities in scope and speed. Agentic AI introduces a unique form of autonomous intelligence. This enables AI systems to operate with a degree of independence that outpaces the predefined restrictions of older AI frameworks. Instead of using rule-based systems that generate content from prompts like older AI systems, agentic AI systems are designed to plan and act almost independently to achieve goals. What Agentic AI Is Agentic AI broadly refers to AI systems that can act almost independently, make decisions and adapt to evolving circumstances without requiring constant human intervention. These systems are characterized by their capacity to reason and plan. Agentic AI can evaluate situations, consider multiple options and devise strategies to achieve objectives like a human professional would. Unlike static models, agentic AI systems continuously learn from their data and improve their performance over time. They can also interface with digital systems or data warehouses to make real-time decisions. Their approach is goal-driven, which affords them the flexibility to tackle problems by "thinking" outside the proverbial box. This shift is fueled primarily by advancements in machine learning, reinforcement learning and multi-agent systems. For instance, frameworks like DeepMind's AlphaGo demonstrated early forms of agentic behavior. The system mastered the game of Go and developed its own unique tactics, defeating reigning European champion Fan Hui 5-0 in a tournament match. Modern agentic AI builds on these foundations, integrating large language models (LLMs), sensory processing and decision-making algorithms to create far more versatile systems. From Generative AI To Agentic AI Generative AI, made popular by models like ChatGPT and, more recently, Deepseek, excels at producing human-like text, images or other outputs based on user prompts. However, its limitations are obvious; it operates within the confines of the user's scope and cannot autonomously pursue broader objectives. Agentic AI, on the other hand, can move beyond prompt-driven responses to proactive problem-solving. For example, while a generative AI might draft an email when prompted, an agentic AI could manage an entire communication workflow, going as far as to schedule email campaigns based on responses without human input. This transition from passive to active intelligence marks the dawn of autonomous systems capable of functioning as agencies rather than mere AI tools. Revolutionizing Cloud Infrastructure Management Traditionally, cloud infrastructure management relies on human engineers and monitoring tools to handle everyday tasks, ranging from resource allocation to incident response. Yes, these systems are designed to be robust; however, they often struggle with real-time optimization and scalability, especially under unpredictable workloads. With agentic AI, the AI could autonomously manage the cloud infrastructure, optimizing performance, reducing costs and enhancing reliability. For example, it can monitor real-time metrics from servers, virtual machines and containers. When a sudden spike in traffic occurs, the AI can dynamically reallocate resources, scaling up compute instances or redistributing workloads across regions, thus preventing bottlenecks and lags. Using reinforcement learning, agentic AI can predict potential failures, such as hardware degradation or network congestion, by analyzing historical performance data and external factors like global internet traffic trends. It can then proactively schedule maintenance or reroute traffic to avoid downtime. Typically, agentic AI operates as a network of specialized agents, each managing a different component in the system. These agents collaborate to ensure seamless operations, such as prioritizing low-latency resources for real-time applications. While agentic AI can handle routine optimizations, it does not entirely exclude the human touch. It can escalate complex situations to human engineers, providing data-driven recommendations to streamline decision-making. Implications And Challenges The rise of agentic AI holds profound implications for industries ranging from healthcare to finance to urban planning. Agentic AI could manage patient care in healthcare based on real-time health data. It could autonomously detect fraud, adjust investment portfolios or negotiate contracts in finance. However, this autonomy also raises critical challenges: Who is responsible when an agentic AI makes a suboptimal decision, such as misallocating cloud resources during a critical outage? Ensuring accountability requires robust governance frameworks like the OECD AI Principles. Autonomous systems must be designed with fail-safes to prevent unintended consequences. Since agentic AI systems, like their predecessors, can inherit biases from training data, rigorous testing and transparency are necessities. Deploying agentic AI in legacy cloud systems requires significant infrastructural upgrades, posing serious challenges for smaller organizations. The Future Of Agentic AI The dawn of agentic AI signals a future where intelligent systems are tools and partners in decision-making. As these systems become more sophisticated, they could redefine industries, reshape economies and even alter societal structures. For instance, urban planning could leverage agentic AI to reduce energy consumption and enhance public safety. However, realizing this potential requires addressing technical, ethical and regulatory hurdles. Collaborative efforts between researchers, policymakers and industry leaders will be crucial to ensure agentic AI serves our best interests. Rounding Off We are entering a new era where prompt-based interfaces are no longer the peak experience of AI utility. Agentic AI represents the first real step toward machines that can initiate, adapt and evolve. These systems won't just answer our questions; they can pursue objectives, solve novel problems and collaborate with humans as autonomous partners. As we stand on the verge of this new frontier, the question is not whether agentic AI will shape the future, but how we will shape it to ensure an innovative yet ethical world. Forbes Technology Council is an invitation-only community for world-class CIOs, CTOs and technology executives. Do I qualify?
Forbes
25-06-2025
- Business
- Forbes
How Business Leaders Can Leverage Blockchain And AI To Unlock New Opportunities
Daniel A. Keller, CEO and President of InFlux Technologies Limited and Flux. Blockchain and AI are increasingly becoming more integrated—the duo can work symbiotically to bolster one another. At its core, blockchain provides a decentralized, consensus-based infrastructure that enables AI solutions to operate without third parties controlling the data and algorithms. There's the privacy element as well. Blockchain can help companies address data privacy issues inherent in AI solutions that run on centralized Web2 platforms. Both of these technologies are continuously evolving. However, business leaders should embrace them sooner rather than later to avoid falling behind. The Key Business Benefits Of Using Blockchain And AI In Tandem Why should leaders embrace blockchain and AI sooner rather than later? Consider the benefits that both technologies can offer companies when used in tandem. Blockchain gives businesses more control and ownership over their data. Third-party platforms—cloud providers, social networks, etc.—can be fickle. Overnight, a third-party platform could change the rules of engagement, such as by raising costs or adding new content restrictions, that make it difficult, if not impossible, for companies to control their costs, maintain their operations and share their narratives. Blockchain breaks that grip of control from third parties. With blockchain, leaders can create cost-effective infrastructure that runs on their terms. As for AI, it can help companies streamline their operations, pinpoint issues in real time and personalize customer service, to name a few of the many use cases. However, AI comes with various risks, namely, data privacy issues and concerns about centralized data control and training when using publicly available platforms. In certain industries, such as healthcare and finance, the consequences that can stem from those risks are magnified. By using the decentralized, open-source infrastructure and consensus mechanisms that blockchain provides, leaders can more effectively safeguard their data—both at the input and output stages. Best Practices For Implementing Blockchain And AI Together Business leaders should adopt blockchain and AI before these technologies mature. The more they delay adoption, the further behind they risk falling. To effectively leverage both technologies, leaders should start by identifying how blockchain and AI can serve their business needs. They should focus on their strategic vision for the next six months to a year and then evaluate where blockchain and AI can fit in. Short iterations are vital, given how quickly both technologies are evolving; long planning cycles could render them obsolete before implementation. Once leaders have identified their strategic vision for the next six months to a year, they can research vendors and find one that aligns with their business needs. From there, they proceed to the implementation stage. There's room for flexibility here. Leaders shouldn't go all-in on adopting both technologies at once. In most cases, an incremental, scalable approach to implementing blockchain and AI will be more manageable. For instance, the executives of a local consulting firm might opt to stay in Web2 and keep 50% of their company's infrastructure there. It could move the other half of its infrastructure to Web3 and then gradually start migrating customers there. On that decentralized infrastructure, it could begin running AI tools that refine certain processes, such as client scheduling and communication. Over time, the consulting firm can move more of its infrastructure to Web3, increase the number of AI tools it runs and shift more customers. Following implementation, leaders should remain proactive in keeping their systems current. Blockchain and AI are rapidly changing, and by staying informed about those changes, leaders can pinpoint how they factor into their business needs. Risks—And How Business Leaders Can Navigate Them Business leaders should be aware that adopting blockchain and AI comes with risks. For instance, aside from technical complexity, another prominent risk is that both operate in an uncertain regulatory environment. Consider recent regulatory activity in the United States. According to TheStreet, on May 29, 2025, lawmakers 'introduced the Digital Asset Market Clarity (CLARITY) Act—a bill designed to finally bring clear regulations to the crypto and digital asset industry.' A June 3, 2025, StateScoop article noted that 'A bipartisan coalition of more than 260 state legislators from all 50 states on Tuesday sent a letter to Congress opposing a provision in the federal budget reconciliation bill that would impose a 10-year ban on state and local regulation of artificial intelligence.' The outcomes of these regulatory activities can have serious ramifications for businesses implementing blockchain and AI, making it paramount for leaders to stay informed about developments on the policy side. A new law could render a company's adoption of blockchain and AI noncompliant, requiring a costly overhaul to get back on track. Another significant risk is workforce disruptions. When a company switches to Web3 and starts implementing AI, its existing workforce will likely be restructured or cut. Leaders must carefully consider the potential workforce disruptions that may arise from leveraging blockchain and AI. However, now is the time for leaders to explore blockchain and AI. Acting proactively, rather than reactively, gives leaders the best chance at mitigating risks, leveraging blockchain and AI symbiotically to drive business results and staying ahead of their competitors. Ultimately, it's by embracing open-source, decentralized platforms and AI solutions that leaders can safeguard their costs, operations and narratives. Forbes Technology Council is an invitation-only community for world-class CIOs, CTOs and technology executives. Do I qualify?
