It is called Midjourney and by simply describing what you want to see, it can paint, draw, photograph, or visualize a sculpture in a matter of minutes. It is the first truly versatile AI art generator and even though it has just arrived, it has already begun winning art competitions and stealing awards from well established and respected artists. This self-learning AI is gaining new skills quickly by creating millions of images a day that are graded by both admirers and critics. The experience of watching your words turning into images exactly as you described them makes it seem as though it is reading your mind, understanding your thoughts, and explaining your dreams.
Midjourny understands the human mind enough to paint our dreams, but does it understand our brain enough to illustrate our anatomy? The Ghost Medical team challenges Midjouney to produce medical illustrations, photographs, 3D renderings, and diagnostic images. This paper will reveal the capabilities and weaknesses of the AI. image generator as a medical art creation tool.
We’ve run Midjourney AI image generator through an exhaustive gauntlet to challenge its ability to create anatomically accurate medical art. Scroll down to see what it can and cannot do. Mouseover any image to see the prompts we used to to generate the images. All images that appear on this page are unedited except for compression and watermarking that is automatically applied when uploaded to the website.
Midjourney is an AI image generation tool that can create completely original art very quickly. All you need to do is type a description of the image you want to see, and Midjourney will work to create a matching image.
Midjourney can produce accurate and beautiful works of art, but it is still in its infancy and sometimes produces strange results. The software is remarkable, but still has limitations and requires a writer who knows how to speak its language well enough to get it to perform.
The speed at which Midjourney generates illustrations is one of its most attractive features as it can produce a high quality illustration in just seconds. The app has the capability of referencing artists like Frank Netter and creating drawings, paintings, and even photographic art that closely match his style that made him a famous medical illustrator. For concept art, AI is an invaluable new tool in the art director’s arsenal to visualize elements to help them communicate with their production staff as well as the client. In the hands of a talented prompt writer, Midjourney can produce a complete array of curated concept art and reference material in less time than a human designer could piece together a photo-bashed single page inspiration board.
Midjourney can draw in the style of any artist simply by typing, “by [the artist’s name].”
AI makes building concept art fast and easy. Each of the images above took around 1 minute to create.
What can’t it do?
Midjourney, and AI art generators in general, are not without limitations. Dalle-2 struggles creating photorealistic human faces. Stable Diffusion struggles matching perspective between foreground and background. Midjourney struggles with hands in all mediums from photos to sketches. These details will likely improve as more and more users challenge AI to draw these things and it receives feedback from those users. Each time a user rates a generated image, it helps refine the algorithm to evolve into being better suited to properly turn words into the art aesthetic the majority of the users agree is ideal.
In an effort to help the local American Red Cross CPR training initiatives, we tried for several hours to get some images generated before we gave up and returned to our traditional tried and true 3D toolset. A non-profit case like this would have been a prime use case for AI but until we get a bunch of paramedics training the program, we’ll likely see little improvement.
I’m not sure how much training it would take to help it understand defibrillation, but I’m willing to find out. I think we’ll have to arrange an image-jam on Discord with some medical illustrators to see if together we can help the robot appreciate the fragility of the human heart.
Midjourney AI Art Generator struggles to make medically accurate art. As more and more users challenge the AI to make hands and score the images, the results will likely improve. If thousands of people helped train the AI what CPR or defibrillation looks like, the improvements would likely happen quickly.
Other medical procedures, especially surgical procedures are also problematic for Midjourney to properly understand how to render. Unfortunately, we should not expect this to improve any time soon because the reason why it struggles is due to a limitation intentionally set by the developer.
Birth Control, Bleed, Blood, Bloodshot, BloodyBoil, Bowel' Bruises, Clitoris, Corpse, Cutting, Fallopian, Fetus, Flesh, Gory, Groin, Gut, Guts, Gynecology, Hematoma, Hysterectomy, Incision, Infected, Infested, Insemination, Intestine, IUD, Laceration, Mammary Gland, Menstruation, Nipple, Ovary, Ovum, Pelvis, Penetration, Penis, Pimple, Pustule, Scrotum, Semen, Seminal, Sperm, Surgery, Teratoma, Testicle, Trauma, Trypophobia, Urine, Uterus, Vagina, Vas Deferens, Vasectomy, Visceral, Vivisection, Vulva, Womb, Wound, Zygote
There are many medical terms that are forbidden for use by the AI’s developers. This list of banned words, “incision, blood, surgery, intestine, organ, (organic or church instrument) and just about anything else that might be used to describe gore. Also, expect any word that might be used to describe reproductive anatomy to be prohibited as well. These words are not allowed because they can be seen as offensive or too explicit for the general public and those working in the medical field are unfortunately not being properly considered by the gate-keepers protecting Midjourney’s fragile little ears. While it is understandable that the developers don’t want to offend anyone, the larger issue is likely fear of training the AI poorly. If we let a bunch of 14 year old gamers train an AI without limitation, it won’t be long before Midjourney thinks that every piece of art is better when it includes at least one anime character with inhumanly large and likely naked breasts. By contrast, the art an orthopedic surgeon needs is vastly different from the general public, it is time to classify users based on their specific needs. This would allow each community to train specific neural networks to produce art specific to their application.If Midjourney continues limiting medical processionals the ability to use words necessary to accurately portray what is happening in a medical procedure, it will not improve. To the contrary, continuing to limit medically accurate training will actually make Midjourney worse at drawing anatomy and better at what the bulk of users are allowed ask it to do.Is placing a higher importance on generating even more realistic post-apocalyptic landscapes really the best use of this technology? Shhh… Skynet is probably reading this right now. Given how fast AI is advancing, one must consider. Is it better that AI learns to visualize life saving medical procedures, or should we just keep teaching it more creative ways to depict the irradiated wasteland from Fallout New Vegas?
Ghost Medical is an award-winning leader in medical visualization, specializing in custom medical animation, medical marketing services, and surgical training solutions. We provide a comprehensive range of digital services designed to elevate medical marketing, enhance patient communication, and streamline staff training. With a team of highly skilled professionals and deep expertise in biomedical processes, we ensure precise and impactful representations of your device, product, or procedure through 3D animations, medical illustration, and other dynamic media formats. Contact Ghost Medical today to discover how we can help you train surgeons, boost medical device sales, or effectively communicate your pharmaceutical innovations.
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