A recent post on X by Nick St. Pierre made a rather bold claim. @nickfloats says that 99% of AI videos made with tools like Luma, Pika, and Runway are generated from images originally created in Midjourney.
“I did an experiment where I used the same prompt on Midjourney, Ideogram, Firefly, DALL-E and SDXL and put the images into Runway and Pika Labs. Midjourney and Ideogram resulting in the best video,” he said in another intriguing post on X.
Echoing similar thoughts was another user, who said that the best way to use Luma is to generate a key image with your favourite tool (Midjourney, etc) and then have the AI animate that. “It will still have that AI video feeling of limbs and people mutating, but you will get closer to what you want.”
However, Midjourney is not the only player in this race. There’s also Stable Diffusion, Adobe Firefly, Canva, DALL-E, etc.
Midjourney Rocks
Since the time Midjourney was released in 2022, it has undergone numerous updates, with the latest being the introduction of the ‘character reference’ feature, which generates consistent characters across multiple reference images.
For a long time, users struggled to obtain consistent images with references, a problem this feature aimed to solve.
Midjourney has attracted users with its ability to generate realistic images. That apart, the company’s free trial policy also drew a significant number of users ever since it was released.
David Holz, the CEO of Midjourney, confirmed that the surge of new users prompted his decision to shut down the free trial services, not the viral images. In a message on Discord, he cited “extraordinary demand and trial abuse” as the reasons. The “abuse” referred to the viral celebrity and political photos.
However, this free trial led to the creation of fake AI images, resulting in a class-action lawsuit against the company. In the latest the company has halted its free trial services.
While the lack of a free trial may discourage some users, Midjourney’s exceptional performance, such as superior image quality and versatility, has made it a popular choice among those willing to invest in a subscription. Additionally, the generated images have led to their use in creating videos.
What About the Others?
Midjourney has been a fierce competitor in the AI image generation market, boasting an impressive 16.4 million active users as of November. On the other hand, Stable Diffusion, once a prominent player, faced significant challenges and controversies.
Stability AI, the company behind Stable Diffusion, found itself in hot water. Last year, Emad Mostaque stepped down from his roles as the company’s CEO and board member to pursue decentralised AI initiatives. This move came amid growing investor pressure regarding the company’s financial situation.
According to a Bloomberg report, Stability AI was burning through cash rapidly, with a reported burn rate of about $8 million per month as of October 2023. Attempts to raise additional funds at a valuation of $4 billion were largely unsuccessful, leading to speculation that the company was considering a potential sale.
While Stable Diffusion claimed more than 10 million daily active users across all channels, as stated by Mostaque, other competitors like DALL-E also lagged behind Midjourney. DALL-E’s followers stood at 1.5 million individuals, producing 2 million images per day.
Despite following a subscription model from its early days, Midjourney’s ability to retain customers has been remarkable. This success can be attributed to the platform’s user-friendly interface, continuous updates, and the high quality of the generated images.
Nothing Like Midjourney
Recently, Midjourney released a groundbreaking new feature called ‘model personalisation’ that allows users to tune the AI algorithm to their personal tastes, effectively removing the inherent biases present in Midjourney’s training data.
Previously, when users prompted, Midjourney would generate images based on its own preferences and interpretations, which were shaped by the training data it was exposed to. This could lead to outputs that didn’t fully align with the user’s desired aesthetic or style.
Midjourney’s specific feature of generating highly accurate images brings an innovative approach to image creation. This approach, coupled with the updates Midjourney is introducing, is helping other video-creating applications enhance their video quality and deliver amazing results.
