We are living in a time where images have become effortless. A face can be generated, a body can be perfected, a landscape can be invented, a scene can be simulated with a few lines of text. Technically, this is extraordinary. Creatively, it is powerful. But psychologically, something else is happening at the same time: people are becoming saturated with the artificial. Across many fields — art, music, writing, photography — communities are beginning to feel a quiet but growing need: the need for something real. Not just realistic. Real.
There is a difference. A realistic image can be flawless, spectacular, impressive. A real image carries something else: presence, imperfection, atmosphere, the trace of a lived moment. It contains time. It contains a situation that actually happened between people, light, space, and emotion. In my work, this distinction has always been central, even before the rise of AI. Every photograph I create comes from real people, in real locations, under real light. Real models, real environments, real interaction. No synthetic bodies, no artificial scenes, no simulated intimacy.
Why does this matter today more than ever? Because abundance changes value. When perfect bodies can be generated infinitely, perfection stops being rare. When any scene can be fabricated, spectacle stops being special. What becomes rare again is authentic presence: the fact that a person stood there, that light fell on skin in that exact way, that an atmosphere was built through collaboration, patience, and intention.
This also reveals a deeper difference between photographic genres. In fields such as product photography, images are increasingly replaceable because the experience of creating them is often secondary to the final visual result. When the goal is purely descriptive or commercial, simulation can easily take over. In glamour and nude photography, however, the process itself is fundamental. The image is not only the outcome; it is the trace of an experience. The interaction between photographer and model, the atmosphere on set, the shared concentration, the trust, the physical presence in a real space under real light — all of this becomes part of the image. It is something lived, remembered, and embodied, not just rendered. This experiential dimension cannot be automated. It belongs to reality.
Authenticity, then, is not nostalgia and not a rejection of technology. It is a human response to over-simulation. We are starting to realize that images are not only visual objects; they are experiences. And experiences are tied to reality. They come from situations that existed, from moments that unfolded, from relationships between people. This is something no algorithm can fully reproduce, because it is not only about how something looks, but about how it came into being.
In figurative photography, especially, this becomes essential. A photograph is not just a representation of a body. It is the result of trust, direction, atmosphere, emotional tone, and the silent dialogue between photographer and model. That invisible process is what gives depth to the visible image. At the same time, much of what is produced with artificial intelligence, while technically impressive, often carries a perceptible artificial flavor. Something feels too perfect, too smooth, too detached from lived reality. Viewers may not always articulate it, but they sense the absence of a real moment behind the image.
As artificial content grows, the desire for depth, presence, and authenticity grows as well. Communities are not only searching for stimulation anymore. They are searching for connection, coherence, and a sense that behind the images there is a real author, a real path, a real vision developing over time. Authenticity, then, is not a style. It is a commitment. A commitment to working with reality, to embracing imperfection as part of truth, to creating images that are not just seen, but felt as something that actually happened.
In an age where everything can be fabricated, choosing the real is not the easiest path. It is slower, more demanding, less spectacular at first glance. But it carries something that cannot be automated: human presence. And perhaps that is exactly what many of us, consciously or not, are looking for again.
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This is pure gold nowadays