Lego Technic AI Models general discussion topic

[Auroralampinen]

Ok, soon the 42232 will be hopefully revealed. But im now serious, why there is a massive craze for 42232 AI slop pictures. This is insane. Pls note, This topic is used for general discussion/roasting for the AI slop pictures for the 42232. But after the 42232 offical reveal i will update this topic for the 42232. So this will be temporary "junk" topic. Because the AI sloppification is getting out of hand and i wanted in the meantime before the launch create this topic for roasting the AI slop pictures for the 42232. Have a fun time in here before the reveal of the 42232:).

[I really hope this will not be taked down. I wont create any more AI roast topics and only reason why i made this was because the 42232 has the most created AI slop pictures and this is getting out of hand and this topic hopefully will prevent anyone making new "leak" topics for 42232. Because the upper picture is circulating online as a "real" 42232 leak picture which its not. So this will be the only one before the launch and hopefully this will help to stop misinformation spread and i will update this when the 42232 will be revealed offically and this topic is only used for now roasting these AI pictures so hopefully mods will allow this because i don't want a massive 42232 misinformation spread to happen thank you nice mods if you don't take this down and this topic can stay here under special premissions:).].

Edited May 8 by Auroralampinen

[Jockos]

I don't know what car the 2nd picture tries to resemble but there's nothing Sadair's Spear about it. IIRC the first pic has been created way before in brown by a member of EB. I could accept this dark blue colour and overall aesthetics.

[Paul B Technic]

Sometimes it is really easy to spot AI images, other times they are harder to pick from real images.
In this case, until we get official photos, anything we see "should" be marked as a mock up / AI / best guess.

[mahjqa]

It's kind of nuts how fast these things have become surface-level convincing. Many AFOLs will be able to spot inconsistencies with panels and construction, but your average lego enthusiast likely won't.

[Jurss]

Yes, AI is pretty good at coming up with new parts 

[Anio]

Which IA made this Twingo ?

[Jurss]

gemini

[Anio]

That is interesting. I got that IA render :

It is impossible to build it because of curved non-existing parts, but the render is impressive nonetheless (note the thickness of the stick to make the Renault logo !).

Using an AI tool might also be interesting to get some ideas on how to design some details.

There is no doubt that, some day, IA will be able to generate full model with existing Lego parts and optimised building process. And this time might come earlier than we think.

[howitzer]

Those AI images are indeed pretty impressive at first glance, and have gotten a lot better in last couple of years compared to the AI generated images of Lego when they first started to appear. Of course someone with actual knowledge on the parts and construction techniques will quickly notice the inconsistencies with real Lego, as is seen with the Twingo pictures above such as bent liftarms, wrong length/width of panels and completely nonexistent parts. For images depicting System creations it's probably a bit more difficult to separate AI images from traditional CGI and photos due to wider parts selection and it also seems to me that AI is slightly better at creating System builds than Technic builds.

When it comes to official sets, I wouldn't be too worried. The official reveal will happen when it will happen, and before that AI images are no more useful than the blurry "leaked catalog photos" of olden days or whatever, which often were nothing like the actual, final product. I find however that AI images could be used to make fake Lego content revolving around MOCs, which could be used to get ad revenue or something. I don't see even this as a huge problem though, as I don't think there's _that_ much money to be made this way. Maybe it could be a problem whenever there's some contest with photo submissions?

[mahjqa]

25 minutes ago, Anio said:

There is no doubt that, some day, IA will be able to generate full model with existing Lego parts and optimised building process. And this time might come earlier than we think.

I'm not convinced. This is a 2D image. An impressive one, but still 2D. Realising a fully functional 3D model with very specific constraints about parts use, buildability, functionality, structural integrity and so on is an entirely different game. It's not even the same league. It's not even the same sport. 

[Anio]

14 minutes ago, mahjqa said:

I'm not convinced. This is a 2D image. An impressive one, but still 2D. Realising a fully functional 3D model with very specific constraints about parts use, buildability, functionality, structural integrity and so on is an entirely different game. It's not even the same league. It's not even the same sport. 

I totally see your point, and I agree with you when you say that a picture and a 3D model are not the same sport. A bit like video games from the 80's and after 2010.

But the thing is that we are at the very early stages of AI. Models properly designed in 3D by an AI are bound to happen.

The question is rather how long it will take to get there. 5 or 20 years ?

[msk6003]

Gemini generated image of Escort RS1800 few month ago.

New ChatGPT generated image of Escort RS1800.

Honestly, in terms of exterior, it seems to have already reached a level where it is worth looking at and referencing. Internal mechanism is still bad.

Edited May 7 by msk6003

[gyenesvi]

8 minutes ago, msk6003 said:

Gemini generated image of Escort RS1800 few month ago.

Well, that's really smart, because it invented some proper fender parts that should exist in technic, to be able to build these kind of cars, with less curved bodies :D

27 minutes ago, Anio said:

The question is rather how long it will take to get there. 5 or 20 years ?

Jokes aside, I'm in the camp that guesses it's more like 10-20 years.. (I've been working with AI for 20 years now)

I think the way these images are generated is that it starts from known mental images of the given car, and kind of applies a lego-like took to them. It's a visual effect mostly, and it has little to do with proper spatial relations. In order to build proper lego models, having proper understanding of spatial relations would be key, and then on top of that it would have to layer part-shape and connectivity / collision constraints. Currently, it not only invents non-existent parts, but even in case of existent ones, their connectivity is fake. And that's a big part of designing lego models. Unfortunately, the way I see it is that spatial relations are kind of an under-researched area of AI. It would be very much required in the field where I work (self driving cars), but even there, it's only used in basic ways. 10 years ago, I thought that self driving car developments will give a big boost to that direction of research, but it did not happen as much as I expected. I think we'll need some major breakthrough to get there, not just incremental improvements.

[Lipko]

6 hours ago, mahjqa said:

It's kind of nuts how fast these things have become surface-level convincing. Many AFOLs will be able to spot inconsistencies with panels and construction, but your average lego enthusiast likely won't.

And this developed in about one year. I remember how crappy pictures AI generated a year ago.

1 hour ago, gyenesvi said:

Well, that's really smart, because it invented some proper fender parts that should exist in technic, to be able to build these kind of cars, with less curved bodies :D

Jokes aside, I'm in the camp that guesses it's more like 10-20 years.. (I've been working with AI for 20 years now)

I think the way these images are generated is that it starts from known mental images of the given car, and kind of applies a lego-like took to them. It's a visual effect mostly, and it has little to do with proper spatial relations. In order to build proper lego models, having proper understanding of spatial relations would be key, and then on top of that it would have to layer part-shape and connectivity / collision constraints. Currently, it not only invents non-existent parts, but even in case of existent ones, their connectivity is fake. And that's a big part of designing lego models. Unfortunately, the way I see it is that spatial relations are kind of an under-researched area of AI. It would be very much required in the field where I work (self driving cars), but even there, it's only used in basic ways. 10 years ago, I thought that self driving car developments will give a big boost to that direction of research, but it did not happen as much as I expected. I think we'll need some major breakthrough to get there, not just incremental improvements.

The spatial thing is developing fast. And the craziest thing that it just emerges by itself. As humans can feel spatial things are off withoug having an actual 3D model in their minds, this ability in AI starts to emerge. We now have videos of objects fully rotated, moving, and stuff, and you have too look closely to notice errors.

Edited May 7 by Lipko

[gyenesvi]

33 minutes ago, Lipko said:

The spatial thing is developing fast. And the craziest thing that it just emerges by itself. As humans can feel spatial things are off withoug having an actual 3D model in their minds, this ability in AI starts to emerge. We now have videos of objects fully rotated, moving, and stuff, and you have too look closely to notice errors.

Well I can imagine some spatial consistency/reasoning emerging from things like training on lots of videos, which is indeed demonstrated by recent video generation capabilities, that's true. Though I wonder if it really understands spatial stuff or is it just really good at faking it. It could be similar to how arithmetic worked in some AI models when it was examined by researchers. They found that AI models can explain how to add numbers, but the way they actually did it inside was quite different; they basically just stitched together text strings in very tricky ways. So for me the jury is still out. But it's true that it's impressive how much stuff does emerge.

[Jurss]

The main issue is, that these are general AI models. If there would be somebody (who knows, maybe Lego already doing it) who feeds some specific model with all legal parts, their possible connections, all existing model instructions, engineering stuff etc., then after some year there would be something pretty OK ready, I suppose.

[aFrInaTi0n]

@Jurss we may not be far away there - blender is offering a so called MCP server already & there is the LDraw Loader to move all legit parts into Blender.. But that may not mean that this may directly allow for collision and other things to be understood by AI.

In my opinion most people are not really understanding the AI-products out there (ChatGPT, gEmini, CoPilot, whatnot), which all  have a huge portion of manual human work done to create needed logic & programming to allow those product to be felt versaitable as they seem to be "out of the box". It is funny that those product are mostly having multiple parts (LLM + RAG + KG), but people tend to think the LLM is the almighty AI - and with that they are not understanding that a model alone may not be worth much..

But I reckon this is another discussion :D

[Jurss]

1 hour ago, aFrInaTi0n said:

this is another discussion

@Auroralampinen can rename this just to AI topic. 

Maybe it also could be just not simply AI, but AI together with that LDraw or any other app. Just like Copilot is integrated in MS word, in which, f.i. I have IT system design,m and then I asked it to create test cases for all bussines logic chapter, and it did it pretty good. 

So, in LDraw You could put panels around, so they replicate some car, and then You ask AI to nicely connect them, if possible. And LDraw connection logic also could "fight" with AI, if it tries to connect something incorrect. Hybrid like this would be more usable, not to ruin all creativity.

[Auroralampinen]

5 minutes ago, Jurss said:

@Auroralampinen can rename this just to AI topic. 

Maybe it also could be just not simply AI, but AI together with that LDraw or any other app. Just like Copilot is integrated in MS word, in which, f.i. I have IT system design,m and then I asked it to create test cases for all bussines logic chapter, and it did it pretty good. 

So, in LDraw You could put panels around, so they replicate some car, and then You ask AI to nicely connect them, if possible. And LDraw connection logic also could "fight" with AI, if it tries to connect something incorrect. Hybrid like this would be more usable, not to ruin all creativity.

Ok then:). 

[aFrInaTi0n]

1 hour ago, aFrInaTi0n said:

But I reckon this is another discussion :D

Oh dang, hopefully I did not got understood wrongly here... I was only speaking about my own post - as I thought I would go too deep into IT topics. Sorry if that has been received in other ways.. 

[Auroralampinen]

1 minute ago, aFrInaTi0n said:

Oh dang, hopefully I did not got understood wrongly here... I was only speaking about my own post - as I thought I would go too deep into IT topics. Sorry if that has been received in other ways.. 

Yeah, for now i will keep this as AI "roast" topic but after the launch/reveal of the 42232 i will rename and rework this to the 42232 topic so in the mean time this will be temporary AI topic. But after the reveal this will be the 42232 topic and after that i will have to see if i will make another AI technic topic if this topic becamed popular;). 

[langko]

13 hours ago, Auroralampinen said:

Yeah, for now i will keep this as AI "roast" topic but after the launch/reveal of the 42232 i will rename and rework this to the 42232 topic so in the mean time this will be temporary AI topic. But after the reveal this will be the 42232 topic and after that i will have to see if i will make another AI technic topic if this topic becamed popular;). 

Or you could just leave this topic as it is, and make a new topic for 42232 when it actually gets revealed. 
The way the AI is going this could be an interesting topic to keep open. 

[Jundis]

It actually is really kind of funny that you can generate such images of vehicles. Especially the box with the 2 in 1 set and a dozer as b-model *sigh*

[Lyichir]

To be honest, AI-generated Lego kinda disgusts me. The analytical part of my brain always goes to work to look for how things are built when I see a cool set or MOC—but when that's not actually built but rather generated by an AI that has no conception of what Lego parts are real, how they should connect, etc., the results are always immeasurably disappointing. Nowhere is that more true than Technic, where clever geometry and functional moving parts are so core to the experience. Even the worst quality off-brand bootlegs are better than that—they at least have to exist in physical form somehow.

[HydroWorld Outlook]

2 hours ago, Lyichir said:

To be honest, AI-generated Lego kinda disgusts me. The analytical part of my brain always goes to work to look for how things are built when I see a cool set or MOC—but when that's not actually built but rather generated by an AI that has no conception of what Lego parts are real, how they should connect, etc., the results are always immeasurably disappointing. Nowhere is that more true than Technic, where clever geometry and functional moving parts are so core to the experience. Even the worst quality off-brand bootlegs are better than that—they at least have to exist in physical form somehow.

I respect that. AI is a pretty controversial topic in the world right now. However, when it is used as a tool to expand creativity rather than simply a replacement, I do believe it is very valuable to have and preserve. I have tried generating models of certain LEGO Technic vehicles with Google's Gemini AI before for the noncommercial multimedia franchise I am creating, but I have kind of been hiding and deleting those images afterwards because the generations were such good quality (even though it obviously made up plenty of parts that didn't exist) that I was getting worried LEGO might perceive such images as trademark and copyright violations. While not necessarily addressed, nor prohibited in LEGO's official "Fair Play" policy (which was implemented before the AI boom), I feared they might go as far as to issue a takedown request against me if I posted those AI-generated images for my story, though I would hope that I am being more cautious than I should be. Unfortunately, from the way AI guardrail laws are unfolding, the legal scales generally appear to be tipping in deterrence of AI usage in creative works, precisely because it devalues works through perceived lacking of human effort, in addition to bypassing paying for the work of other human artists who rely on works they sell for a living, and the creative industry that relies on economic activity to survive. Therefore, to stay on the legally- and ethically-safe side, I am using primarily physically-built models for the final story—even though it's ten to twenty times more expensive (well into the high four figures). That being said, I still hope to throw in some AI-generated models here and there to keep physical construction and production costs down, provided that doing so is still legally allowed by the time I finish my work in 2029.

Regarding the use of Technic pieces in AI images, this might be acceptable from a legal standpoint since other competitors like Mould King, CaDA, and others are all effectively copying the same part designs (just taking out the LEGO-specific protected trademarks like logos, production codes, etc.), however, the AI's near-successful imitation of the official LEGO logo (which is definitely forbidden under the "Fair Play" policy without official affiliation) is a major concern that I could definitely see LEGO raising, if they haven't already. I already saw a pretty scary example of this on YouTube on April 1st (I will share the link to the video later if I can find it again), but if people can generate ultra-photorealistic images of fictional Technic sets that don't actually exist but easily fool others into believing they are official LEGO sets, I definitely see LEGO stepping in to make sure that customers aren't misled by those images into thinking those sets were actually produced by them when they clearly weren't in reality. In my opinion, this should be fine as long as the AI images are watermarked and labeled appropriately as AI-generated, but people who deceive for a living—unfortunately—keep removing these labels and messing things up for the rest of us who are trying to be honest. This is one of the many reasons why why we're seeing governments stepping up worldwide to pass stronger laws mandating irremovable watermarks. 

6 hours ago, langko said:

Or you could just leave this topic as it is, and make a new topic for 42232 when it actually gets revealed. 
The way the AI is going this could be an interesting topic to keep open. 

Excellent idea. If our moderators are okay with this, I strongly support continuing this topic. We're already having a very interesting discussion here.

4 hours ago, Jundis said:

It actually is really kind of funny that you can generate such images of vehicles. Especially the box with the 2 in 1 set and a dozer as b-model *sigh*

I think that's awesome! And yes, I know how it feels. I deeply miss B-models in Technic sets too. The good news is that Rebrickable always has our back nowadays when it comes to providing ideas for alternate models.

Edited May 9 by HydroWorld Outlook