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The story
At a night market in Los Angeles, more and more food stalls are reportedly using AI-generated images for their menu photos. CNN reported that customers described the results as feeling off — “too perfect, almost rubbery.” On 5ch, users posted numerous examples of AI-generated food images, pointing out issues like overly uniform textures, unnatural angles, and a lack of steam. Others pushed back, arguing “AI itself isn’t the problem — it’s on whoever approved these images without checking them,” splitting opinion over whether to blame the technology itself or the businesses using it.
Sep 13 (Sun), 3:10 PM JST
CNN.co.jp
(CNN) The menu photos lining food stalls at a night market in Hollywood look real at first glance — mountains of fries, taquitos, smoothies. But Adaeze Onyejekwe, 28, a Los Angeles resident who visited in late August, said that on closer inspection they looked too perfect, almost rubbery. “It didn’t look like chicken nuggets. It didn’t look like the food I normally eat,” she said.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
It's probably that unsettling feeling you get when something's too uniform — it just doesn't match human intuition for what's natural.
Why does it end up looking so buggy, like some kind of insect?
That's exactly what the image in Re: #10 looks like.
They're just using the bad output as-is lol
People feel genuine disgust at a world overrun with AI.
They simply can't accept it.
The shrimp one looks like some kind of larva.
I get why they'd have AI make it, but I can't understand whoever signed off on this.
AI isn't the problem here. What pisses me off is the judgment of whoever decided this was good enough. Does a restaurant that actually posts something this creepy even exist?
The angle of the bowl is weird — it's tilting toward the viewer.
Stuff always ends up looking like it's floating whenever Gemini makes these.
Re: #131
The front-to-back leveling is off.
It's like the gravitational field itself is warped.
I can't imagine how someone who actually has the phobia would react.
I closed the tab the second I saw it.
Seriously, it brought tears to my eyes.
That's fine for a basic menu listing, but for ad photos like the one in Re: #1, you really need proper photography or it just looks bad.
Phones these days can take great photos too, you know.
You've got to keep the lighting and that mouth-watering "sizzle" look consistent.
And of course things like reflections showing up in a cup are a no-go too.
The problem is these are menus for the restaurant's own brand-new items — not existing dishes.
When you have AI generate something totally new with no precedent, you get Re: #46.
Looks fine at a glance, but look closely and the noodles are too thick for this type of soup.
There's no steam or anything, though.
looks pretty tasty, right?
The noodles look kind of gross somehow.
Re: #124
And they post it so confidently too, even though it looks like this.
The noodles are so thick I can already imagine the soup being greasy and overly rich — I wouldn't order it.
Looks like someone already snuck a bite out of the egg yolk.
There's zero evidence this thing has any idea what kikurage (wood ear mushroom) actually is.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b7/Elias_Garcia_Martinez_-_Ecce_Homo.jpg
Background and Key Points of the Discussion
AI-generated images are said to trigger an “uncanny valley” reaction because their textures and shading are too uniform, straying from the natural variation people expect from real food based on experience. Thread commenters repeatedly pointed out unnatural details — the absence of steam, noodle thickness, and how light falls on the food. Opinion split over whether to blame the AI technology itself or the businesses that used the images without properly checking them, with AI defenders emphasizing the latter. Some also noted that while AI excels at reproducing existing dishes, it tends to fall apart more with restaurant-original new menu items, which have little training data to draw on — suggesting real limitations remain for its use in advertising photography. In compiling this article, replies disputing the authenticity of an unrelated disaster photo and exchanges that veered into sexual content were excluded.
*This article is compiled from excerpts and a summary of the 5ch (News Express+) thread “AI-Generated Food Photos Are an “Uncanny Valley” — Why Such a Backlash?.”
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