Gerryt wrote:

im guessing this abomination using ai generated "art" isnt licensed ?
https://www.cartembooks.com/tolkien-legendarium/

It may be AI-generated, which is pretty scummy and just a bad move in general, nothing to do with Tolkien, but it wouldn't take two years to make, in that case, if I believe the product description. It may well have be done using digital painting techniques by an artist adapting concepts generated by some AI tool that was fed textual descriptions. I can't tell from the description on the page translated by Google Translate. I didn't care so much so as to dig through the website to get any more clues. Certainly the art style is very far from the more familiar Tolkien art we are used to.

ADDED: I don't mean to defend the people producing this book if they are indeed just slapping AI-generated pictures in there. Just that it's not clear the extent to which AI was used in the production, from what I can read.

It’s all ai, an artist who was slated to work with them left the project as the company defended the use of ai in the book

Ah, in that case, it's totally scummy, regardless of it being Tolkien or not. I was trying to be charitable and think of a suitable use-case in the creative pipeline. Thanks for confirming.

I agree - definitely the images shown have the characteristic AI feel: like they were painted by a computer pretending to be the Hildebrant brothers. Here's one I rustled up in about 2 seconds using a well known free AI image generator web site. This is all it takes these days. I dread not being able to recognise them anymore, they are getting better all the time. I just entered 'ents and bilbo get drunk' to produce this masterpiece - perhaps more 'legless' than 'breathless':

Mod edit - Image removed, we have a policy of no AI artwork on the site.

New paperback edition of Smith of Wootton Major, to be published on March 27th 2025.

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Smith of Wootton Major (UK paperback)

HarperCollins (2025-03-27)

£8.99 HarperCollins (Paperback) - Availability: Click to check

$11.50 Blackwell's (paperback) - Availability: Unknown

£8.99 Amazon.co.uk (Paperback) - Availability: Preorderable

€11.20 Amazon.de (Taschenbuch) - Availability: Preorderable

Oh that’s incredible!! All that’s left would be Roverandom for The Treasury boxed set (I’d also love to see a Signature Edition of Father Christmas and Tree and Leaf make it to the format)

Worth mentioning: this is the first time that Smith of Wootton Major has ever been released in paperback by HarperCollins (I don’t remember if it did ‘pre-HarperCollins publishing Tolkien’ so I don’t wanna say “first time ever”)

There was a Hapercollins Paperback Edition with illustrations by Roger Garland published in 1995

Oh wow: thanks for clearing that up remy: I honestly thought those covers/editions were Unwin-only ones.

Scarlet_Sorcerer wrote:

Worth mentioning: this is the first time that Smith of Wootton Major has ever been released in paperback by HarperCollins (I don’t remember if it did ‘pre-HarperCollins publishing Tolkien’ so I don’t wanna say “first time ever”)

https://tolkienbooks.net/php/details2.php?id=593

Also, Smith has been published in PB numerous times. A quick search of this site could've told you that.