16. February 2025
When my girlfriend asked me to help build a website for her new Pole dancing studio, I thought it would be a breeze. I’m a web developer; this is my thing. I envisioned a sleek design with cool, dynamic images of dancers performing gravity-defying tricks. Naturally, I turned to AI image generation for some quick placeholder photos. That was my first mistake.
What I got was an eldritch gallery of mangled limbs, dancers fusing with poles, and hands with more fingers than I was comfortable counting. Some had arms that extended into infinity; others had legs that wrapped around nothing but air. It didn’t take long to realize AI has a real problem with anatomy and object interaction—especially when it comes to pole dancing.
So, why is AI so bad at pole dancing? Well, it boils down to two main issues: anatomy and object interaction. And boy, does AI butcher both.
Anatomy Is a Picasso Nightmare Come to Life
AI-generated humans often look like they were assembled by someone who failed IKEA instructions. Fingers multiply like gremlins, knees bend the wrong way, and necks stretch like a giraffe in training. When it comes to pole dancing, where the human body is twisted into gravity-defying poses, the results become nightmarish. The dancer might end up with a leg that loops back into the ribcage or an arm that fuses directly into the pole like a mutant symbiote. Trying to get an AI to render a dancer mid-spin is like asking it to solve a Rubik's Cube blindfolded while drunk.
Object Interaction Is a Complete Afterthought
Humans know what poles are for. AI? Not so much. You might ask for a dancer gripping a pole, but what you get is often an eldritch fusion where the hand is both holding and becoming the pole simultaneously. Sometimes the pole floats a few inches away from the hand, suggesting that the dancer possesses telekinesis.
Or worse, the dancer's legs might wrap around thin air, while the pole lurks awkwardly in the background like an ex-boyfriend who showed up uninvited.
Why This Happens
The underlying reason is that AI doesn’t understand the world like we do. It’s trained on a massive pile of images and statistics, not a conceptual grasp of how bodies and objects work. It doesn't know that hands should wrap around things, or that legs shouldn't casually phase through steel poles. It just mashes together pixels based on patterns it has seen before. When it encounters a niche subject like pole dancing, with its complex body movements and tight object interaction, the results are... interpretive, to say the least.
If you are still not ready for grabbing your own camera, then here are some tips that "might" work.
Tips for Getting Better AI-Generated Images
While AI image generation can be hit-or-miss, there are a few tricks that can improve your results:
- Be Specific with Your Prompts: Instead of just asking for a pole dancer, describe the pose, the clothing, the lighting, and even the style (e.g., cartoon, photorealistic, abstract).
- Avoid Overly Complex Poses: The more complex the pose, the more likely AI is to break a limb or merge a dancer with the pole. Start with simpler requests.
- Use Inpainting Tools: Some platforms let you edit specific parts of the image. You can fix hands or clean up a weird leg using these tools.
- Reference Images: Uploading a reference image can guide the AI to follow a particular style or composition.
- Expect to Iterate: It often takes multiple tries and refinements to get something usable. Treat it as a creative process, not a one-click solution.
In summary, if you want a picture of a pole dancer, it's probably best to just... take a picture of a pole dancer. Or be prepared for the AI to give you a Lovecraftian monstrosity who moonlights as a contortionist in a parallel universe where bones are optional.
If you would like to get started creating your own monstrosities, here is a few ressources:
