See the video: Pope Francis goes viral in a stylish coat – what’s behind the photo.
You’ve probably never seen Pope Francis look so stylish.
This image, circulating on social media at the end of March 2023, shows the head of the church in a fashionable down coat.
Hundreds of thousands of users see, comment and spread the supposed recording of the “Holy Father”.
But is the photo of Pope Francis really real? What’s behind the picture?
The picture of Pope Francis in a stylish down coat is a fake.
A reverse search of the image leads to the Reddit community of the AI ”Midjourney”.
Midjourney is a text-to-image AI and allows users to generate deceptively real images on the basis of so-called “prompts”.
The fact that the image is posted on Reddit alongside other AI creations is a clear indication that the photo is not a real one.
Midjourney allows users to browse other users’ images.
As the research shows, many users have created their own variants of the stylish pontifex.
With a little patience, the viral photo of the Pope can be found on the platform.
Midjourney user “Mister Shart” created the deceptively real picture on March 24, 2023.
The “Prompt” used and additional information about the image can be found under the file.
To create the fake, the user only needs a command of 349 characters.
The case makes it clear that in times of AI images, one should not believe every photo from social networks.
Practice and creativity enable users to create deceptively real fakes and thus put celebrities in situations that never happened.
How do we check videos for manipulation in the editorial office? It is important to look at the details. The individual frames of a video often reveal whether a video has been edited. We take a close look at each image and enlarge individual sections. Indications of a fake are, for example: lack of motion blur, unnatural shadows or editing errors. The general rule at stern is: Seriousness before speed. We always double-check facts and material thoroughly before publishing them. For this we work with the cross-editorial “Team Verification” together with RTL, NTV, RTL2, Radio NRW.