I don't think anyone has a problem with the use of stock images. It's mostly the bad use of Photoshop, wrong perspective, bad (or nonexistent) shadows, difference in the asset resolutions that points to the so called "laziness".
This is the issue that I have with Hugh's art for the last 15-20 years - especially on DT's artwork. The cover for BCaSL is a primary example of that. The lack of a shadow for the mouse, the elephant not looking real, the majesty symbol not having the correct perspective and even just having the majesty symbol there as basically a stain on the floor. When I created the artwork for the Black Clouds and Silver Anniversary T-shirt (which MP asked me to do), I did everything I could to make sure everything fit - so the shadows matched the light source, the perspectives were more accurate and I made the majesty symbol a marble floor design. In fact, MP was impressed enough that he decided to do a poster of that image, too.
The same could be said for 8v with the wonky angle of the swinging ball on the cover; plus the domino monoliths, much of the underwater scene (especially the stop sign) and the 8-ball image on the CD tray all not being photo realistic. When I created the artwork for MP's drum heads on the 20th anniversary tour, I used real photos of a stop sign and 8-ball.
And I also have issues with some of the other artwork Hugh's done for DT. Not trying to nitpick at all, and as I've said in other posts, I actually *like* Hugh's ideas. It's just that the execution of his ideas unfortunately is often lacking. More than anything, I attribute that to him probably cutting corners now to save time and to find more work since he probably can't command the same high prices he used to now that Photoshop, stock imagery and digital photography are so common place (never mind telecommunications) so that even the average Joe can create artwork for themselves or others. This besides his increasing reliance on stock photography.
Are you seriously saying Hugh Syme should've travelled to Norway to take that image himself, which would've looked pretty much identical to the literally thousands of other images on the internet... instead of picking that stock image?
I mean, Storm Thorgerson did this: https://youtu.be/6Hxn1Jy_v0I
Yeah, but DT are not PF, and they probably couldn't afford the kind of work that went into producing the cover for AMLOR.
I agree and was going to post the same thing, altho I *love* the spirit that Storm embodied in how he created artwork. That said, when that cover was created, Photoshop didn't even exist then, so it wasn't an option. If he had done that artwork 10 years later, you can be sure he would've only used a small fraction of the beds that they did end up using. But still, the execution would've been done perfectly, as can be seen by Storm's art from the 90s onward (the cover of Pulse and Richard Wright's Broken China album both come to mind immediately).
Also, if DT weren't happy with Hugh's work, they wouldn't keep going back to him, so obviously they seem content with his work enough to continue having him do artwork for the band. Or maybe it's just John's "What Would Rush Do?"... either way, I don't blame them, or Hugh. I do think Hugh does put a lot of work into his work, but there are also some oversights in them, so either his vision is going, he doesn't care enough, or the band doesn't care enough to notice or point out anything that might look odd.
From what I understand, they of course love Hugh's artwork - not just JP but MP, and I'd imagine that the case for the rest of the guys as well. But it seems that they (both JP and MP who deal with Hugh) defer to Hugh in general when it comes to the details of the artwork, trusting him, being that he's the professional instead of questioning him. I think it's a mistake, but it's their product and their choice. All I can do is sit back and be an arm-chair quarterback knowing it could have (and should have) been better because I care about such details and want the best for my favorite band. But if they don't care, there's nothing I can do about it than periodically express frustration.
I'm hoping for some weird sci-fi sounds in The Alien! That's something they've never done.
Ummmm....did you forget about the 5 NOMAC tracks on TA? Those are "weird sci-fi sounds" if I ever heard them.