1. Scope
This version of the Human Authorship Standard applies to digital illustration. Other creative media are outside its scope and cannot currently be listed on BHFH.
2. The standard
Artwork listed as human-authored on BHFH must be 100% human-created.
Generative AI must not contribute expressive visual content to the final illustration.
3. Prohibited
The following are prohibited in qualifying human-authored artwork:
- Text-to-image generation
- Image-to-image generation
- AI-generated illustrations, characters, backgrounds, objects and textures
- Generative fill, AI inpainting and AI outpainting
- AI-generated line art, colouring and shading
- AI-generated visual content that is painted over or substantially edited
- AI-generated composition drafts that are directly incorporated into the final work
- Any generative system that creates expressive visual content used in the final illustration
There is no "AI-assisted" category under this version of the standard. The promise is deliberately strict.
4. Allowed
Non-generative editing and illustration tools are allowed when they do not generate expressive visual content. Manual brushes and erasers, selection and transform tools, cropping, rotation, resizing, layer organisation, opacity and colour adjustment, curves, levels, hue and saturation, brightness and contrast, non-generative filters, blur, sharpening, compression, file conversion, export, undo and redo, stroke stabilisation, perspective and symmetry guides, grids, and non-generative vector tools.
A tool is not allowed merely because the application that ships it is a mainstream illustration application. Most modern art applications now include generative features. BHFH classifies the specific feature used, not the application's name. The current classification of every catalogued feature is published alongside this standard.
5. What BHFH verifies, and what it does not
BHFH does not claim to prove with certainty that no AI was used. No such proof exists today, and any platform that claims otherwise is overstating what its technology can do.
What BHFH does is combine creator declarations, creator history, artwork provenance evidence, automated risk screening, random audits, human review, community reports and enforcement history into a single accountable record.
A creator who cannot produce creation evidence is not thereby in violation. Many legitimate artists simply do not record their process.
6. Audits
Listings and creators are selected for audit through a mixture of random sampling and risk-based selection. Audit probability is not published, and it is not predictable.
If you are selected, you will be notified, given a reasonable deadline, and asked to supply whatever evidence you have. You may state that you have none. A human reviewer examines what you provide and records structured findings.
An inconclusive audit is not a violation.
7. Consequences
Intentional misrepresentation is treated as a serious matter and can result in listing removal, restriction of your account, or suspension. Honest mistakes are treated as honest mistakes.
Every enforcement action can be appealed, and every enforcement action is decided by a person.