Sunrise host Matt Shirvington has shared the unexpected reason he was busy “playing” on his phone during presenter Edwina Batholomew’s news report.
Shirvo made the admission just after Bartholomew revealed a new image taken by NASA’s Webb Telescope.
WATCH VIDEO ABOVE: Shirvo reveals exactly why he was ‘playing’ on his phone
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The photo shows a real-life close-up of the birth of a star, captured almost 400 light years away.
“The image’s release coincides with the first anniversary of Webb’s observation of the cosmos,” she added.
But at the end of the report, Bartholomew noted that the Sunrise crew had a “doubter amongst us”.
She was referring to Shirvo, who earlier in the show had said that the spectacular image looked as if it may have been created using AI.
“Well, the first time I saw these images, I was like, could that be AI?” he said.
“No, seriously — these days, right?”
The host then decided to test out his theory by creating his own AI images of the same thing.
“So I went, ‘OK, what if I threw that into an AI program and created one of my own?’” he said. “So I did.”
He then showed off the results of his experiment, revealing a series of AI photos he had generated.
“Just on my phone this morning, I just put in ‘star explodes, planet born,’” he explained.
“And yes, the real one’s much better, isn’t it?”
Sunrise star Nat Barr then pulled up her co-host for not paying attention to Bartholomew’s news report.
“So instead of listening to Eddie’s news, (you’ve) just been playing on AI, on your phone,” she asked.
Bartholomew added: “Yes, yes.”
Shirvo replied: “Well that’s every day!”
Barr then conceded that it was “actually very interesting” to see Shirvo’s AI images versus the real thing.
“But the real one does look better,” Shirvo added.