Artificial Intelligence, not Actual Creativity

I recently read an article that said there was evidence the quality of AI was diminishing already, because it was starting to draw on AI-generated content in its own pool of reference material.?

This intimated that AI was already in some sort of technological death spiral. My reaction to this news was telling. I sniggered. Like when you see the guy who bullied you out of the fast lane ten minutes ago having a word with the motorway police on the hard shoulder. It was schadenfreude, plain and simple. “Ha! You got yours!”

Then, just two days ago, I was working on a large graphic for a client’s stand at the forthcoming defence show, DSEI. The source image supplied by the client was okay, but cropped too close to the subject matter, meaning we had little flexibility in how we position it in the space provided.?

My reaction was telling. I sniggered. Only this time it was as if I was in a BMW and just bullied someone out of the fast lane. I felt empowered.??

So, in the latest version of Adobe Photoshop - with its suite of AI tools - I extended the canvas top and bottom, selected those empty areas and clicked ‘Generate’. No prompts or descriptions.?

10 seconds later I had extra trees and sky at the top, and a useful amount of stony riverbed at the bottom, complete with perspective and motion blur. You cannot see where the original finishes and the AI takes over. My reaction was telling. I sniggered. Only this time it was as if I was in a BMW and just bullied someone out of the fast lane. I felt empowered.??

In this example, AI was doing something that, realistically, we simply couldn’t do before. In other areas, it does mundane but useful things - like cutting out subjects from backgrounds - better and so, so much faster than we can do manually.?

As a business, this is already saving time, and that means money, right? And as creatives, it’s enabling us to ideate faster and push back technical limits that may have constrained us before.?

10 seconds later, she had a photorealistic bowl of what we in the UK call ‘crisps’. AI’s imaging was perfect. Its grasp of British vernacular was not.

That’s not to say it’s perfect. Ally Binns was working on a graphic for a client in the food industry the other day. She had an image of a roast chicken, seen from above. She used AI to extend the background as well. Perfect rustic wooden worktop, check. Then she selected the area and typed the prompt: “a bowl of chips, viewed from above.”

10 seconds later, she had a photorealistic bowl of what we in the UK call ‘crisps’. AI’s imaging was perfect. Its grasp of British vernacular was not.

It still requires a decent AI-wrangler to feed the system, and the seasoned eyes of a strategy-driven creative to assess both the quality and applicability of those results to the objective, no matter how miraculous the technology may feel.

What are my feelings about AI then, specifically for my industry? In a word, ‘complicated’. The inevitability of both AI’s momentum and its seemingly exponential rates of improvement mean that burying my head under a pillow and pretending it will fizzle out are asinine. In a recent webinar on AI held by the Design Business Association (DBA), there was cause for reassurance - AI is not, as yet, good at novel thinking, but its capabilities offer us boundless scope for fast ideation. It still requires a decent AI-wrangler to feed the system, and the seasoned eyes of a strategy-driven creative to assess both the quality and applicability of those results to the objective, no matter how miraculous the technology may feel.

That said, as much as AI might put us in the fast lane, what’s the point in that if you’re on the M25, going round and round and round, chewing up the same scenery?

I feel the threat of AI to the design sector comes in a potential decrease in the value perception of the profession. Design is poorly taught in our education system, and consequently, poorly understood or appreciated in our professional lives. This drives late engagement with creative consultants, and low expectations for what can be achieved through the application of good strategy and relevant materials.

We’ve often joked in the studio that some people think we just click buttons and 'Photoshop does it all for us.’ AI kinda makes that truer than it’s ever been.

Where AI drinks from a lake, the creative wants to swim in the ocean.

That said, as much as AI might put us in the fast lane, what’s the point in that if you’re on the M25, going round and round and round, chewing up the same scenery?

One of the most valuable qualities of a good designer is that they get bored easily. They hate homogeny. They hate churn. They hate ‘trends’. They want to help brands be distinct in their own way, by finding novel and relevant ways to connect and engage. They seek out different roads to explore. Where AI drinks from a lake, the creative wants to swim in the ocean.

I’m not sure AI will ever get bored enough to do that.

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