Artificial Intelligence & The Consequences
What are the consequences for art directors and copywriters when artificial intelligence can create art and copy. Is this an existential crisis or a handy new tool?
Artificial intelligence programs such as Mid journey, DALL-E and Stable Diffusion can create rich imagery from textual descriptions. ChatGPT can write copy generate ideas. These skill sets typically take years to master but an un-skilled person with the right text prompts can (with time and effort and a serious amount of computing power) create usable content.
Creativity, artificial intelligence, productivity, ethics.
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As artificial intelligence continues to advance, there are growing concerns about its potential impact on the art and advertising industries. With AI programs like Mid journey, DALL-E, and Stable Diffusion able to create stunning images from textual descriptions, and ChatGPT able to generate copy and ideas, some are wondering if this technology could replace the need for skilled art directors and copywriters.
On the one hand, AI-generated art and copy could be seen as a handy new tool for creatives. Instead of spending hours or even days sketching out ideas and writing copy, art directors and copywriters could use AI programs to quickly generate a range of options to choose from. This could save time and allow for more experimentation, ultimately leading to more creative and effective campaigns.
On the other hand, the rise of AI could also be seen as an existential crisis for these professionals. If anyone with the right prompts and a powerful enough com- puter can create usable content, what value do art di- rectors and copywriters bring to the table? This could lead to job losses and a decrease in the overall value of these roles.
Ultimately, the impact of AI on the art and advertising industries is still unclear. While it could potentially be
a useful tool, it could also pose a threat to the liveli- hoods of art directors and copywriters. As AI continues to develop, it will be important for these professionals to adapt and find new ways to showcase their value and expertise.*
*These four paragraphs were generated by ChatGPT. I wrote the summary of the article first, and then told it to ‘write an article based on this summary’. Not too shabby ChatGPT.
Why it matters
It may be a short-cut to better work. Copyright issues. Misinformation issues.
Image generated by Mid Journey bot on their Discord server with the following prompt:
/imagine prompt: Robot covered in paint, photo realistic, epic composition Unreal Engine, Cinematic, Color Grading, Ultra-Wide Angle, Depth of Field, hyper-detailed, beautifully color-coded, insane details , intricate details, beautifully color graded, Unreal Engine, Cinematic, Color Grading, Editorial Photography, Photography, Photoshoot, Depth of
Field, DOF, Tilt Blur, White Balance, 32k, Super-Resolution, Megapixel, ProPhoto RGB, VR, Halfear Lighting , Backlight, Natural Lighting, Incandescent, Optical Fiber, Moody Lighting, Cinemat ic Lighting, Studio Lighting, Soft Lighting, Volumetric, Contre-Jour, Beautiful Lighting, Accent Lighting, Global Illumination, Screen Space Global Illumination, Ray Tracing Global Illumination, Optics, Scattering, Glowing, Shadows, Rough, Shimmering, Ray Tracing Reflections, Lumen Reflections, Screen Space Reflections, Diffraction Grading, Chromatic Aberration, GB Displacement, Scan Lines, Ray Traced, Ray Tracing Ambient Occlusion, Anti-Aliasing, FKAA, TXAA, RTX, SSAO, Shaders, OpenGL-Shaders, GLSL-Shaders, Post Processing, Post-Production, Tone Mapping, CGI, VFX, SFX, insanely detailed and intricate, hypermaximalist, elegant, hyper realistic, super detailed, dynamic pose, photography, 8k.
Bullshit check
ChatGPT will happily and confidently churn out nonsense so a careful fact-check is crucial. Human writers com- municate meaning, and computers are not concerned with meaning. They look for what looks meaningful to humans and try to re-create it, often with hilariously (and seriously) wrong results.
Control
Professional creatives working to a deadline need precision tools in order communicate carefully considered mar- keting messages and currently these ai tools miss the mark too often to be reliable.
Usage rights
Ai image generation machines are trained on billions of images available across the web. I’ve personally seen a wa- termark from gettyimages on an image generated by the mid journey bot. Whether or not this image was ‘scraped’ by the bot from the website or uploaded and ‘re-mixed’ by a user it raises serious concerns around usage rights. The image concerned featured a woman walking in a desert and for that to be created it would have required lo- cation scouting, wardrobe, casting, photography, stying etc so for a bot to take it and alter it a bit to create a new image is un-ethical to say the least.
Takeaways
With the right input, ai tools can create usable content, but for professional creators it has many limitations. It’s definitely time to start integrating these tools into the creative process, but as of December 2022, it’s best use is for me personally is as an idea exploration tool. Headline generated by memory of https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=ij2LNSgDufM
Ian McFarlane, Senior Art Director, Javelin.