At least, I hope not.
I could be wrong.
The release of Midjourney, DALL-E 2, Stable Diffusion, and other similar programs, have made a big splash in the art community, with some artists reasonably concerned that it signifies the end of commercial art careers.
As someone on Twitter said, “If creative jobs aren’t safe from machines, then even high-skilled jobs are in danger of becoming obsolete. What will we have then?”
An AI artwork even won an art competition.*
(* The guy who ran the AI prompts said it took him 80 hours of work, so there’s still a good amount of labor to find the really good stuff.)
In first impression, the artwork generated by AI is mind-blowingly good, but rendering a concept is really only the beginning stage of the creative process. You still need to go through rounds of changes to improve an design to get closer to what you (or a client) exactly want.
The intrinsic problem with AI, at least for right now, is that you can’t really make any changes. You can run a prompt again, with a revised set of keywords, but the results are random. With each render you might get closer to what you want, but equally you might also get farther away. It’s a roll of the dice.
Human artists, engaged in the process of refinement, are more linear.
“So why not just program an AI to make design decisions like a human?
Because it’s incredibly hard. So hard, in fact, that in AI research a problem that requires an AI to be as intelligent as a human to solve is called “AI-hard” (great name, folks) or “AI-complete”. There’s also significant doubt among AI researchers that it’s even a possible outcome or worthwhile pursuit.
I’m willing to bet design is an AI-complete problem.
To make a fully automated designer you have to first program an AI that is as smart and creative as a human being. In that case you might as well hire a qualified human.
It’s more likely that AI will become a tool for designers to use in parts of the process where it makes sense. Crunching large amounts of data and identifying patterns. Or generating a wide variety of possible solutions and selecting the best based on inputs and criteria from human designers. In fact, it already is being used this way with generative design tools.
It’s possible that AI tools will replace or enhance some parts of a designer’s craft. But a designer’s tools have always been evolving. CAD software has totally replaced paper drafting. Fast, easy, photo-realistic rendering has made high-fidelity visualization by hand all but obsolete. 3D printing has replaced foam shaving.
Emphasis will shift to more of the synthesizing, integrating, and refining parts of the design process that can’t be easily automated. These higher-level functions are where future designers will hone their craft.”
(Source: https://www.anson.design/newsletter/will-ai-take-your-design-job)
Artists will not be replaced, but artists will need to adapt.
I could be wrong.
The release of Midjourney, DALL-E 2, Stable Diffusion, and other similar programs, have made a big splash in the art community, with some artists reasonably concerned that it signifies the end of commercial art careers.
As someone on Twitter said, “If creative jobs aren’t safe from machines, then even high-skilled jobs are in danger of becoming obsolete. What will we have then?”
An AI artwork even won an art competition.*
(* The guy who ran the AI prompts said it took him 80 hours of work, so there’s still a good amount of labor to find the really good stuff.)
In first impression, the artwork generated by AI is mind-blowingly good, but rendering a concept is really only the beginning stage of the creative process. You still need to go through rounds of changes to improve an design to get closer to what you (or a client) exactly want.
The intrinsic problem with AI, at least for right now, is that you can’t really make any changes. You can run a prompt again, with a revised set of keywords, but the results are random. With each render you might get closer to what you want, but equally you might also get farther away. It’s a roll of the dice.
Human artists, engaged in the process of refinement, are more linear.
“So why not just program an AI to make design decisions like a human?
Because it’s incredibly hard. So hard, in fact, that in AI research a problem that requires an AI to be as intelligent as a human to solve is called “AI-hard” (great name, folks) or “AI-complete”. There’s also significant doubt among AI researchers that it’s even a possible outcome or worthwhile pursuit.
I’m willing to bet design is an AI-complete problem.
To make a fully automated designer you have to first program an AI that is as smart and creative as a human being. In that case you might as well hire a qualified human.
It’s more likely that AI will become a tool for designers to use in parts of the process where it makes sense. Crunching large amounts of data and identifying patterns. Or generating a wide variety of possible solutions and selecting the best based on inputs and criteria from human designers. In fact, it already is being used this way with generative design tools.
It’s possible that AI tools will replace or enhance some parts of a designer’s craft. But a designer’s tools have always been evolving. CAD software has totally replaced paper drafting. Fast, easy, photo-realistic rendering has made high-fidelity visualization by hand all but obsolete. 3D printing has replaced foam shaving.
Emphasis will shift to more of the synthesizing, integrating, and refining parts of the design process that can’t be easily automated. These higher-level functions are where future designers will hone their craft.”
(Source: https://www.anson.design/newsletter/will-ai-take-your-design-job)
Artists will not be replaced, but artists will need to adapt.
