HAS AI KILLED OFF THE CREATIVE?
dall-e 2 takes on the role of creative and designer
AI has taken another scalp, and this time it’s come for us Creatives.
This might not be wholly true (cue a collective sigh of relief), but OpenAI are getting mightily close. They’ve created a system called ‘DALL-E 2’ that uses AI to create images and art based on a collection of descriptive words inputted by its users.
The service has already seen its first brand involvement with Cosmopolitan, the entertainment magazine, using it to create a bespoke front cover for their latest edition. Although the service is still quite clunky – it took Cosmo quite a few hours (and a few hundred prompts) to perfect the combination of descriptive keywords – it does take on the role of both Creative and Designer. This streamlines the creation process and opens us up to the possibility of endless outcomes mere mortals may never have considered.
For years I’ve fought the case that Creatives are a sacred species (admittedly I am perhaps a bit biased) and something AI could never replace. The creation of DALL-E 2 however, has potentially derailed my theory, bringing it crashing down to earth in a burst of flames, sharpies, and precious tantrums – creative stereotypes the OpenAI team have overlooked for some reason.
This doesn’t necessarily mean the end is nigh for us Creatives. I’m sure when services like Photoshop were first launched, similar questions were likely to have been asked. Similarly throughout history whenever new creative innovation came about, uncertainty arose on the necessity of the older, less shiny version, but ultimately it just creates the opportunity for collaboration between the two.
For example, DALLE-2 can be used by us as a creative tool; hours of endless searching on Google Images for that one incredibly niche, impossible to find, reference for a pitch deck has now been reduced to a quick search and a few key words. In the same vein, this could also be a quicker, sleeker, partner to specialist skills such as scamping and storyboarding – both of which are seen as necessary requirements for all Creatives to have in their arsenal.
Ultimately the OpenAI team have created more questions than they’ve answered, which I suppose is the goal when launching industry defining projects. The big question though, is what is next for AI in creative? Personally, I’ll start getting worried when the waitlists to use services like DALL-E 2 are shorter than my lifetime.