The integration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in graphic design has been a topic of heated debate within the creative community. As AI continues to evolve, its impact on the industry is both intriguing and concerning. This blog post explores the various facets of AI in graphic design, drawing insights from a detailed discussion between John Paul Mains and Jared Ramey, the Creative Director at Click Laboratory.
Understanding the AI Influence in Graphic Design
The Initial Threat Perception
Initially, AI was viewed as a significant threat to the graphic design industry. There was a belief that AI could design quicker and better than humans, raising concerns about the future of human designers. However, as Jared Ramey notes, this view is gradually changing. While AI’s capabilities are impressive, they are not without limitations.
AI’s Struggles with Complex Tasks
A notable example of AI’s limitations is its struggle with rendering hands accurately. This shortcoming has become a telltale sign of AI-generated graphics and highlights the technology’s current inability to match human precision in certain aspects.
AI’s Role in Current Design Processes
Despite its limitations, AI is not without its uses in the current design landscape. AI has been incorporated into tools like Photoshop, assisting with tasks like background removal or extension. This indicates a shift towards viewing AI as a tool rather than a replacement for human creativity.
The Future of Graphic Design in the Age of AI
Evolving Designer Roles
The role of the graphic designer is evolving in response to AI advancements. AI might streamline certain tasks, but it cannot replicate the creativity and depth of understanding that human designers bring to the table. As such, there’s a belief that serious designers who pride themselves on quality and creativity will continue to thrive, while those who rely heavily on AI may find themselves at a disadvantage.
AI’s Impact on Industry Standards
With AI’s integration, industry standards and expectations are also shifting. Art contests have started banning AI use, recognizing the distinct difference between AI-generated and human-created artwork. This move reinforces the value of human creativity and originality in the design world.
Preparing for the Future Market
Graphic designers, especially those entering the field, must adapt to a landscape where AI plays a significant role. This means leveraging AI as a tool while focusing on developing unique creative skills that set them apart from AI capabilities.
Key Takeaways
- AI as a Tool, Not a Replacement: AI should be seen as a tool that assists designers rather than a replacement for human creativity.
- The Limitations of AI: AI currently struggles with complex tasks and lacks the depth of human creativity.
- The Future of Design Jobs: The graphic design industry will likely see a shift, with a higher emphasis on creativity and less reliance on AI-generated designs.
Conclusion
As AI continues to make inroads into the graphic design industry, it’s crucial for designers to adapt and leverage AI as a tool while focusing on their creative strengths. The future of graphic design lies in a harmonious blend of AI efficiency and human creativity, ensuring that the industry continues to thrive with innovation and originality.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
ai, graphic design, design, designers, growth, brochure, graphic designer, fiverr, work, backgrounds, impact, brand, talk, photoshop, logo, portfolio
SPEAKERS
John Paul Mains, Jared Ramey
John Paul Mains 00:16
All right, a growth mentor family, we are back today. And I’ve got a special guest on for today. Jared Ramey, who is the creative director here at Click Laboratory. And, as always, we’re here to talk about how to grow your business and the things which can impact the growth of your business. And so today, as a creative designer, we want to come in and talk about the impact of all this generative AI stuff on graphic design. And we probably need to define what graphic design is a little bit. So is it we’re talking about, you know, brochure design, or designing boxes or background images for your website, or who knows what, and there’s all sorts of things, obviously, a graphic designer has traditionally done for us. But as we all know, the design world is kind of up in arms on what AI is capable of doing. And is it really going to impact housing, it is going to impact and how’s it going to impact the world of graphic design. So welcome, Darren. Yay. Happy to have you finally on board.
Jared Ramey 01:24
Yeah, no, we haven’t done one of these yet. I’m not we’re finally getting around to doing it. Definitely,
John Paul Mains 01:28
definitely. Well, I mean, what can you just give me your quick off the cuff two cents? What is your opinion about AI on the world of graphic design?
Jared Ramey 01:40
Well, it started out negative. And I think it’s kind of coming around. But But initially what it what it was was a threat. Because it was basically saying that computers can design things quicker and better than humans can. I think that was the initial belief, but but the more you see it, the more you can pick it out. And I don’t think it says it’s going to be as prevalent as we initially thought. I think right now, we’re in this phase of what do we do with it? It’s still very threatening. There are I’ve heard of some art contests, things like that, that use digital illustration, part of it, like some of the best digital illustrators out there. And what they have already said in these competitions is they have banned all AI use. And they can tell the difference. Yes, it is something that you can tell the difference on. It’s funny, because in AI, it’s kind of getting made fun of at the same time, because it’s not quite there yet. I’ve seen some some pretty funny ones where for some crazy reason it has a hard time with hands. Big telltale sign is that that AI is not good with hands. I’m sure they’re working on it to fix it. So it’s probably short. But right now, it’s funny, you’ll see a lot of these things. I’ve seen kids with third arms and fingers and stuff like that. And it looks like we trained it doesn’t notice them. The untrained eye does not notice it.
John Paul Mains 03:13
But you’re right, it is coming back. I mean, think about how fast we’ve come and where we are right now solving the hand issue is just a matter of time that so that I don’t have 1111 fingers anymore. 10 fingers but a great example with December right now and we went to our church Christmas play the other day. Sure enough, you open up the brochure, and little Jesus in the manger actually had his arm going all the way from the top all the way down to his foot. And Mary was holding an iPad that had nothing to do with any of them.
Jared Ramey 03:58
The church didn’t even notice that she was holding an iPad?
John Paul Mains 04:01
I don’t know what they thought. I’d be very curious to ask the question, but it was very, very clear that it was an AI design.
Jared Ramey 04:20
Oh, it’s more than a little weird. It doesn’t take anything in context. It just throws out what you what you want it to do. Now, I do believe within five years, a lot of these problems will be taken care of. And you can describe it in using you know, I guess you’d call it fuzzy logic. It would figure out what you want and be a lot more accurate. But right now, it’s just really not. It’s funny, it’s calmer.
John Paul Mains 04:44
I mean, that brings up the issues like okay, what is the future for graphic design? I mean, can you know right now, in my opinion it can’t do a good brochure, for example, or a mailer. It’s not going to get you A brand quite right. It’s not going to design it exactly the way you want it. It’s more like, Okay, I’ll tell it what I want. And if it does, it is good enough for me great. But if I’m very particular about my brand, and I want things to look a very certain way, it’s right now not capable, in my opinion. Yeah. Yeah, you’d like you’ve done some pretty amazing stuff with like, for designing Bach, box designs or wraps and things like that, there’s no way AI is going to be able to do this stuff anytime soon. Yeah.
Jared Ramey 05:31
And it’s because it’s so granular, you know, I think AI kind of relies on a sweeping statement, kind of thing, where it’s, it’s more, you need to make it as simple as you can for it to understand. So it can do it. And if it does, it may turn out something pretty good. But how do you get it to be very, very specific, right? I want this on. I want these words on this line. And I want it, you know, a quarter inch from each, each edge on the bottom left of this panel, it’s like, well know what I did. You know, it’s gonna throw some crazy stuff, actually, because it may not be able to figure those things out. And so yeah, I think on very technical designs, print work, and things like that, it’s a lot different. I mean, it also has to know, that to put in the right DPI, it has to be 300 dpi, or so that’s one of the problems that it has is it’s just not ready to handle the load by itself. Right? You know, I think you’re, it’s pretty good for photos, if all you want is amazing photos done, but it’s when we had talked about this earlier, with Photoshop, Photoshop has actually incorporated it into it with 2024. And, and so you know, I played around with that, to see what it would do. And in the end, it was like, this is a believable photo. You know, it’s because I didn’t give it crazy parameters, quite frankly, it’s because I gave it believable parameters.
John Paul Mains 07:16
Things actually kind of like I saw in Photoshop the other day, I mean, I’m, I’m not a graphic designer by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s a build t now using some of this AI logic to be able to remove backgrounds, or apply new backgrounds or extend backgrounds in, like, in front of an object. I mean, I thought that was that was a huge time saver. And so there’s some good into what it’s capable of doing and making your life easier with some of this stuff,
Jared Ramey 07:44
you got to think of it as a tool, rather than a replacement. To think that that’s pretty much where it always needs to be. Because as smart as AI is, I don’t know if you can teach your creativity. I don’t know if you can teach it. There’s there’s something about the human mind that thinks about things deeper than a computer would. Now can a computer solve equations way better than a human can? In AI? Absolutely. Can it can compute faster and think faster. Yeah, of course it can’t. What do you do better in chess, or a game show? Yeah, but not necessarily. When it comes to creativity?
John Paul Mains 08:27
Well, let’s think about logo. A logo is a perfect example of this. I mean, you could go out and tell AI to crank out a logo. And if you’re a lazy person, it’s just go I like that one, I’ll just go with that. But if you really, really want something their respective your brand, you know, there’s no way I wouldn’t trust that wouldn’t trust it for anything.
Jared Ramey 08:45
I’m wondering if guys that use Fiverr that are designers on Fiverr, if they’re just going to start typing in parameters, and it spits out three or four different ones, and they throw it all in there and be like done, because
John Paul Mains 08:58
I know that I can go over here to this AI thing and put it in few things, period, a logo that because I’m lazy, and I get what I want. Perfect.
Jared Ramey 09:07
That’s what I’m saying. I think I think maybe if people on Fiverr if they haven’t already started relying on AI, then it could be their downfall.
John Paul Mains 09:19
So I’ve seen even where some of these stock photography sites are allowing AI now they will call it out and say hey, this is AI and if you want to get it, but I’ve seen starting to see this in different places where I can go in and download AI where it’s clear that it’s AI art. Yeah. As opposed to somebody something an actual real photograph or something like that. So it’s it’s having an impact.
Jared Ramey 09:44
I think it kind of it. You know, it’s it’s disturbing as a long-term designer because it it. It makes me think that they’re actually actively trying to shove designers out of the way It’s just like, let us do it. And it’ll be cheaper, and it’ll look better and all this other stuff. And I, you know, at this point, it’s easy to spot that and you can, you know, it’s like the hands thing. And it’s, it’s the several other things especially trained eyes can see. But I think I think in the future is where it gets really dangerous. What happens whenever, you know, I’ve got an eight-year-old son, what if he wants to be a graphic designer? Is there even going to be a market for it at that point? You know, I worry.
John Paul Mains 10:35
I mean, I think my opinion, my opinion, is that it is going to be impacted. But if you really want the truly great, that’s still a person, you’re if you’re the lazy man out, you’ve got and you’re just your business that accepts mediocre, then they’ll go AI, but if you’re if you take your stuff seriously, and your work serious business seriously, you really want to grow, then you really want to have a strong brand, AI is not going to be the way to go when it comes to doing this type of work. Yeah,
Jared Ramey 11:05
I think that it’ll also weed out the very, very serious designers who take pride in their work versus the ones that really don’t care all that much. And I think the industry will get thinned out quite a bit. Because if you’re putting out stuff that is heavy in AI, or is not on par with a, I can’t even keep up with a I might as well just get out and go find a different job. Because you’re not gonna get hired, your portfolio is gonna, you know, show that, and they’re not gonna want to hire you. And I think there’s going to be fewer graphic designers in the future. So yeah,
John Paul Mains 11:49
yeah, I still struggle in the back of my mind on layout, and laying out a beautiful design, I will AI or be able to do it, I don’t know. It’s because at the end of the day, it’s an algorithm.
Jared Ramey 12:05
It is an algorithm. But see, we every day, graphic designers are given it more and more information, whether they like it or not, and that’s a good point. And, and so you, you can see a designer, put something out and they’re like, Hey, this is really good. I really liked doing this. I think that, you know, you’ll have designers that have been doing this a long time. And, you know, if they’re not keeping up with, you know, current trends and things like that, then you’re going to end up seeing a lot of them, get out of it, and, and move on to something else. I think that’s it’s sad, but I really think that’s commonly probably true. And, you know, like, like I mentioned, we’re giving it we’re, we post something on the, on our portfolio, whatever that we’re very, very proud of. And it gets out there, it’s public, my portfolio JRS, our art is available to the public, anybody can see it. So if it gets skimmed by AI, they go, Okay, well, these are good. This is their best work. Let’s see what we can glean from what they’re doing, and apply it to the AI. And I bet it’s kind of frustrating because you want to put your best stuff out there. But then at the same time for everyone to see. So you get more jobs. But then again, AI is taking that and saying this is successful work, I’m going to use it as a basis for which I thought about before. Yeah, it’s every day, we’re putting more and more out. And every day, it’s learning more and more.
John Paul Mains 13:48
So right now it’s a tool, but we’ll see where it goes from here. But if you’re obviously if you’re serious about your business, and you’re serious about your brand, you’re going to use the true creative, which is the human mind.
Jared Ramey 14:04
Yeah, while you’re out there listening to this, but keep that in mind and, and know that computers can’t do everything.
John Paul Mains 14:12
Don’t think there ever will be.
Well Jared I really appreciate you coming on here and let’s talking about this and be sure to like and follow us wherever you’re watching this or listening to this. And we will see you next time.