In the past year, AI has completely exploded in popularity and controversy. I have neglected to add my two cents, because there seems to be a lot of emotion on both sides of the pro and anti AI coin. But I think it is time, as a graphic designer, that I add my piece specifically with regard to using AI for image generation and graphic design.
So here it is:
I am not one bit afraid of AI taking my job (at least not for a long time to come).
Why?
When you hire a graphic designer, you are not hiring them for technical skill alone; you’re hiring for taste, too. This is something I firmly believe AI cannot compete with yet.
Where AI Falls Short in Graphic Design
For someone to get a usable design from AI, they have to frontload a lot of work—writing the perfect prompt and giving AI meticulous instructions, guides, and inspiration. And even then, what someone ends up with might be sub-par because they don’t understand enough about the nuances of graphic design to recognize what’s wrong with it.
AI is never going to give you pushback. It will never tell you that a design’s colors do not have enough contrast or that the copy is too long, unless you specifically ask for it. And even then, the burden is still on you to have the working design knowledge to be truly confident in a finished product.
This feels antithetical to the goal of AI; instead of creating less work for you, it is actually creating more.
Conversely, clients don’t have to tell a graphic designer every tiny detail about what they’re envisioning. With just general parameters, copy, and some brand materials, a designer can create a pixel-perfect image that may only need a few revisions here and there.
And that’s part of the appeal of working with a professional, right? While anyone can make a flyer or graphic for social media with beginner-friendly tools like Canva, a graphic designer has an artistic eye and the ability to discern between what you are asking for and what will actually look good.
Editing graphics and images is another function that AI fails to do well.
It’s unlikely that the first image AI generates is spot on (or even close to it), so you’ll want some tweaks made. Unfortunately, AI cannot build in isolation off its own creation. Rather, it is forced to regenerate the entire image. So, for example, if you ask AI to brighten just one segment of the image it has produced, it regenerates the entire thing, not only making the change you requested but also altering other areas that you wanted to keep as is. Frustrating? You bet!
In comparison, when you ask a graphic designer for a revision, they open the same document, make one tiny edit, and five minutes later, you have the exact same image with only your requested adjustment. You get the desired result so much faster and with far less effort on your part.
AI Is No Competition for Graphic Designers
Graphic designers and AI are not truly in competition with each other. The list goes on and on for reasons not to use AI for design—including environmental impact, questions on parameters for ethical use, and overall unpopularity.
So why add more work for yourself and take on the risks, merely for a cheaper production?
My feelings are best described by this tweet: “I want AI to do my laundry and dishes so that I can do art and writing, not for AI to do my art and writing so that I can do my laundry and dishes.”
AI is a tool, not a replacement for human creativity and expertise. If we can find more environmentally friendly and ethical ways to expand and use it, I would be all for incorporating it into my design workflow—the key word here being “incorporate,” not “replace.”
