Surprise and discovery. The two things that, for me, are most important for coming up with great ideas.
But is AI removing them from the creative process?
In a recent post I mentioned the dangers of creative thinking becoming siloed in specialisms.
That silo effect’s also one of the dangers of AI, especially when it’s being used to generate ideas, executions or craft. It’s easy to lose the surprise and discovery the creative process needs. We only get out what we’ve put in. The expected. And a version of what already exists.
You can see evidence of this in a lot of the work that’s used to promote AI tools. It’s usually rehashing (copying) great existing work, like the recent Studio Ghibli, Simpsons, Wes Anderson trends.
Coming up with great ideas isn’t about getting to a solution as quickly as possible.
It’s not going with the first thought.
Or doing your version of what already exists.
Yes, you can put the brief into AI, get an idea straight away and then get it to knock out an image and copy. But you’d be losing so much chance for discovery.
Ideas need to evolve and morph. Improving and building at each stage with different creators, illustrators, photographers or directors adding their skills and experience to shape them too.
However, being aware of this maybe gives us a clue of how to use AI well.
That’s by being as innovative as the technology itself.
One of the best uses I’ve seen was an agency who’d start the creative process by feeding the brief into AI. Then using what it came up with as a checklist of ideas not to do. That’s great. Creatives normally start off by getting all of the obvious first thoughts out of the way before springing off them to more interesting work. The AI does those obvious thoughts for them, letting them move on quicker.
AI’s here to stay and it’s going to be a useful tool, as long as we use that tool correctly.
To a hammer everything is a nail. Let’s not let AI become a hammer that bashes all creative into the same shape.
Is using AI creative? It is, if we’re creative in the way we use it.
