AI for the Future of Graphic Design, No Longer for Designers. Fact or Fiction?
Last update: 9 November 2023 at 12:51 pm
2.60/5The future of graphic design is facing yet another revolution! Artificial Intelligence and automation dominate the graphic design industry, leaving businesses and designers to rethink their futures and livelihoods.
The fear of ‘being replaced’ is evident and valid, but it is essential to understand the big picture to move your brand forward with the tide, not against it.
And so, our answer to the question “Will AI replace graphic designers?” is, “No, it will not. It will replace the way we do business.” And that is what we want to highlight in this blog.
At Sortlist, we have asked for help from the Dubai-based digital design firm PrezLab to answer these open-ended graphic design questions. Their inspiration for this article comes from experiencing this firsthand, who try to automate and optimize their processes, aiming to find the right tools that won’t hinder their creativity.
Artificial Intelligence Tools Vs. Human Graphic Designers
AI-powered tools such as an AI art generator offer value that human-powered services don’t, and vice-versa. So, let us begin by sharing:
3 Ways AI Tools Prove Its Superiority
Being aware of the AI-powered tools and their impact, we accept that these tools have specific qualifications to transform and transcend graphic design trends that are uniquely applied to the design services that we provide for our clients—(from branding and logo design, infographics design, website design, and more…).
Our core specialty, presentation design, is one of the most requested design services, especially in our current pandemic times, and AI has found its way to offer incredible value:
Content Personalization
“AI content personalization is a software that uses artificial intelligence to serve up the right content at the right time for individual site visitors, based on what they’ve consumed in the past.”
The success rate of this particular feature has been understood since the inception of Instagram. The creative process has been built around consumer behavior and has developed a significant learning curve for the future of marketing design and user experience.
Kathleen Walch, founder of Cognilytica, an AI research and advisory firm, shares:
“Brands now understand that not all users are the same and content isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach. To resolve this issue, organizations need to shape their content to the individual”
Shaping creative content is one of the first steps taken in the future of graphic design. The possibility of collecting data about a specific target audience enables businesses to not only convert more of that type of audience but also retain existing and new customers. The dynamism of content is endless with AI graphic design tools help (not take over).
Developing Variations with AI Graphic Design Tools
Content optimization is power, From optimizing social media posts, paid advertisements, logo design, brand identity, websites… etc.
AI tools utilize the database it has gathered on the consumer’s behavior, patterns, keyword research, interests, engagement level, and many more matrices to leave no room for predictions but to cultivate data-driven design solutions that better cater to its customers and, therefore, can generate multiple variations.
NUTELLA tried and tested AI’s potential through AI-generated images r under the project name “Nutella Unica,”
“The algorithm pulled from a database of dozens of patterns and custom color palettes to create seven million different versions of Nutella’s graphic identity, which have been splashed across the front of jars in Italy.”
All of this was created while preserving the brand’s identity.
As an agency specializing in creating high-level presentation designs, having a variety of ‘templated’ slides is always a bonus (not a replacement). PowerPoint and other tools offer this service, and PrezLab is taking advantage of that.
Need for Speed.
When it comes to data collecting, analyzing, processing ….etc., as human beings, there is much to be done, and time seems to be the enemy.
Prioritizing tasks becomes a terrifying routine whether you are a graphic designer in a team or a multi-billion dollar company co-founder.
AI tool enables us to focus on what matters most while caring for the rest. It allows us to work smarter, not harder.
41% of European employees are seeking a reduction in repetitive tasks and more than a third (36%) call for the automation of admin tasks
Now for the other side of the coin:
3 Skills That Prove Humans to Be the Heros
Undermining the human element and what it offers is a waste of human talent. People want to interact, feel safer, and prefer to do business with real people.
So here are three things human designers excel at, just by being human:
Understanding Nuances & Empathy
In business, they always tell you to “put yourself in your ideal customer’s shoes.” This is a skill to hone, not an automatic switch.
Humans can perceive, predict, understand, empathize, and connect. Emotional Intelligence is something that can and never will be replaced.
It helps business leaders, marketers, brands, and customers create an emotional experience. And that is something even AI and the future of graphic design can’t undersell.
The Art of Human Creativity: The Ability to Create Original Content
At some level, AI and computers can process and analyze data to the point where they can produce art, music … etc. But that is not the whole story. It never was.
Here’s a question for you… Where does this data come from? Without human creativity and initiative, will AI have any data to analyze?
Everything starts with a dot; in this scenario, everything begins with human creativity. And originality is what AI lacks. It’s a spy that detects, analyzes, and produces only what it is told to make. It can prolong innovation, but innovation stems from that one original human idea.
Technology Management
For most people, the most at-risk jobs are in technology. The fear is valid regarding the high chance of being replaced by AI and robots to do the job.
However, the flip side of this narrative is that even with this increase in technological advancements, humans are still required to create, manage, and fix the technology itself.
In a Forbes Article, business consultant Bernard Marr shares his thoughts on the matter:
…automated systems will still require oversight, especially at the beginning. Even if an AI system can take over the bookkeeping for a company, an accountant will still be needed to check for errors.
He followed with:
Likewise, while a computer might be programmed to make ad buys for a company, a marketing expert would want to double-check that the purchases are aligned with the brand.
As the ‘rule makers’, designers only…
…can define what design is. Artificial intelligence can imitate human to manipulate design language, voice, and tone, pattern, and component within the system, but the whole system is designed by human.
Where Do We Stand in the Face of AI? [Past, Present, Future]
Graphic designers and businesses alike have to accept that technological advancement brings with it the evolution in the roles that designers undertake. Not the eradication but the development.
Richard Buchanan explains this phenomenon through Buchanan’s Orders of Design Model, where he “has devised a matrix that looks at levels of design activity.” He describes how the shifts in these activities and outcomes have created different roles for designers to operate and collaborate.
The research shows that graphic designers have evolved from being creators to curators.
Understanding Nuances & Empathy
In business, they always tell you to “put yourself in your ideal customer’s shoes.” This is a skill to hone, not an automatic switch.
Humans can perceive, predict, understand, empathize, and connect. Emotional Intelligence is something that can and never will be replaced.
It helps business leaders, marketers, brands, and customers create an emotional experience. And that is something even an AI design tool and the future of graphic design can’t undersell.
The Art of Human Creativity: The Ability to Create Original Content
At some level, AI and computers can process and analyze data to the point where they can produce art, music … etc. But that is not the whole story. It never was.
Here’s a question for you… Where does this data come from? Without human creativity and initiative, will AI have any data to analyze?
Everything starts with a dot; in this scenario, everything begins with human creativity. And originality for the design process is what AI lacks. It’s a spy that detects, analyzes, and only produces what it is told. It can prolong innovation or create images with an image generator, but innovation stems from that one original human idea.
Technology Management
For most people, the most at-risk jobs are in technology. The fear is valid regarding the high chance of being replaced by AI and robots to do the job.
However, the flip side of this narrative is that even with this increase in technological advancements, humans are still required to create, manage, and fix the technology itself.
In a Forbes Article, business consultant Bernard Marr shares his thoughts on the matter:
…automated systems will still require oversight, especially at the beginning. Even if an AI system can take over the bookkeeping for a company, an accountant will still be needed to check for errors.
He followed with:
Likewise, while a computer might be programmed to make ad buys for a company, a marketing expert would want to double-check that the purchases are aligned with the brand.
As the ‘rule makers’, designers only…
…can define what design is. Artificial intelligence can imitate human to manipulate design language, voice, and tone, pattern, and component within the system, but the whole system is designed by human.
Where Do We Stand in the Face of AI? [Past, Present, Future]
Graphic designers and businesses alike have to accept that technological advancement brings with it the evolution in the roles that designers undertake. Not the eradication but the growth.
Richard Buchanan explains this phenomenon through Buchanan’s Orders of Design Model, where he “has devised a matrix that looks at levels of design activity.” He describes how the shifts in these activities and outcomes have created different roles for designers to operate and collaborate.
The research shows that graphic design artists have evolved from creators to curators.
What Can Your Business Do Now to Adapt?
Seen in this light, AI for graphic design is a positive catalyst for the future of design
Whether in the B2B market, B2C, or even the stock market, the future of graphic design will affect you as a business, your user, and your visual communication tactics, strategies, and user experience processes.
How Can You Adapt?
Machine Learning: Understand Existing Tools & Capabilities
Get a better understanding of the technology to experience design in a new way. This enables your brand and users to quickly adapt to the change in nature and create a responsive communication method.
Several Designer-friendly Resources to Study AI and Machine Learning can help guide your brand through the different kinds of AI and the breadth they offer.
Bring ‘AI Ethics’ to the Table
Create a culture where “AI Ethics” is part of your business processes.
Just as there are ‘Design Principles’ that every brand follows, ethical AI principles keep you ahead of the game and in alliance with the innovation.
Microsoft has shared its commitment “to the advancement of AI-driven by ethical principles that put people first.”
Adaptability & Acceptance
Accepting the evolution of AI is one thing, but also accepting the change of creative professionals, as explained before, is another. Once these two concepts are born, studied, and aligned, adaptability is a company value, and culture will have room to grow and flourish.
AI creates and generates design variations by learning data and patterns of behaviors. As people and innovative beings, we should not only consider how a particular product is being experienced but also consider the different adaptations of these products depending on context and varying users’ decisions.
And the hard truth is, As Leon C. Megginson put it, “It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.”
Conclusion
The Future is an Opportunity.
We can all agree that AI design tools offer undeniable potential for the future, such as image generation, but can they outperform humans? No, not the way we see it. It’s all about empowering one factor with the other.
Designers will harness the power of AI and use it to their advantage, and companies will see this as an opportunity to embrace humans and technology to strive for improvement and aim high.
Imagine the rebranding possibilities that you can develop! Transforming your logo, gaining more website responsiveness, spicing up your social media and online presence with creative interactive infographics, giving top-of-the-notch presentations to seal any deal…etc.! They’re endless!
And we’re here to provide you with even more possibilities!
What Do They Say?
Below are some of the thoughts shared by industry experts about this controversy and what they expect to happen:
“….As for the future of graphic design, I think artists are going to see an increase in the need for visual content more than traditional elements of graphic design.” – Chelsey Moter, Marketing Coordinator for the Arizona Grand Resort
“Technology will play a bigger role than ever in the way that we communicate through design. We are living through a time where the paradigm shifts so often in the way we approach content creation that the overall effect is now the new norm.” – Miguel Lee, Partner/Creative Director of Midnight Sherpa.
