The Benefits of AI for Artists

While many are still divided on the topic of AI art, we are firm believers that generative AI can offer unique benefits to artists. New technology has improved the creative process throughout history, and here’s how generative AI does the same.

Takeaways

• AI-based art tools make new creative skills accessible to those without the time or money to invest in learning them from the ground up;

• Generative AI can offer design concepts to help artists overcome their creative blocks;

• AI is capable of enhancing art in ways that are close to impossible to do by hand;

• Conceptualizing new creative projects is made easy with the help of AI, reducing the time it takes to create and finish a new piece.

Accessibility

Blender is one of the best-known 3D modeling and animation software to work with. It’s by no means the first, but in recent years, it’s gotten really popular for one very good reason: it’s accessible in more ways than one. First of all, it’s completely free.

So long as you have hardware strong enough to handle it, you can download it and start sculpting or animating.

Secondly, it’s accessible thanks to a user-friendly interface that is very easy to learn and use. With the release of Blender, thousands of new artists across the globe gained access to 3D sculpting and animation tools that helped them create new art and start their careers as artists.

Now, this doesn’t directly translate into generative AI, since rendering an image with Midjourney doesn’t make someone an illustrator or painter. However, the accessibility in the case of AI art is about giving artists more opportunities to make useful additions to their work.

Here’s a great example of how accessible AI tools can help artists overcome challenges in their work. A comic book illustrator may be very skilled in designing characters but is unable to draw gorgeous backgrounds.

Normally, they’d have two options: either take time to learn the skill themselves or commission another artist to help them. In the case of artists who are just starting out, dedicating time and money to either of these solutions may not be an option.

With the help of generative AI, this artist can easily create a background for their comic. There will always be demand for skilled background artists or artists of any kind for that matter.

But for those who don’t have the privilege of learning the skill themselves or the funding to pay for a professional, generative AI is a useful alternative.

Creating a Manga Background

Let’s put our aforementioned example of a comic book artist to the test with Midjourney and create a manga background.

1. Register on Discord and create a private server.

2. Go to the Midjourney website and join the Beta.

3. After you’ve joined, Midjourney will ask you to join the official Midjourney Discord server. There, you can generate images, however, we still need to add the Midjourney bot to our own private Discord server.

4. In the official Midjourney Discord server, on the right-hand side of the user interface, find the Midjourney bot, click on it, and add it to your private server.

5. In any text channel in your private server, type in /imagine followed by whatever it is you’d like the AI to generate.

6. After a few seconds, you should see the results of your prompt in the text channel of your Discord server. Click on any of the 4 options, and right-click to download.

As you can see, Midjourney was able to create vibrant backgrounds that artists can use as inspiration on how to draw their own.

Pro Tip: There are tricks to writing effective text prompts for AI image rendering. Check out this in-depth guide on how to create prompts for image generators.

Inspiration

Even artists with decades of experience in their craft are sometimes at a loss for ideas. Artist’s block is very common, where artists reach a temporary creative limit.

No words come to mind, no ideas on where the brushstroke should go, or what final note to add to the composition to complete it.

This does not mean the artist is incapable of creative work, but it is the result of an infinite number of circumstances, such as emotional exhaustion, lack of motivation, interruptions from personal matters, etc.

Generative AI has the potential to provide artists with the inspiration they need to overcome artist's block and continue developing their creative work. Let’s take writing as an example.

If I had writer’s block while writing this article, I could use platforms like ChatGPT or Lex to help me understand what elements are missing from the work that would allow me to continue writing.

They could also provide me with new wording or paragraph structuring ideas that would help me avoid writer’s block and continue working.

It’s important to keep in mind, that generative AI functions as a database for art.

This means that if you’re looking for something new, quick use of generative AI could assist you in discovering new artwork and creative pieces that will provide you with the inspiration you need to continue working on your own stuff.

Think of it like visiting a museum with an infinite number of paintings or reading excerpts from hundreds of authors, each with their unique voice.

Overcoming Creative Block for Character Design

Let’s use Midjourney once more, and this time, to generate concepts for a Steampunk character.

Much like with the previous Midjourney example, you’re going to need a Midjourney bot that has been invited to your private server.

1. Type in the text prompt for your desired character concept. For this use case, we wrote a steampunk woman with goggles wearing a mask;

2. Here are the results of our text prompt;

Now, you can use these rendered images as inspiration for your own character designs. Because the AI targets specific features that are indicative of the steampunk style, you can replicate these prominent elements in your own artwork and grasp the fundamentals of this art style.

Enhancement

We’ve been using software to enhance our work for some time now. Software that automatically applies filters to photos adjusts lighting in videos and enhances the quality of images has existed for quite a while.

This technology has made it easier for artists to enhance their work, and AI generation can help in this regard as well.

While still in the early stages of development, there are AI platforms specialized in turning a static drawn image into an animated GIF. Prior to the development of such technologies, artists had to draw and animate these on their own.

Now, an artist who does not possess these skills can feature additional enhancements and make their art more complex.

The same goes for lighting, adding filters, unique stylizations, and so on. This is especially useful for artists working on a very urgent project who do not have the time to do all this by hand. But with generative AI, they have more options to enhance their work in a very short amount of time.

Upscaling a Photo

A great example of how AI can enhance art is by upscaling it. Let’s Enhance is an AI-powered platform that can upscale and increase the resolution of images without loss in quality, something that is pretty much impossible to do without the help of AI.

1. Create an account on Letsenhance.io.

2. Click on My Images, and you will arrive at the photo editing dashboard.

3. Upload the image, and tweak the options on the right-hand side to the image type and by how much you’d like the image to be upscaled.

4. Click Start processing, and once that’s done, save the image to your device. We upscaled one of the images from a prior example, which was 446 by 442 pixels to 1784 by 1768 pixels. Here’s a side-by-side comparison of the two images.

Pro Tip: Check out this complete guide on how to upscale your images.

Conceptualizing

Creating art is a procedural process for many artists, where they create a prototype or first draft of their work, then keep chipping away or adding new portions to it and create a complete piece.

This process is a crucial part of creation as makes the final product more complex and dynamic.

The challenge of working on WIPs is that artists spend days, even weeks creating a concept for a new design, only to have it be rejected.

For design teams working with very strict deadlines, generative AI can help them develop tons of design iterations, present them to clients, and then start developing the WIPs that are approved.

This means greater results in a shorter amount of time, which benefits both artists, who now don’t need to worry as much about creating everything from scratch, and also clients, who now receive exactly what they want without having to wait for the commissioned artist to create new concepts.

Storyboarding a Film

Using Dall.E 2, we tried to see how well AI could help us create a storyboard and conceptualize how a film will look before a single frame is even shot.

1. Register an account on openai.com/product/dall-e-2. Write the text prompt in the designated space. Make sure to include stylistic keywords, such as black and white, noir, wide shot, and photo. Wide shot, close-up, and over-the-shoulder are just a few examples of keywords that are very useful for brainstorming film frames.

2. Once the images are rendered, hover over the images to download the one that you think fits the style of your film.

Using AI, scriptwriters can visualize their film as they are writing the script, reducing the time it takes to conceptualize the storyboard.

Concluding Words

It’s important to understand that generative AI is still in its infancy, and it’s far too early to tell which direction it will go, both in terms of technology and legislation.

It may just be that in the near future, policies and regulations are adopted to limit the use of generative AI to ensure that human creativity is not curtailed.

It’s hard to tell, but in an ever-evolving world of technology, it’s important for everyone to learn and adapt to the changing landscape of the creative field.

Computer-generated imagery (CGI) has taken off recently to the point where anyone with half-decent hardware can create their own animated films. But skilled 2D animators are still in high demand.

AI was able to write content all the way back in the 1980s, and yet, writing is still a bustling industry. Creating art by hand did not disappear with the introduction of digital tools like Photoshop.

AI is not here to replace artists. Instead, much like with any technological advancement, it is here to offer convenience and make the creative process more practical for those who are looking for efficiency in creative designs.

And while there is still plenty to discuss regarding the ethical use of AI art, it’s important to acknowledge how this new technology can benefit artists and their hard work.