Craft

Some storyboarders are using AI specifically to come up with more ideas, faster.

Some storyboarders are practicing their craft specifically to come up with more ideas, faster.

They’re both faster.

One of them is smarter, more skilled, more committed to their craft, and more likely to create stories no one has seen before.

The other is de-skilling, more committed to ease than quality, and more likely to rehash the median of what came before.

The same is true in so many industries at the moment.

Fascinating to watch!

I’ve used Adobe products since 2002. I’m far from their biggest fan.

But they taught me something when I last visited their homepage.

When listing their verticals, they detailed “Creativity and design” as their first one.

Makes sense.

Followed by “Content creation”.

Huh. (Then PDFs and all that other stuff they do.)

Creativity and design. Totally different to — and not to be confused with — content creation.

For “Creativity and design”, they describe industry-leading apps for design, photo, video, and… “creative AI” (whatever that means).

Then, for “Content creation”, they describe how you can “quickly” create and edit images with “creative AI”, “easily”.

The former is focused on using top tools to do great work (with occasional slop).

The latter is focused on prioritizing fast, easy slop (without a creative bone in your body required).

The lesson I learned: Don’t think of “content” as “creativity”. Don’t think of “content” as the discipline of creating things that matter for people who care. Think of it as empty banalities offered at the altar of algorithms, designed to direct your attention toward those who didn’t earn it.

Duly noted, Adobe.

The “savvy entrepreneur” tries to do less.

The “passionate artist” tries to contribute more.

I know which I’d rather be, and work with.

I own more art books than I’ve read (time!)

And I keep on buying them.

Silly or smart?

I argue smart. Because spending $10–20 here and there to signal to your subconscious how much you value your craft is smart.

It’s watching, and it influences your behavior based on what it understands about you, so show it what you’re all about.

I give art and design feedback every single day, as part of my work.

And I wondered what it’d be like if I didn’t. Do I actually like it?

So I went to Discord and left feedback in channels designed for artists to request feedback, and left some. Not work-related at all, just unsolicited feedback in places where people were looking for some.

Some were really, really grateful for the input. To be seen. To be invested in.

I love how it feels to help others, in areas related to my craft.

That right there is the litmus test: is it still enjoyable when you do it for nothing?

Art is supposed to be hard.

The blank canvas you’re writing your script in? Figuring out how to assemble those ideas? That’s supposed to be hard.

The storyboard you’re working on, where you could take a hundred different directions? That’s supposed to be hard.

The song you’re working on, where you could go many different ways with it? That’s supposed to be hard.

Yes, AI can “help” with those things. It can make art easy, removing the tension and friction you feel with the world around you, from the intuition you bring to the creative process, and from the journey from here to having work worth talking about.

And that’s what people want to see: work worth talking about.

But is it still worth talking about? “The computer did it”?

Is that the story you wanted to share? Or is it just a story a little bit like the remarkable, touching, inspiring, conversational piece you might have shared if you’d done the hard work?

Hasbro, who owns Peppa Pig, is under fire.

Their latest contracts require child voice actors to sign away rights for the company to use their recordings and likeness to train AI for the purpose of voice reproduction.

Which not only threatens their gig with Hasbro, but threatens their future career as voice actors, while asking them to agree to things they can’t possibly understand at that age.

I get it. Voice actors aren’t cheap. I pay voice actors all the time.

But here’s the thing.

I love paying voice actors. Whenever I send payment, I feel good. They’re making something awesome with me, and they’re getting to do that for a living. We get to do this again, as soon as possible.

When there’s an actor I really like, and I don’t have lines for them for a while, I feel bad — I want to give them more, so we can make more cool things together.

Paying nice people to do what they love and create awesome things together is a privilege. Not a burden.

If it’s a burden to you, the answer isn’t to try and AI-slop your way to a cheaper alternative. It’s to get into a different profession, and make room for those for whom this would be their dream, too.

Support those who collaborate gladly.

Withdraw support from those who try to short-change hard-working talent.

They may listen if the message is received in dollar form.

Will your writing improve with a better text editor?

Will your art improve with better graphics software?

Will your ideas improve with a fancier notebook?

A little, actually.

Honoring your craft with tools you enjoy is no bad thing.

It may help you lock in and go deeper.

But only a little.

The rest comes from sticking to what you’ve got, sticking to tools you know, and going deeper on the discipline of doing your thing.

Wired earbuds are “back” this summer.

Which amuses me, as I use wired earbuds.

Not because I’m “back”. Because they never left.

While keeping my head down doing my thing, studying and diving deeper into my chosen topics, parts of the world moved on, then came right back again.

A lesson to us all, perhaps: focus on your thing. Trade the cyclical new hotness being marketing to you for a deeper understanding and mastery of your choice of craft. One pays dividends for you and those you serve. The other puts you right back where you started.

If you love what you do, play with it sometimes.

Like to sketch? Play with pens. Different nibs, different inks, feeling how they behave on paper, to see how they influence your sketches and my ideas. A mechanical HB pencil and a wooden 2B make you sketch differently. A fine nib and a brush nib make you ink differently. Different inks make you layer differently. Try and see what happens for you.

Like to write? Play with keyes. Different boards, different switches, different arrangements, to see how they influence your writing. A raised mechanical board with wrist rests may make you not want to move, and commit to longer writing sessions. An easy low profile chiclet keyboard may make you feel like jotting down notes more quickly. Try and see what happens for you.

Nothing beats committing to the work itself — actually making. But playing with your tools a little along the way to see how it influences your output? That’s what fans do, and its an investment in your craft to be a fan of it.

Ever feel guilty for going the extra-extra mile when making things for those you serve?

I used to.

I’d hear a voice in my head saying, “It’s done, the customer will be happy with that, you need to move on to the next item on your list or you’re only going to slow you and your team down, it’s done, what are you doing, get on with it already.”

Listening to that voice is likely no bad thing.

But choosing not to listening to it is also no bad thing. If you want to be known for going that extra-extra mile. If you want to attract more customers like them, as a result of your care, your generosity, and their advocacy. If you want to show yourelf — and the world — that this is more than a job, this is a craft, and one you take very seriously.

We love learning in my household.

We’re planning to build a small library into our home once we clear the room out planned for it, and carve some time to carve some wood to make it how we envision it.

But it’s not just books (though there are a lot of books).

There is also comics. Videos. Little toys that remind us of lessons learned. Pictures we’ve drawn. Photos we’ve taken.

Learning is a vibrant, exciting, fulfilling-for-its-own-sake passtime. Something to pursue before we even know we might need to know the things we’ll learn, because who knows what we may discover along the way.

Didn’t always feel this way. I had to learn to learn by practicing, finding my tastes, and leaning into them with curiosity.

Learning to learn — your way — will be an intensely rewarding, never-ending gift to your future self, if you make the time for it.

Talk to almost any freelancer.

They’ll tell you about the difference between the opportunity, and what shipped.

A wonderful, vibrant, exciting possibility, and what shipped.

A novel new approach that customer interviews revered, and what shipped.

A huge part of making great work is having CEOs that don’t ruin it.

We don’t like when big tech talks about what their products will do to writers, or artists, or musicians, because they’re not writers, or artists, or musicians.

Artists want to work together to push art forward. We do it all on our own, and we enjoy it intensely.

Same for writers. We do it all on our own, and we enjoy it intensely.

Same for musicians. I’m not a musician, but I adore watching musicians collaborate and advance their genres.

In some ways, AI is a scapegoat — it’s not just AI that bothers creatives. It’s that an outsider came in and decided to tell the doers how to do.

No wonder they’re getting booed during commencement speeches.

Great artists don’t draw all day.

They draw a lot. When they’re tired of that, they read about drawing. When they’re tired about that, they think about drawing. When they’re tired of that, they do something else.

All in service of their craft, for its own sake, and for those they toil for.

It’s okay to put the pencil down so long as the fire keeps burning.

Lean into your craft for long enough… and you’ll find you disagree with every one of your heroes on at least something.

This can feel disheartening at first. Lonely, even.

Then you realize it’s your voice taking form. Your point of view. An expression perhaps worth sharing, a by-product of your tenure in the space.

Lean into it — it makes you our brethren, instead of merely our fans.

If a toddler draws a picture, then AI “improves” it by generating a lifelike version of the drawing… does that make the drawing better?

Or does it steal a gift from that child away from you.

Or rewrite history as we lose evidence of their growth, perspective, and effort.

Or remove the desire to improve in a skill that computers “will just do better anyway”.

What if the generated lifelike version of the drawing removed the art, by removing the artist.

What if their imperfect hand-drawn art is more “real” art, a communication between artist and viewer, a relationship shared through images, than the machine-made alternative could ever be.

What if that’s true whether it’s hand-drawn on paper or in Photoshop - the hands of the artist are on each brushstroke, like words in a poem.

Worth thinking about.

What makes a great tool?

A premium notebook that’s so pretty you daren’t write in it… or a cheap notebook so quick to scuff that you enjoy using it and throwing it around?

Software that’s slick and minimal, but does half the things you need with bugs to fix… or software that’s old and clunky-looking, but does everything you need with bugs long fixed?

An e-reader that holds thousands of books but needs replacing as the tech ages… or a handful of dog-eared physical books you’ve felt, re-read, and deeply internalized?

The latest smartphone with the latest distracting features… or an old basic phone that never pulls you away from your focused, meaningful work?

No right or wrong answers. There’s something for everyone. But it’s worth asking yourself what makes a great tool, then shopping for that, instead of just buying what the marketing says.

One of the gifts AI has given real artists, is the ability to see our art more clearly.

Before generative tools existed, we just thought of art as the whole thing - the process, the product, the person, all kind of mixed together. We never questions the component parts, or their relation to one another. Why would we?

But now generative tools exist, widely rejected as artists in favor of “making our own art”, we get to question what exactly it is that we’re rejecting.

When generative tools can produce finished pieces, flawed as they are, we say “that’s not art”. And we don’t say that because it puts six fingers on a hand. That’s not why it’s not art. I’ve drawn most of my characters with four fingers for decades, as a style choice. That doesn’t make my art “not art”.

So it’s not “not art” on technicalities. It’s “not art” for deeper reasons that, prior to generative tools, we may have missed entirely.

Why do we connect with “real” art, and feel so empty when looking at generated images?

Lots of reasons. The knowing that someone toiled at it. The knowing that someone had a lived experience that brought them to a moment where that art needed to be made, by them, at that time. The knowing that someone’s process is developing, and this is part of their journey that we got to share with them. The knowing we can go and look up that artist and learn more about their journey.

Art is a conversation without words, a bonding, a relationship. Generated images is an output, a decoy, with no relationship possible.

Even when brands deploy art in their marketing materials, the same is true there. Real art lets us converse with the brand — and the artist who represented it — without words, letting us bond and relate with both identities. It’s communal. When brands generate images instead, all that disappears.

We used to try to grow as artists by merely improving our output. Thanks to AI, we can now see that growth as artists is about having better conversations through our work.

I’m thankful for that realization.

“I can develop sites without a developer!” says the designer.

“I can design sites without a designer!” says the developer.

“I can write site copy without a copywriter!” says both of them.

“I can generate the whole thing without any of you!” says the site owner.

All of them are both right and wrong.

They’re right, in that it’s possible to marginalize every area they lack in taste or mastery, with slop.

They’re wrong, in that it’s impossible to know every mastery like the masters do, so they’ve no idea what magic they’re passing up by dismissing the masters.

It’s never been easier to be amateur… and, apparently, never been harder to be a master.

People think the tools keep changing yet the skills you use with them stay the same.

But I love when the opposite is true.

When the tools grow old, and the skills stay new.

In art, you get used to a certain pencil from a certain store… a certain notebook in a certain size, certain paper, certain cover… yet the act of creating art is forever new. There’s always more to learn, more to practice, more to master.

In writing, you get used to a certain keyboard from a certain manufacturer… a certain writing application, certain ritual, certain process… yet the act of writing is forever new. There are always more styles, topics, and mediums to explore and master.

Messing with your tools is a distraction, unless its to benefit the skill. Watercolor needing thicker gsm paper, for instance. But new apps for the sake of new apps, new tools just because they’re trendy, that’s all a distraction from what matters: letting the skills stay new.

That is, if your goal is to continue to grow in the things that matter most in your craft.

Why do you take photos?

Sony’s Xperia 1VIII launched with an “AI Camera Assistant” that suggests entirely new, generated compositions of your pictures.

That way, you don’t take photos. You take prompts. Prompts that generate images that may be a bit like what you saw, but not really. A library of images similar to the memories you could have captured, if you where to have taken photos instead.

That feeling of “wait, that misses the point of taking photos” is indicative of so much art today.

Sony did a wonderful job of helping us understand what we don’t really like about AI generated images.

We rarely create with a blank canvas.

Normally, the canvas has certain expectations before the first brush stroke is made. And those expectations can be wonderful for creativity.

I thought of this while perusing a gardening magazine this morning.

The rising temperatures in the UK, mixed with pricing challenges and wild weather, is causing huge disruption across gardens across the country. Some are electing not to bother with their gardens anymore, astroturfing the problems away.

Others are seeing opportunity for creativity. Swapping annuals for perrenials. Growing shorter more resilient plants that need less water and soil disturbance. Little changes to their rituals that can produce a slightly different type of garden, but one no less beautiful.

And so it is with economic crises, turbulent markets, rising competition, or any other constraint that may come one’s way.

Better to see constraints as a playful companion, nudging you toward a creative solution, than an enemy trying to ruin your day.

Our work is so much better for it when we befriend constraints.

If most people publish average ideas…
Run average campaigns…
In average businesses…
With average levels of care…

…And that’s what AI is trained on currently…

What should you expect to receive if you ask it for ideas or production support?

Worth thinking about.

There are two types of notebook users.

One: People who love reading about notebooks, buying notebooks, comparing paper quality, deliberating about the brands that make them.

Two: People who write and sketch liberally into their notebooks.

The first kind loves the thing. The second kind loves what they make with the thing.

No right or wrong. But it’s worth noticing which you’re being.

We’re at a crossroads.

When AI can generate an image that looks like what’s in your head…
Like what you’ve seen before and want to see again…

We get a choice:

1. Choose to engage a creative who will bring a new perspective, a new idea, a new take on an old theme
2. Just take the generated image, advance nothing, and not care one bit

But it’s not so simple.

Creatives will worry about people choosing Option 2…
But the problem isn’t necessarily Option 2.

The problem is that fewer and fewer creatives want to show up fully to Option 1.

Many creatives are phoning in their creativity to inspiration galleries or prompting-in-secret.

The solution isn’t to whine about Option 2…
The solution is to show what Option 1 is capable of.

Now’s not the time to be fearful, nor lazy.
Now’s the time to be more creative than ever before.

Sometimes, you can get more ideas to explore by prompting an LLM for them.

Sometimes, you can get more ideas to explore by sitting with a cup of tea and watching the clouds roll by.

The second is less efficient yet, often, more effective.

If, that is, you’d like ideas different to those everyone else is having.

When you write good documentation, you’re really writing a book.

Something with chapters. Something that takes people on a journey. Something that leaves people better than it found them. Something worth reading.

It can transform a business.

When you write bad documentation, you’re done none of those things.

You’re simply making things harder. Worse than a 1:1 tutorial. Worse than a disorganized back-n-forth email thread. Worse than no documentation at all.

Write good documentation.

If you try to ‘generate’ a shortcut to creating your magic, you’ll lose the magic.

And probably, create a lot of frustration and wasted time along the way.

If you try to focus your mind on doing your best work, somehow, the magic shows up.

And probably, when you forgot all about shortcuts and just danced with the magic itself.

Don’t try to phone it in. Don’t look for shortcuts. The fastest way to producing great work is to not look for the fastest way at all.

Some people optimize email for speedier replies, hitting more people with less care, shorter ping-pong replies powered by AI.

Other people optimize email for fewer messages in the first place, choosing to be thoughtful with people who will thank them for caring.

Some people optimize their copy or designs for speed, templating and generating quickly to get it done and move on.

Other people optmize their copy or designs for depth, taking the time to do fewer things but better, knowing the results will be far better… eventually.

There are people who argue for either side in both scenarios.

I have my opinion on which is better. I live and work accordingly.

You don’t have to agree. But your work benefits if you choose.