These Surreal Ads From an AI Art Director Could Offer a Glimpse Into the Future

The "Ad Intelligence" project has reimagined ads for 10 iconic brands, from Colgate, to Gucci, KFC to British Airways and more. Using Midjourney, an AI art tool that generates single images based on an English language prompt, U.K.-based creative agency 10 Days "fed" descriptors related to each brand into the computer program (for instance, "Gucci", and "fashion"). These simple instructions were then followed by genre-based words like "noir" and "sci-fi" to deliver different artistic poster iterations for each brand. The AI was asked to ideate 24 times for each of the 10 brands considered. The result is a collection of 240 bold, and somewhat surreal, static ads. The posters cover a whole spectrum of visual identities, with some radiating bright, kitsch colors, where others depict sci-fi Dali-esque nightmares: menacing, melting Colgate grin, anyone? For 10 Days' founder and creative director, Jolyon White, most startling is the fact it only took the technology five minutes to "churn out" the work. “It’s staggering what AI can achieve given the right set of prompts and keywords," he said. "We’re now able to create 24 layouts in the time it takes our art director to have their first sip of coffee." A creative quandary Brands are increasingly finding advertising applications for AI, whether it's reducing digital media bias or enhancing their speech recognition capabilities. Agencies too, including Publicis Groupe and its Marcel platform, are opening up to the promise of machine learning. It’s staggering what AI can achieve given the right set of prompts and keywords.Jolyon White, creative director, 10 Days White and his team decided to experiment with this particular use case for AI after seeing "amazing early artwork" coming out of AI platforms such as DALL·E (a portmanteau of surrealist Salvador Dalí and lovable Pixar robot WALL-E) and MidjourneyE. "It's almost created a whole new genre of art and design," said White. "But it’s the speed that's quite remarkable—it only took 60 seconds to create a set of four unique images, which got us really excited." The experiment certainly has interesting implications for advertising creatives, who (like those in every other industry) are finding elements of their jobs increasingly automated by a suite of tools. Recent European Union (EU) data from the European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training revealed the share of jobs facing a "very high" risk of being automated by emerging digital technologies was just 14%. However, what two in five jobs do face is a high probability of “substantial transformation.” In short: a robot might not steal an art director's job, but it will change how it's done.From where he's standing, White predicted AI art direction would become as ubiquitous as using Adobe for design or Pinterest for inspiration in the near future. For other creatives, while an interesting use case, these powerful image generation tools have a long way to go before they take up desk space in ad agencies. "This work is interesting and I love its experimental nature... many of the images feel similar, so initially I thought I was looking at an illustrator’s portfolio," observed RAPP London's chief creative officer Al Mackie. His agency already employs machine learning-based tools throughout the creative process around insight gathering, trend analysis, copywriting, 3D rendering, audience profiles and personality types "to name just a few." For him, these aren't a silver bullet so much as a promising bit of tech that in the long-run could help creatives translate hard numbers into something more visually pleasing. "In the short term, I think there are issues around bias for AI generated content like this and complicated notions of ownership, but there’s no doubt tech can do the heavy lifting to help us fill the content gap," he said. "Longer term, there’s huge value in the data powering this work. When you match it with the data on customers, prospective customers, entire customer experience etc. you can create even more engaging images." 'Mindlessly fun' or 'sinister'? Dillah Zakbah, creative director at BBH London, also had a warm initial reaction to the "Ad Intelligence" output. "I really, really love it. It is so mindlessly fun. And it reminds you to not take the creative process too seriously and to be open to getting inspired by anything at all in this world—even from an AI," she said. Though, she also conceded that it is no replacement for a top creative.BBH recently used Midjourney to help with a mock up for an "outrageous idea," though still found itself having to edit the visuals to get the desired result. I really love it. It is so mindlessly fun. And it reminds you to not take the creative process too seriously and to be open to getting inspired by anything at all in this worldDillah Zakbah, creative director at BBH London Zakbah sped up the process "quite a bit" and introduced the agency to a new visual langauge. Her team is already looking at other ways to apply similar technologies to speed up automation for more spontaneous and irreverent ideas. 10 Days' AI imitation campaign for Gucci are almost Dali-esque Chief creative officer at indie agency St Luke's, Alan Young, said something in the "Ad Intelligence" project reminded him of classic graphic advertising, where simple and bold graphics "demanded a second look." "However, the problems start on the second look," Young caveated, arguing the work lacked the charm of the vintage posters from days gone by, and at times felt "sinister." These ads feel like the tortured fever dream paintings of Salvador Dali and Francis Bacon.Alan Young, creative director, St Luke's "The visual puns the software is designed to create [has] weird mashups where dogs' teeth merge into the white head of a glass of beer," he asserted. "These ads feel like the tortured fever dream paintings of Salvador Dalí and Francis Bacon. But of course those guys deliberately set out to create work that disturbed the living daylight out of us. This software is trying to sell us toothpaste and lager." On the flip side, he said the way the AI deployed color and symmetry could well provide a human designer with the "foundations" of a useful layout, but said human input would be required to infuse the idea with "wit and life." It wouldn't take an AI to decipher why creatives have mixed feelings about any technology that might challenge their existing place in the agency landscape. But, for now, most are in agreement that this experiment shines a light on the potential for machine learning to improve advertising's visual and strategic impact, aiding in basic content creation tasks. "I guess if brain surgeons can work with a robot called Da Vinci I see no reason why creatives can’t get to grips with a robot called DALL·E." mused Mackie. Cosmo Let AI Design Its Latest Magazine Cover