2022 saw a tremendous rise in AI’s technological advancements. Be it web2 or web3, any industry or sector, AI has turned out to be an asset that’s radically changing the working operations of both larger and smaller brands. Earlier this year, a deep learning model, DALL-E, was created by OpenAI that could turn natural language descriptions (text prompts) into high-quality digital images. And, the results were pretty impressive.
Cala is another one-stop solution for users to design and produce clothes with ease. What makes it even more intriguing is the fact that they’ve recently integrated DALL-E AI-powered services into their system. Digital fashion artists can now easily use AI capabilities to create new virtual wearable creations by simply providing AI with text prompts.
All that a digital creator needs to do now is feed the tech with reference design images or text inputs to churn out beautiful artwork, digital garments, etc. Isn’t it cool? On the flip side though, all artists are not happy with the technology that will apparently put the artists community in jeopardy. But before jumping to any conclusion let’s dive deeper into how AI works in creating digital art, fashion, etc. Is AI really going to overthrow artists or whether it’s going to further facilitate their work?
AI’s Designing Digital Garments — What’s the deal?
As soon as AI and digital fashion blended, digital artists were real quick to experience how well the tech works. For example, an Instagram influencer named Karen X is utilizing DALL-E and other AI tools to create digital fashion. Not only is she creating virtual wearables but also wearing them in her videos. She says “it would have been much harder to make them with VFX (Visual Effects) alone because of the repetitive and technical work involved. However, with AI, it’s seamless and we get more time to work on the creative vision than technical.”
XR Couture, which has always been proactive in leveraging the latest technologies, partnered with Imagined Outfits, a platform that specializes in digital outfits created with AI for your photos, and crafted exquisite virtual fashion fits that can be worn in pictures. We now empower people with a higher form of creative expression, art, and digital imagery — all thanks to AI and human collaboration.
Users just need to go through an easy three-step process of entering a prompt, choosing a design, and enjoying the wearable on their picture. Yes, it’s that simple!
Another prominent advocate of AI, web3, digital fashion, and developing metaverse activations for fortune 500 brands, and top web3 startups is Xander Simms. He’s been assisting the digital fashion house, Exclusible, as a Metaverse Leader & Advisor and also helping brands with modern and abstract short-form videos and 3D/AI/VR/AR content with his company called Digital Storytellers Inc.
XR Couture was fortunate enough to have a word with the OG himself and got to hear about his take on the ongoing affairs in the digital fashion and AI world.
“AI is like a co-founder to our brand”, says Simms.
“A tool (AI) that can augment our imagination, make it visual, and bring out that creativity in all of us is something that I’m really excited about. I know there are a lot of conflicting opinions around AI but I think they are healthy. I believe digital creators will slowly start accepting the tech once they’ll comprehend how it enriches our lives and the potential it carries along.
We love to explore new technologies and ideas to let people better connect with the digital world, where 3D and AI content are big players that help us achieve that. Not only AI has helped us create digital avatars for our clients, but has also aided with the content side of things. It’s like a co-founder to our brand — yes, that’s the level it’s been assisting us. This is again why we leverage it (& will continue to) and value-based content to empower people to experience a better touch of the virtual space.”
Xander’s Purple Intuition 99 shown in the image below is one of his latest Sci-fi digital fashion collections made with AI technology. Looks fascinating, doesn’t it? Check out more pieces from the collection and his other work here.
AI-Generated Art Stood First Place in Colorado State Fair Art Competition
In case you’re wondering how fascinating the results can be with such AI tools, here’s an interesting fact — an artist stood in first place at this year’s Colorado State Fair art competition for his AI-generated digital art made with Midjourney, an AI tool capable of producing realistic images with text inputs.
It may appear a little bizarre that the AI-generated artwork won the first prize. But, despite the fact that it was generated by artificial intelligence, it was still a piece of art and didn’t hold the judges back to consider it the best piece. On the other hand, New York City Schools have banned students and teachers from using Chat GPT.
Is AI the End of Independent Artists?
While AI has been churning out eye-pleasing content, the internet, on the other hand, is flooded with questions like:
- Can AI really replace designers?
- Is AI creative enough to design wearables that are unique and modish?
- Is this the end for human designers?
ArtStation, a platform where artists can showcase their portfolios for films, games, and media & entertainment, recently caught some flak as many artists began to protest against the platform featuring AI-generated art on its Explore page. According to them, AI creating art/images dishonors the amount of time, value, and creativity they put into the work. And, there’s no point denying that.
It’s clear that AI creating art/images has stirred up a wildfire of criticism from a slew of artists — and this just hints at what may come in future. Designers’ concern over AI’s takeover of their work is valid, as creating art takes more than imagination and years of hard work to master the craft. AI designing digital images questions the time, energy, and resources an artist puts into work which, however, is overthrown by AI in a single stroke — and let’s not forget it is done by feeding AI with pre-existing images/art as samples. Moreover, at the outset, anyone can use AI to generate images but that doesn’t make them an artist as there are no real skills involved, which speaks for itself.
XR Couture’s founder, Subham Jain, has a profound outlook on all of this which answers the designers’ concerns and whether AI is a boon or a bane for human artists. He believes:
“Earlier, artists used to design using pen and paper which was later done by tools like AutoCAD, SketchUp, and other Adobe software like Illustrator and Photoshop. But did they replace the artists? No, but in reality, the tools just facilitated the entire design process while allowing designers more time to work on other important stuff.
Similarly, AI won’t replace human designers as it still needs the emotive nuances of the human mind to create art. AI only exists to simplify the outcome.”
In Closing
The future that AI promises has taken the digital fashion industry by storm. The use cases are remarkable and, like the cherry on top, it’s also even more sustainable for being power-efficient. There may be a lot of debates on the internet about people showing skepticism toward technology and virtual fashion designers. But we feel the tech is an asset, not a liability. AI may provide more room for artists to experiment and be more creative with their work.
As the experts say, it’s not the point of getting replaced. When used the right way, technology can make human work more effective and give us plenty of time to work on other meaningful stuff.
Besides partnering with Imagined Outfits to bring AI into digital fashion, we, at XR Couture, have also collaborated with media giant, Snapchat, to let users wear their digital wearables in real time with AR and Snap Lens technology. Learn more about it here.
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