With artificial intelligence able to generate pictures and graphics in seconds, uncertainty is a natural reaction for organizations in the creative industry. But one Ottawa agency is embracing AI to bring its work to the next level.
“As AI has become very top of mind, the immediate feeling that we had here was that this can really unleash the next great era of human creativity. Not get rid of it, but kind of super-power it,” said Denise Blasevick, CEO of S3 McMillan, which helps organizations build and design brands.
Last week, the company launched an AI-powered program that allows businesses to examine their core values and identity in a fun way. The #Brand2Band Visualizer inputs information from a business to reimagine its brand in the world of rock ‘n’ roll, complete with a band name and debut album title and cover.
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“A lot of people are thinking about using AI in terms of efficiency gains and productivity gain and we are, too,” associate creative director Chris Campeau told OBJ. “But we wanted to do something to have a little fun, to just bring a moment of delight into our clients’ day. It gets them thinking about their brand, the self-discovery of their brand, through a different lens.”
From “greatest hits” (top products and services) to “company anthems” (the song that would be shouted from a concert stage), Campeau said the answers to the questions can reveal a lot about a company’s “core attributes and fundamental pieces of its brand identity.”
“When you apply a new filter on top of that, it gives you a chance to really think, do we have these things nailed down? Do we really know who we are?” he said. “And at the end of the day, fun was the priority.”
The project was the agency’s first foray into developing custom AI applications, with Campeau calling the process a “crash course.”
It wasn’t without its hiccups. Campeau said the questions they developed had to be simple and user-friendly to keep the experience playful, while also being detailed enough for AI to be able to understand and generate interesting results.
And while it was meant to be fun, it also enabled the agency to find ways to integrate AI in a way that enhances its work, rather than replacing it.
“We want to make sure that we have the most knowledge of how we can use AI as a creative partner,” he said. “It just goes to show how you can’t replace creative thinking with AI. In other words, when you marry AI with creative thinking, you can create interesting opportunities for brand engagement.”
While some companies may turn to generative AI to develop a brand, Blasevick said the experiment also highlighted the technology’s creative weaknesses.
“It’s not a critical thinker, right?” she said. “AI is all predictive, so it’s just predicting what’s next. And it hallucinates. Hopefully we’re not hallucinating as people. AI, it wants to please you. It tells you how smart you are, how incredible every thought you have is. That’s not realistic for anything.”
But when paired with human strategists and designers, Blasevick said AI has elevated the company’s work.
After the success of the #Brand2Band visualizer, she said that other AI projects are in the works to help companies find “brand clarity,” a foundation for building a strong identity.
“I think in the end the idea (is for) AI to be used as a way for us to present even more thought-through, vetted ideas to our clients,” she said. “The world changes. There’s progress and I think if we can grab it in the right way, it will really usher in the next great era of human creativity. In the end, if the machines are just advertising the machines, they’re all going to be doing the same thing. We need to make sure the humans are represented.”
