AI Isn’t Taking Your Job. It’s Redefining It.

I’ve been in the creative industry long enough to remember the panic when digital photography came along. Before that, Photoshop stirred things up. And before that, it was the camera itself that made painters nervous. Every time something new shows up, people say it’s going to replace us. But that’s never been the full story.

Photography didn’t kill painting. It pushed it forward. Photoshop didn’t end retouching, it made it faster, more flexible, and more accessible. Each shift changed the tools, not the value of creativity itself. And generative AI is doing the same.

But this time, there’s a new layer: ethics.

Unlike past tools, generative AI doesn’t just enhance your own work, it’s trained on everyone else’s. That changes the conversation. It raises questions about ownership, consent, and where the lines are between inspiration and imitation.

It’s right to be asking tougher questions. We’ve never used tools that learned from other people's work before. But that doesn’t mean we stop creating. It means we create with more clarity. More responsibility. More respect for people and their work.

I stay optimistic because the ethics conversation is finally getting real. AI research shops like Moonvalley train models such as Marey only on footage they’ve licensed directly from creators. Production studios like Asteria put those clean models to work on set. Rights platforms such as TrueRights let creators license their work for AI training and get paid. Big ecosystem players are stepping up too: Runway pairs with Getty Images, Adobe built Firefly on Adobe Stock, Getty offers its own Edify model, Shutterstock struck a six-year deal with OpenAI to compensate artists, and ElevenLabs pays voice actors every time a licensed clone is used.

What’s still true: the role of the creative. We’re here to tell stories, shape culture, and make work that connects. That hasn’t changed.

What’s new: the rise of roles we hadn’t imagined a few years ago. Prompt engineers. AI creative strategists. Generative AI Art Directors. These tools haven’t erased creative work. They’ve expanded the ways we do it.

The biggest shift I’ve seen lately is in how teams work. AI can handle repetitive, time-consuming tasks. It can generate a first draft, a visual sketch, a moodboard. That frees us up to focus on what matters most. Taste. Judgment. Storytelling. Emotion. Those are still the human parts of the process, and they’re not going anywhere.

Personally, I find this exciting. It opens up the industry. It gives people who may not have had access to the tools or teams before a way in. It invites more experimentation. More voices. And honestly, more interesting work.

I know change can be uncomfortable. But the idea that AI will “replace creatives” misses the point. The people who understand both creativity and technology are going to have the most interesting careers of all. I’ve seen that firsthand. These tools haven’t taken away my role. They’ve expanded it.

If you’ve spent your life learning how to shape a great idea, guide a team, or build a brand, your experience still matters. AI is just another set of tools.

And we’re still the ones holding the brush.