How Generative AI Is Reshaping Creative Work

After more than two decades working as a photographer and creative director, I’ve spent a lot of time staring at blank pages, empty moodboards, and half-formed ideas.

Sometimes an idea comes together immediately. More often, it takes a while.

That early part of the process has always been one of the hardest to predict. You research, collect references, sketch things out, revisit old work, and try different directions until something starts to feel right.

Generative AI has changed that part of my process more than anything else.

I use tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney early, when an idea is still loose. I might use ChatGPT to explore different ways into a concept or organize thoughts that aren’t fully formed yet. With Midjourney, I can experiment with lighting, locations, composition, texture, wardrobe, or an overall visual language before committing to a direction.

I don’t expect either tool to give me the answer.

What I’m looking for is something that makes me think differently.

In a traditional workflow, I might start by collecting existing photographs and campaigns as visual references. I still do that, but now I can also generate variations on an idea and see what happens when I change one part of it.

What if the light were harder?

What if the environment were more minimal?

What if the image felt less polished and more documentary?

Sometimes the result confirms the direction I already had in mind. Sometimes it gives me an idea I wouldn’t have arrived at otherwise. Most of what gets generated never becomes part of the final work, and that’s fine. Its value can simply be helping me figure out what I do and don’t want.

That has probably been the biggest change for me.

AI makes experimentation inexpensive.

I can explore more directions before committing time, money, or a production team to one of them. It gives me a way to make an abstract idea visual enough to evaluate.

That doesn’t make every idea better. More options can just as easily create more noise. Knowing what to ignore becomes as important as knowing what to generate.

That’s where experience still matters.

After years of directing shoots, editing images, building campaigns, and working with other creatives, I have a pretty strong sense of when something feels right for the project and when something is simply visually impressive.

Those are not always the same thing.

I still believe deeply in craft, photography, collaboration, and taking the time to make something well. I don’t see generative AI replacing those things in my process.

What it has given me is another way to explore.

And for someone who has spent most of his career turning ideas into images, that makes it a very interesting tool.