The Value of Designers in the Age of Generative AI: Insights from the Pre-Mac Era

With the advent of generative AI, we designers are standing at a major turning point, much like when the Apple Mac first appeared in this world. While generative AI can create decent work in a short amount of time, it also produces a lot of junk. What is junk, and what is not? How can we improve a 60-point piece of work to an 80-point one? It is none other than us humans who are responsible for taking things from there.

Generative AI is a 'skilled newcomer'

In a sense, generative AI is like a 'skilled newcomer.' It fits perfectly into the workflow where an art director, acting as a supervisor, corrects and improves the designs created by a newcomer. In typical design firms, it is standard practice for junior designers to generate various ideas and compile designs based on a director's instructions, with the art director finally checking and making revisions. Generative AI is now poised to take over this junior designer position.
This presents a very harsh reality: will junior designers lose their jobs? This is already starting to happen in the West, and in Japan, news about design firm bankruptcies has become a major topic on social media.

Structural similarities between the pre-Mac era and today

I have been working as a designer since before the Apple Mac became widespread. That is precisely why I have real-world experience of the turbulent era when the way we worked changed drastically before and after the Mac.
Before the Mac, there was a profession called 'hanshita-ya' (mechanical layout artists). A crucial part of a designer's job back then was writing the 'blueprints' for these layout artists. We would specify typefaces, photo positions, and the thickness of ruled lines. The instruction sheets were incredibly detailed blueprints filled with text.
Based on those instructions, the layout artists would create the mechanicals, which served as the originals for printing. Furthermore, designers would use utility knives to cut 0.5mm into the photographic paper between characters to adjust the kerning. Finally, we would place tracing paper over the top, write down detailed color specifications like '30% yellow, 20% magenta,' and hand it over to the printer.
It was an era where we had no choice but to imagine the final result in our heads until the mechanicals were finished and the printing was complete. With the arrival of the Mac, all of these processes could be completed by the designers themselves in a short time while viewing the actual finished image.

The increased burden on designers behind the efficiency

While I thought it was a good thing, there is no doubt that the burden on designers increased. We ended up in a situation where designers had to handle every process that used to be carried out by layout artists and printers.
Work that used to take several weeks from design concept to submission could now be completed in just a few days on a Mac. Of course, it is better to be able to create things exactly as you imagine them rather than asking someone else to do it. That is why, for designers at the time, knowing how to fully utilize Photoshop and Illustrator to give shape to their images was a crucial skill.

The main work back then was not just the task of creating mechanicals, but focusing on the 'design direction' and 'direction' leading up to those specifications. The true work of a designer was in those upstream processes, not in moving their hands to finish the mechanicals.
However, look at it now. Design schools and students seem to focus too much on how to use Photoshop and Illustrator, and are only interested in what kind of expressions they can create or what techniques they can learn using those tools. Social media is overflowing with such technique tips. These are just part of the mechanical layout work of how to express something, but the original job of a designer should be to think about whether that expression is appropriate in the first place, and to consider the design direction and outcomes.

The 'aesthetic eye' needed to avoid being swayed by tools

And now, with the advent of generative AI, even the work of creating mechanicals using Illustrator is being handled by AI. If we are not careful, we are in an era where designers can just throw a vague prompt at it, and it will think up a decent design on its own.
Many people might wonder, 'Can I really call this my own design?' The most important thing is whether you can judge whether the design that appears on the screen is good or bad, and how it can be improved. Even before that, it is about giving precise instructions on what kind of design to create. I think it is very dangerous to adopt a design created by AI as is, without having those criteria for judgment.

Generative AI is an efficient, fast-moving junior designer, but it only does what it is told and creates a lot of junk. It doesn't understand the subtleties of the human heart, it lies without hesitation, and it creates strange things based on its own assumptions. In other words, you could say it is a junior who has excellent abilities but is a fool. That is precisely why, if the art director in charge does not have a proper aesthetic eye and a clear design concept when giving instructions, they will be completely swayed by it.

In this era where generative AI has become widespread, the importance of learning the operational skills of Illustrator and Photoshop themselves is gradually decreasing. Instead, isn't there a stronger demand for an aesthetic eye as a true designer, and an awareness of upstream processes related to business and management?

Every time generative AI or new tools have appeared, the way we work has changed significantly. I feel that the current wave of AI is very similar to that time when the Mac appeared and we started doing all the work ourselves. Since AI will do the work, designers should focus on what they are truly meant to do.

No matter how much work efficiency improves, it is none other than human aesthetic judgment and direction skills that guarantee the final quality and elevate it into something valuable. I believe that what is required of designers who will survive in the coming era is to have the perspective of an art director who masters tools rather than being used by them, and to support design for management starting from the upstream processes.