First, radio was king. Then TV reigned for a long time. Next, it was the smartphone, and the game changed once again. As of 2023, we were watching nearly as much content on our phones as on our TVs¹. Let’s not forget social media, either. It’s fair to say that with each technological development, there’s always been some kind of apocalyptic prediction for our industry that never really transpired.

Today, there’s AI, more specifically generative AI. In short, the ability of machines (computers et al.) to produce content in a human-like way by analysing data patterns. Note: human-like. We’re not going to lie – as an agency, we see it as an opportunity, so we invited Jules Love from *spark to help us understand how we can leverage it to deliver more for our clients.

The creative ‘wingma-chine’

From exploring the generative power of ChatGPT and Midjourney to the ‘legals’ of image production, Jules covered a lot of ground in our four-hour session. We came away with a resounding feeling that AI cannot necessarily do what we do for our clients – but it’ll certainly help us do things even better.

Some big-budget companies are doing completely AI-generated campaigns right now – here’s looking at you Coca-Cola – but behind those adverts are humans who tell the machine what they want, and it responds. That only serves as an inspiration to us and what we can achieve with it, too. As Jules beautifully described, AI is like a hard-working intern who needs guidance. Hardly the terrifying fictional Cyberdyne Systems machines we imagine. Not yet anyway.

Starting from a position of strength

For us, the journey has already begun, and this session was much needed to help us crystalise our thinking. Our Art Director, David, and Head of Production, Russ, are already nicely genned up on the levers that need pulling to create stunning visuals, animations and short films. But it’s a skill set. As the old sweats might say, a craft. It’s also more diverse than that, helping us out in some of our meetings as an assistant. And thanks to Jules, we’ve seen other more strategic uses for it.

With AI as our new e-tern (see what we did there?), we can work smarter and with even more wow-factor for our clients. The opportunities feel endless: AI can reduce the grunt work, leaving us more time to dream big and deliver game-changing campaigns. It’s here to amplify our talent, not replace it.

(Full disclosure: AI wrote 99% of that last paragraph, but we came up with the term e-tern
– see, humans and machines working together beautifully).

Huge thanks to Jules and *spark for a brilliant session. It’s been the talk of the agency!

1. Statistica ↩︎