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2025.05.18 Working with Ai as a creative professional today

AKA "Learning New Tools"

In 1989, I was hired at Atari Games as a 3D artist before most people even knew what that meant. The art team was built around 2D workflows, with talented artists using traditional techniques to hand-paint sprites and backgrounds. They’d take them to a scanning service, have them scanned, bring them back to the studio and then “pixel push” the artwork into a useable 256 color image.

Understanding nothing about professional game development, I arrived with early 3D tools and began to solve art puzzles. I was making comparable assets in a fraction of the time and some saw it as a threat. Others saw it as a curiosity and even an opportunity. Artists who learned this new, and sometimes janky art tool became highly sought after talents that went on to work for ILM and other AAA game companies.

Decades later, I’m seeing the same conversation resurface, only this time, it’s Generative Ai. Just like 3D back then, GenAi isn’t here to replace artists. It’s a tool. When used well, it accelerates the parts of creative work that are slow or repetitive. I’m not handing off the whole process to a machine. I’m using AI to generate drafts, experiment with styles, or rough in concepts that I then refine by hand. Productivity goes up. So does possibility. But the point, always, is the same: do the work better.

That said, I haven’t forgotten what disruption feels like from the other side. When 3D entered the game industry, not everyone made the leap. Some brilliant 2D artists struggled to adapt. It wasn’t about talent, it was about timing, resources, and how fast the ground moved under them. I think about that now when people talk about AI like it’s a revolution. It might be. But revolutions have costs. If we don’t acknowledge them, we lose sight of the human side of progress.

So I approach AI the way I approached 3D: with interest, caution, and a willingness to get my hands dirty. I’m not here to cheerlead for automation. I’m here to make things. As long as these tools help me do that without compromising what makes the work human, I’ll keep learning them. But if they start to erode that core, I’ll push back. Because after 35 years in this field, I’ve learned one thing above all:

The tools keep changing. The work remains.