I think it’s good that it exist though it being own by giant corporation and the copyright issues along with it is questionable. But in terms increasing productivity it’s obvious. Though everyone can generate but not everyone has an artistic mindset and be able to produce what their thinking. Artist should leverage it to increase or get inspiration for their next big thing, essentially treat it like those custom brushes but on a higher level. Imagine animators having the ability to tweak movements in between frames making it super crisp without much effort. All they will have to do now is produce key frames and describe the in between process. Graphic artist generating starting scenes which they can work further to do some concept art. No longer having to spend overtime animating a scene for an episode that is to be aired the next day. A mangaka having to draw backgrounds for their manga. This means no need to do overtime to reach a certain quality that customers demand. Though the question it replacing artist entirely at some point in the future, I don’t think it will happen since people in general especially to art wants a human touch on things. Though if that time comes we might have a bigger question to answer.
As a graphic designer, I’m currently on the fence. I love the AI tools that make tedious tasks significantly easier such as cutting out curly or frizzy hair. I also enjoy using generative AI as a tool to do things like replace an object in someone’s hand or seamlessly fill in the background where I removed something, but unfortunately those are the things that are potentially stealing from other artists and so is morally wrong to use. It is nice to just play around with it for the sake of generating ideas that you could build off of or to try to create a mock-up before execution. It’s sad really, because I would absolutely love to use the generative tools more but I just don’t see how I can at this point in time. Instead I currently use it for things that are private that I wouldn’t profit off of. For example, I made a puzzle for my father in law using a photo of his family’s farm and used generative AI to recreate the photo in the artistic style of his favorite puzzle artist. He was delighted to have it and it became a highly unique item he could enjoy. I never intend to sell it or even share it with anyone else. It’s for him only and I doubt his favorite puzzle artist will lose anything from it.