How I Use AI (Please Read)

# AI In My World

I want to dive deeper into how I personally do—and don't—use AI.

There are legitimate uses for AI, but when its use is overdone, it is destructive to the artistic process. This idea has been explored by many people much smarter than myself, but I still see it as my duty as an artist to articulate my own approach. I don't want readers, viewers, or people who appreciate my work to live under the delusion that I don't use it at all.

I do use it—very, very sparingly.

I'm going to walk through my process at a high level so it's clear where the boundaries have been placed.

They are lines I will not cross—they compromise my craft and, thereby, my ability to share emotion with anyone who cares enough to take even a fleeting glance at who I truly am.

## Esoteric Concepts

Art can be a bit high-minded.

Art can be hard to get your head around.

For people who haven't been deeply immersed in the craft, art can leave them... **out**, confused, frustrated, and simply without connection.

My art has always contained a human element, a touch of something to which everyone can relate.

Art cannot be a gate or a wall; art must be a path, a garden, a stream.

It has to allow anyone in the world to put their own meaning into it and walk fully into the experience.

It must say something easily accessible, deeply personal, and entirely relatable all at once.

And yet, still it must provide something more.

Art must provide the ability for anyone to put themselves into the piece.

It must connect to feelings anyone could find.

If it fails in that goal, it has ceased to be art at all.

Let's introduce AI.

AI at its core is pattern recognition.

It applies previous knowledge to find similarities.

'AI' answers "what's next?" but only for "what has a human done?"

'AI' has seen art but it hasn't experienced art.

The network has information for what is pretty.

It can tell you what has previously elicited emotion.

It might show you something profound.

*But*... that is because it sees what humans have already created.

Then where does AI fit in the process?

What is the purpose of using AI?

How does it help?

How does it hinder?

We each deserve our own answers to those.

Take this from a person who built the monster...

It touches your work where you decide,
but it can destroy beauty in the process.

## Poetic Process

I sit with the feeling—a moment calls to me and I
place myself into that space.

I occupy that room; I let it fill me with whatever
it says it should.

A Buddhist idea I return to: emotion is a wave;
it crests and breaks, but calm seas always lie beyond.

That is always, always, always the first stair on the
winding path to a finished work.

The medium comes next, after you begin with yourself.

Oils, pens, charcoals, all tools of creation.

Those come next.

Screwing has a tool.
Nailing has a tool.
Sawing has a tool.

There is a right one for the job.

Art is different; it has many.

There is one for that piece, and one for another.

Mine is the pen, the paper, the oils, the camera.

I let my thoughts flow—freely upon the canvas.

I surf the Dao; I let the currents flow and ebb.

Stops and starts
Ins and outs
The end of each step comes to me
A clear feeling of conclusion for each stream.

Each stream comes to the river; each builds to the ocean.

Move the streams you build; streams wind with you—you direct them.

My friends direct them; I enlist the brigade.

We direct the work in teams.

I want all my readers to be my friends.

Make friends who want to build with you.

Let them shape these natural forces.

See your ocean next.

Observe the hills and valleys.

Take a stop at a town.

Let yourself float.

Dive down rapids.

Know your path, but let it know you.

Build each stream within that landscape.

Always be moving toward the ocean.

Stop before you see that final body.

That's where AI becomes your final friend.

Collective knowledge, distilled into a single body.

Authors long dead.
Poets with no pen.
Speakers silent.

Those can speak to you in the final step.

It can show you how they traversed that final barrier.

The final lock to allow the boat to rise.

Your vessel sails the ocean at last.

AI doesn't have to raise your sails.

It doesn't have to swell your wave.

It can.

Let yourself decide and maybe you'll see...

A Dostoevsky in the sea.

## Concrete

I never let AI dictate where I'm going or what I'm going to do with my own work.

I prefer the human connection and the input of my countless friends; I prefer my close ones (shoutout to Boris, Anant, and Mallory).

I honestly let even my past friends influence the work indirectly.

I like to have their input throughout the entire process so I can see how a reader sees my work.

I think a lot of times a writer can get caught in their own work and thoughts; then, when someone complains or is like, "Dude, this sucks," you're more hurt.

Art can be appreciated by yourself, but ultimately it's meant to be shared.

I will only ever ask AI to review my work when I'm 99% complete.

I've made the idea by that point and created the entire work and edited and let my friends edit and finally arrived at the conclusion I want.

Then I try to let my favorite authors speak to me through AI.

It sucks that I can't actually talk to Dostoevsky or Proust or even Dr. Seuss (amazing author btw).

I try and let it give me that and tell me, not how I compare to their styles, but what they might say about my work from what they've written.

I always ask, "Do you think my favorite authors would enjoy my work?"

I'm actually really distantly related to Dostoevsky and Hans Holbein, so those are favorites to ask. I'm proud to be descended from them, and I want my children's children to think of me the same way.

## Advice

Really my only advice for you is to do what you want.

I personally really hold back because it hurts the process **for me**.

That doesn't mean it hurts the process **for you**.

I think that it gives some people a voice, honestly.

There's a lot of people who can't write like me.

There's a bunch of people who can't draw with the same skill.

I'm not going to lie and act like I'm not a naturally good writer.

Maybe they have an amazing idea, though, and they don't know the first step.

Doesn't having someone who's seen it all guide them to a starting place help?

I want to hear from them, even if I'm hearing it through a million voices.

Ultimately, I want you to do what you want, but please dear god just be honest.

Don't lie and take away someone's entire style or career.

There's such meaning in art and expression, and really, you'll only see new stuff if you continue to support people who have that within them.

It might not be your style, or you might just not have the same God-given talent, drive, or quite simply time to hone your ability.

That's okay, but it's really only going to hurt what you get to experience by taking their livelihood away.

I'm not going to stop, but somebody else might, and they have amazing things to say.

Some of those things you need to hear.