“A true artist is not one who is inspired, but one who inspires others.”
― Salvador Dali
― Salvador Dali
It’s inevitable that cartoonists sometimes come up with identical ideas about a particular subject. Great minds think alike, right? But you wonder where some cartoonists get their ideas from when nine out of ten cartoons depict the same idea regarding a certain subject. Under the guise of "inspiration" ideas are shamelessly copied, and to avoid suspicion of plagiarism minor adjustments are made. No, when it comes to originality some cartoonists are no better than AI.
Regarding my working method: I start off with an idea, which I sketch beforehand with a pen on a piece of paper. Then I search for useful components to visualize that idea. I mainly use AI to generate the components I need for my composition, but also stock-images. Before AI came along I scored image banks using keywords to find useful imagery. Today I use a text prompt to create useful imagery. Not much difference if you ask me. I combine the different images with the use of Photoshop.
My own distinctive style lies mainly in the caricatures of the heads. I don’t use AI to create these heads, at least not to caricature them. I create the caricatures in my cartoons from scratch in Photoshop based on a photo of the person in question. Yes, after that I finetune my caricatures with the help of AI, but these are only cosmetic improvements, the shape of my caricatures remain intact.
My working method hasn't changed since I use AI. My cartoons are still a mixture of images from which I cut out parts to create a new narrative. That some of these images are now generated by AI doesn’t take away the fact that my work is still based on the old-fashioned cut-and-paste-method. Didn't Salvador Dalí do exactly the same thing, albeit in a less refined, more symbolic way? In a sense my cartoons are just as well (digital) collages.
It shows great arrogance for traditional cartoonists to claim exclusive rights to create cartoons. As if they earned their talent instead of being given it to them at birth. Yes, it takes a lot of time and practice to develop that talent. But the same goes for me. It took me as much blood, sweat, and tears to master Photoshop and develop my own style as any old fashioned cartoonist has undergone.
Creating cartoons with only a simple text prompt is questionable. But I don’t do that. What’s the fun of that? I create my own ideas and use the same equipment and software of regular cartoonists, leaving me, after a few hours, with a Photoshop-document of 50 - 80 layers per cartoon.
Don’t get me wrong, I am as much of an opponent of AI as every artist is. But by using AI merely as a tool, I think it can lead to something unique.
It's not about talent. It's about creativity.
Bart van Leeuwen