It’s been a while since a magazine arrived at my coffee table with a proper THUD!
There was a time – not too long ago, perhaps 6 or 7 years – when a new issue of Fantastic Man or Arena Home Plus would weigh in at +1kg. I know, I know, some are still around, but the marginalisation of print media has made biannual magazines more rare and less heavy.
So it was a familiar sensation when the latest issue of Stockholm-based Copy Magazine landed on my kitchen table the other week. It has almost 400 pages of beautiful printing on multiple paper stocks, a stunning repetition of ad spreads at the beginning and a marvel of creativity across the multiple fashion and beauty stories that are beautifully laid out throughout the publication.
It’s almost as if I’m transported back to 2007 and the peak of print fashion media.
The difference between then and now?
Every inch of Copy Magazine has been generated using artificial intelligence. Every ad spread, every portrait, every fashion story, every model, every caption has been produced with the help of AI tools like Midjourney. It’s an editorial feat thas has garnered a lot of attention in other media, including Vogue.com.
It is one of the most fascinating editorial experiences I’ve had in a long time, in part because it is such a complex impression. On the one hand, I’m amazed by the level of quality that AI can achieve. On the other, I’m freaked out by the level of quality that AI can achieve.
Having flipped through it for the last couple of weeks, more existential questions about AI and content have started to emerge.
What—for the love of creativity!—is the point of all this machine-generated content? What is the story it tells? Does it actually move me on a deeper level? Does it teach me anything?
The problem lies in the questions. I ask these questions mostly because of the lack of story and substance. There is nothing in this intriguing illustration that tells a story from the world at large. There is no actual brand behind the clothes and no real human quote behind the text. Other than the training data that are deeply hidden in the machine learning tools behind the visuals, there seems to be a complete lack of connection to the real world.
Part of me would like at least some human content bundled in the AI stuff. Perhaps a real interview with a real person, enhanced with AI imagery? Or AI-generated text describing a real-life artwork?
But I might be missing the point.
What, then, is this product really?
Well, for one, it’s the brainchild of creative director Carl-Axel Wahlström, a visionary and AI-driven creative that is the founder of the magazine. Since Carl-Axel, and his team of producers and editors, are the actual human connection to the publication, you also realise that it’s mostly a showcase for the company behind it – The Copy Lab, acreative agency specializing in AI imagery.
Carl-Axel was a speaker in one of the live podcast panels we hosted this spring under the editorial banner Virtual Creativity Live. Reflecting on this series of conversations (the last of which will deal specifically with AI and branding, stay tuned for that), I realise we are at the early stages of AI-driven creativity.
All of the creatives we’ve had on stage—whether visual artists like Carl-Axel, fashion designers like Roei Dehri, or entrepreneurs like Kive founder Olof Lindh—could agree that AI is a tool, a way to augment and enhance human creativity, and a massive opportunity for brands.
As Carl-Axel said on the panel:
”For me, AI represents a tool. It’s a new type of camera. It’s a new type of technology. I remember when the first digital film camera came and how that opened up for more moving content. Or when I worked as a sound engineer during the 90s, and we worked with tape recordings and the digital audio recordings came and we could edit on a screen. So, all these different technological revolutions have accelerated creativity and made it more widely used by the public.”
Exactly how this tool will be used by brands, by creative agencies, and by individual creatives is less clear. There seem to be two different types of approaches in the market right now: you are either super excited about it or scared shit-less. That reflects the strategies within companies, to the extent they have any– you are either just fascinated and dabble with it, or you are leaning into it, hiring dedicated prompt engineers and AI designers.
As Olof Lindh put it in our latest panel:
“Everyone has sort of realised that, oh, this is going to be big; we better figure this out. Most brands have done a few things. And they’ve played around in maybe one or two tools, obviously ChatGPT and maybe MidJourney. But there are a few that are doing very, very advanced things. They are creating a new role for AI creativity, and then they’re creating training programs for it. Those who are the furthest along have AI creatives, and then they have training programs to become an AI creator. And then those people work with AI tools to create new things in much faster, smarter ways.”
It’s been a fascinating, humbling, and highly educating journey to produce the Virtual Creativity Live series this spring, and I’m more eager than ever to learn more and think more deeply about the subject.
Until then, I encourage anyone to grab a copy of Copy Magazine. If not for the dizzying experience of seeing into the future of creativity, then for the calming effect of a traditional print magazine.
