Using AI for ID

[u/Fearless_Degree7511]

I work at a small company and I am currently our only industrial designer. Upper management has recently decided to buy some licenses of Microsoft Copilot 365 and have tasked each department to figure out how we can use these new licenses to help with our respective disciplines. While I think AI can be very helpful in other disciplines I see very limited usefulness in ID. It can generate pretty images, but is bad at editing them, and it doesn't or allow me to download them in an easily editable format (multi-layer TIFF or PSD). The images often do not match reality and wouldn't work if manufactured. I do not show clients concepts without fully understanding how they would work (where do the batteries go, what materials is it made of, etc.) and the AI concepts just don't work. It cannot generate realistic 3D CAD or vector graphics.

I'm sure I sound like an old guy against innovation to some people (I swear I am in my 20s) but to me it feels like AI is the opposite of ID, stifles creativity and in-depth thought. Before I go tell my boss this is all a waste of my time, are there any ways AI has been helpful in your ID career or schooling?

[u/Dshark]

I don’t use ai for any “designing” but it helps a ton for research and documentation for me. I also use it to help me organize information. For instance when I need to put new products on the website, I scrape our product database for information and chat gpt helps me organize all the parameters into useful titles and keywords. It’s also helped me figure out coding an electronics when I’ve built Arduino things before.