I was having a long conversation the other night with a friend from far back in the day. a phone call that was supposed to be about me helping him get his basic household shit together/organized because I am good at that sort of thing. towards the end, he got very animated and borderline frantic about his band. as in, I couldn't say anything for about 10 minutes of his exposition/monologue about how inspired he is by his own creativity lately, the tools he is using, and how he wants to collaborate with me.

I am mostly creative in the realm of food, visual design (digital and physical) and like some sculpture with just enough literary shit to be amusing. though he wouldn't really know that, because I don't just launch into my various tinkerings unless something specific or relevant is mentioned. he does know that I used to do a lot of work with digital design, so I believe that's what he wanted to collaborate about.

but before I can even say "OK, sounds fun" he's frantically telling me about how he has some subscription to AI tools and he's been using them to make stills and generated music videos from prompts and how it's absolutely incredible to generate these animations of subjects using styles and how well it goes with his music... and in my head I'm just like "it sounds like you have it all figured out and don't actually need me for anything."

I wanted to say I had made some cool visual stuff that I thought might be cool to have an audio component to match and that he just gave me the idea to use AI to generate some music based on prompts, but that seems kinda cruel and he probably wouldn't even get the hint anyway.

so I just let him go on and on and gave a non committal response about doing shit together in the future, with absolute no desire to follow up.

all I ever think about anymore is how these generative tools are absolutely dulling any cultivation of talent. after a decade of working exclusively with digital, I wanted to start working with physical media. paint, canvas, ink, transfer, dyes/pigments, wood, inlays etc. things I can touch, hold, hang, give away, or place somewhere there isn't a screen.

seeing someone go entirely in the other direction, not just digital, but like prompt oriented generative is like... sad. like nothing is being stimulated and opened, but rather it is being funneled into pre existing categories and boxes.

I left that conversation absolutely uninspired.