Achi news desk-
Artificial intelligence (AI) continues to change the way people do things, with its use increasing in the workplace, school and even on personal devices through platforms such as ChatGPT.
One person working with and benefiting from AI is Doug Belding, owner of Halifax-based design agency DLB Creative.
Belding says the main way he uses AI is to understand his clients’ problems and what they are trying to create.
“Then kind of going through what tools are out there for AI and customizing a system together from those tools to help them operate (it) more efficiently.”
Belding says his clients don’t always have time to stay up-to-date on AI, or see what’s coming down the road.
“That’s something I do to make sure that if a tool doesn’t work for them, that we think it might be efficient, effective, in the beginning, we can exchange it for something else,” he said.
Belding provided a recent example of a small boutique design firm he was working with that was struggling with personal illustrations and photographs.
“We were going through what their brand was, and also what their clients tend to like. So from that point we would go into a tool, so like Midjourney, and kind of work really how we could make those pictures look realistic,” he said.
“But also do interesting things, like choosing the kind of people we want in them, what their background is, or what their ethnicity is, what they’re doing in those photos, and also, also, you can decide what is the Photos look based on if you also have an understanding of photography.”
A recent survey by Leger suggests that Canadians have mixed feelings about AI and Belding says he can understand why some people are hesitant or afraid of the technology.
“It’s a disruption, things change, I think it’s very interesting, and with that change a lot of great things can come from it as well,” he said.
“AI has been with us for a while – you think of Alexa, you think of Netflix, or YouTube, the things that you like or tend to watch that will give more of things like that to you, so you train that AI, for example, to give you what you want.”
Belding says AI is just one of many tools available for people to use, but they need to “work with it.”
“You almost have to date him a little bit and talk to him how you want him to talk back to you. And it’s an ongoing relationship, it’s not something you do once and it comes back perfectly,” he said.
AI can also save clients time, Belding said, allowing them to build a repository of files so they don’t have to outsource them.
“If they only needed it for a quick back and forth with a client to get approval that takes weeks of like back and forth, once the client has time to see it they’ll say yes or no, you could almost work compactly together in a much smaller meeting and get to the final product much faster.”
Overall, Belding believes that AI can be a positive and useful tool in the workplace.
“Right now, you see it in the medical field where it helps people, like doctors to diagnose things faster, safety in vehicles, it helps farmers grow food, it has a lot of applications actually,” he said.
Belding also offered tips for people who want to be more informed when it comes to AI.
“I think just being curious and then talking to people about it and asking about it,” she said. “There’s a lot of tools out there, so it can feel very overwhelming for someone like me who’s very interested and into it, it’s very overwhelming to know what’s out there, but really don’t be shy about it, ask for it, play around with it, it’s available.”
