There is a truth to the idea that, while we had hoped AI would do our work for us so we have time to create art, the reality is the opposite: AI excels in creative efforts while lacking physical skills.
For content creators though, this isn’t a threat but an opportunity. Nor is it a future technology that we can ponder about, but a day-to-day tool for our creative workflow.
For content production, AI can work in image, audio and video generation, along with illustration and graphic design. There are very few mediums of communication that it cannot competently do today, and the one business that is seeing it as a threat is royalty-free stock content libraries, which is why Freepik has pivoted towards AI – and gone all in.
Freepik’s AI ecosystem
A lot of the cutting edge of AI has become fragments; one model is advised for coding, another for creative writing, and another for video.
The strategy of Freepik’s direction has been to consolidate where AI is today (so users aren’t missing out on any modality) and create a single ecosystem that has a sense of cohesion. This helps many soothe many creators’ FOMO of trying to keep up with the latest possibilities (Google VEO 3 is available to use), but it also helps keep the workflow more streamlined.
While it’s useful to use the same platform and library for different projects, it also creates an internal pipeline for ideation, generation and editing. You can generate an image to place within a generated graphic. By reducing friction and context-switching for the user, projects are more easily tracked and faster to complete.
The suite of Freepik AI Tools includes:
- AI Image Generator for producing novel visuals from text prompts
- AI Video Generator for creating dynamic short-form content
- AI Audio Generator for either a voiceover, sound effects or stock music
- AI Illustrations for stock vectors and illustrations
- AI Design for stock templates, social media posts and mockups
- AI Assistant to facilitate the creative process
These are complemented by intelligent editing functionalities like AI-powered image upscaling and object retouching. This holistic environment is what happens when a company brings all the pieces of the puzzle to one space for you, where you can begin to play in a sandbox environment.
Practical applications for the modern creator
For experienced creators, AI’s value is measured in its ability to solve tangible and high-level problems. New efficiencies are great, but the end result needs to be better, as content creation is not a place for cutting corners.
Of course, the AI suite isn’t just for novelty or to make AI products (in the perception of the consumer). While AI content is a meta-trend in itself and a style in its own right, these tools can also achieve business objectives that have nothing to do with AI, like brand consistency and production scalability. Being able to generate many on-brand product images at once is useful for social media manager’s and web developers, for example, and products can be placed in diverse settings and lighting conditions without the cost of physical photoshoots.
The true benefit here is achieving rapid A/B testing at scale. Meaning, 10 high-quality posts can be generated, and very quickly the most persuasive one will prevail, which helps quantify and industrialize the marketing strategy. Human quality assurance is still needed, but scalability is extremely valuable for small businesses with limited budgets.
One aspect of this new efficiency gain is the automation of previously laborious editing tasks. The Freepik Background Remover is a good example here, as it can execute precise subject isolation in a matter of seconds (a task that was previously labor-intensive).
But again, it’s not just about saving time while achieving a similar level of quality, it’s about freeing up creative energy elsewhere to improve the final output. By automating repetitive processes, AI frees creators to spend time on being more strategic or creative. This extends to object retouching, quality enhancement, image expansion… Many tasks can now be automated.
AI and creativity’s symbiotic relationship
The narrative of AI as a replacement for human creativity is quite simplistic. While there is an interesting philosophical debate over whether AI is truly creative or inherently regurgitating, the truth is that it doesn’t matter because it’s just a tool. This was a similar debate to whether electronic drums can ever be real music, but are now standard practice because of their ability to achieve the artist’s vision quicker, but also, more accurately. This, then, means that such technology boosted creativity, and AI is no different.
Freepik’s strategic direction is built on the idea that AI is simply a powerful creative partner. When purpose-built (rather than an open LLM model), it can handle the technical and often time-consuming aspects of content production.
Strategy, storytelling and high-level ideation is still firmly in the hands of the people. Of course, we could hand this over to AI, too, but the quality of results begins to diminish. So, AI is not currently fit to replace a marketing manager, but instead is a tool to double a marketing managers productivity. While artistry is important as a concept, productivity is what matters in the workplace.
The democratization of professional-grade content
Freepik’s decisive move is an interesting one, because it signals the end of royalty-free content as we know it today. Less and less will there be photographers and musicians creating stock content, as the economics of this leans more into AI automation. If this is seen as a bad thing, there will still be a market for it, no matter how niche, and thus the market corrects itself.
But more important than the stock industry itself is how businesses use it. Freepik has decided to provide professional-grade content creation to the everyday business person. Before, it would be too difficult for a sole trader, non-technical coffee shop owner to photoshoot their products and create brand assets (an agency was an option, but expensive). Today, they can try their hand at creating sophisticated adverts, graphics and product photos in a matter of minutes via conversational prompts.
