Anna Leighton –AI style design winner from AI Trend Week – Season 1 & 2 (Picture Credit score: Anna Leighton)
If you happen to’re an ardent follower of synthetic intelligence and what this know-how means for style designers, then you definitely would possibly already be ‘within the know’ about AI Trend Week. Particularly in case you have been studying our weblog for the previous two years. AI Trend Week was spearheaded by visionary minds at Maison Meta, the world’s first AI generative company based in New York Metropolis in 2022 by Cyril Foiret, in partnership with next-generation on-line retailer Revolve Group.
The UoF weblog coated the First AI Trend Week (AIFW-April 2023) and the Second AI Trend Week, November 30 – December 1, 2023, which is the place you’d have discovered about Anna Leighton, considered one of 10 style design winners from that present. I lately had a chance to interview Anna about how foray into AI style design and, I’m pleased to announce, that Anna shall be creating an AI Trend Design lesson collection for UoF. Meet Anna:
The Interview
Francesca: Are you a formally skilled designer?
Anna: Sure, I went to Otis Faculty of Artwork & Design in LA and graduated in 1996. I labored for quite a lot of firms after which in 2001, I began my very own assortment, making one-of-a-kind “eco-effective”attire, known as Annatarian. Then, in 2004 I began doing jewellery. With household within the jewellery enterprise for 40 years, they helped me launch my jewellery assortment known as, Peace, Love, Earth by Annatarian. In 2012, I began working with my husband who’s a high quality artist,and took a break from making one-of-a-kind items. I additionally realized that I wanted enterprise schooling and commenced taking enterprise lessons in gross sales and advertising and marketing. Quickly I obtained my jewellery line in 75 shops, together with Nordstroms.
Francesca: What laptop abilities are essential to grow to be an AI Trend Designer?
Anna: In 1996, I took a Photoshop class at Otis then employed a one-on-one Photoshop professional to show me and that’s what obtained my foot within the door at plenty of the style firms after commencement, since I had actually good technical abilities. Then in 2015, I obtained a VR headset as a result of I needed to begin a VR style undertaking. I then discovered 3D design utilizing Browzwear and obtained related in 2020 (I found them in 2018 or 2019) with Amsterdam-based The Fabricant, a digital style home utilizing CLO 3D, the place I did a few of their group occasions, and was requested to grow to be their group supervisor in 2021. That is the place I grew to become extra concerned within the 3D artwork world. My husband is a tech genius, artist and filmmaker who created an app whereby via augmented actuality, you may see his work come to life. Since I began working with him in 2012, I began to see the potential of augmented actuality for style. I began working in Tilt Brush (an open-source VR portray app) with VR headgear and dabbled in Gravity Sketch (a free 3D sketching and design software program), which I feel goes to be large for the style trade quickly. You may design utilizing your headgear or you are able to do it on-line too, you don’t should be in digital house.
Anna Leighton and her husband created a public artwork undertaking for the Metropolis of LA which is up indefinitely at Angels Flight in Downtown LA, known as Angels in LA. (Picture Credit score: https://downtownla.com/discover/grand-ave-augmented)
Francesca: What different packages do you utilize to create AI-inspired style?
Anna: Via one other group, primarily based out of Amsterdam known as LoveKraft, I began working with an AI product known as GauGAN and that was my first expertise in AI, three years in the past. It blew my thoughts since you might draw a crude little home and get one thing actually magical. A couple of months later GauGAN obtained actually good. Then alongside got here Midjourney AI (a device that lets you create high-quality pictures from easy textual content prompts from the browser of your laptop or telephone, no particular software program wanted), which on the time was invitation solely and I used to be one of many first to make use of it. Then got here DALL-E, an AI system that may create life like pictures and artwork from an outline in pure language. I used to be in a position to get myself and my group passes to DALL-E. Utilizing DALL-E, my husband and I created a public artwork undertaking for the Metropolis of LA, which is up indefinitely at Angels Flight in Downtown LA, known as Angels in LA. We initially generated the imagery utilizing Dall-E. Nevertheless, as Midjourney AI surpassed Dall-E, we switched to Midjourney.
Anna Leighton is High 10 winner along with her Magical Thriller Core Assortment – AI Trend Week Season 1 (Picture Credit score: Anna Leighton)
Francesca: How did you grow to be concerned in AI Trend Week?
Anna: Via The Fabricant,I discovered concerning the first AI Trend Week (April 2023). I needed to give them some concepts, get permitted, construct my assortment after which get individuals to vote on my assortment. I did that for each AIFW Season 1 and a couple of. For AI Trend Week Season 1, the designs from my Magical Thriller Core Assortment made the High 10.
Anna Leighton’ s Annatarian Harmonia Assortment – Makes High 20 at AI Trend Week Season 2 (Picture Credit score: Anna Leighton)
Anna: After which for AI FW Season 2- they modified the rating to High 20, from High 10, and my Annatarian Harmonia Assortment made it once more.
Impressed by the power and style of feminine athletes, Anna blended couture style with the spirit of girls’s basketball. (Picture Credit score: Anna Leighton)
Francesca: Are you able to talk about how vital having ‘hands-on’ design abilities is when creating AI style?
Anna: Whereas it’s very interesting to do sci-fi and issues that may’t exist, as a result of the place else are you able to try this however in AI? Nevertheless, I actually needed to see these collections come to life. Due to this fact, my style design abilities and information are crucial to the method. I’d like to have an opportunity to being the subsequent designer at Chanel. I’m additionally impressed by my mother who was a giant classic individual within the 80s, and my grandmother, who’s 99 and as soon as labored for Mr. Blackwell and Travilla as a pattern maker and is a stickler for stitching correctly. I like draping and I like textiles and hand stitching. All of that’s vital to me. When working with 3D designers on numerous tasks the place they had been utilizing CLO 3D and had been good at placing it collectively however didn’t know the drape and building usually it will be a bit “off”. I wasn’t as professional on that software program, however I used to be in a position to say, “I feel you could curve that line proper there on the sample to get it to drape this fashion,” and it will work out.
Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Method We Make Issues- a e book by by Michael Braungart & William McDonough
Francesca:Are you able to describe your inspiration for creating AI style?
Anna: I contemplated how I had began my Annatarian gown assortment in 2001, when 911 occurred, and my jewellery line Peace, Love Earth in 2004. I mirrored on my time working within the style trade, which had its highs and lows. I obtained to journey fairly a bit, however I additionally obtained to see how issues had been manufactured and wasn’t very snug it. What we do to international locations, how issues get recycled, and the way polluting the style trade actually is. I’m extra targeted on creative design than conventional profession paths. As soon as I learn Cradle to Cradle by Michael Braungart and William McDonough and met William McDonough, I spotted that I needed to create that sort of style – utilizing the ideology that uncooked supplies should not thrown away [from cradle to grave] however are reused indefinitely or function “meals” for brand spanking new merchandise. Incorporating eco-effective design rules, I usually use textiles and jewellery collected from my travels to Egypt, Armenia, Europe, China and Thailand because the story behind my design ideas.
A glance from Annatarian’s AI Trend Week Season 2 Harmonia Assortment utilizing DALL-E. (Photograph Credit score: AI Trend Week)
Francesca: Are you able to describe the design idea on your AI Trend Week Season 2 assortment?
I began with an idea. For instance, I had simply gone to Athens, Greece and noticed graffiti all over the place, juxtaposed in opposition to historical partitions. It was so lovely and engaging to me. On the identical time, the disaster in Ukraine and Israel-Gaza was going down. Once I began engaged on the Harmonia assortment, it was about bringing within the textiles that I had collected in my travels and placing tales collectively and including the runway with a background of Athens. And what I did with Annatarian was put tales collectively like making peace inside a gown. I’d mix materials from combining cultures that had been in battle and make peace. So, the gown above had a narrative.
A glance from Annatarian’s AI Trend Week Season 2 Harmonia Assortment
Francesca: Are you able to talk about the technical course of for creating an AI style piece?
Anna: For the Annatarian gown assortment, I began by manually inputting particular parameters into the AI, (DALL-E and Steady Diffusion for the face), similar to shade schemes, mannequin sorts – what sort of mannequin, my textiles, my Athens location pictures, lighting, digital camera angle and design types. There are optimistic prompts, damaging prompts, picture inputs, and a lot extra. These parameters information the AI in producing the preliminary design. And, like ChatGPT, I refine it.
For me, from the primary day, I’ve actually been in a position to communicate to AI in a method that may be very pure to me and jogs my memory of after I used to journey to totally different international locations and they’d say, “I actually perceive your English, however when so and so speaks, I can’t perceive them.” So, perhaps I perceive how AI thinks or what it might probably perceive and so perhaps that’s it.
Annatarian- Shirt & Pant from AI Trend Week Season 2 Harmonia Assortment (Picture Credit score: Anna Leighton)
Francesca: Is there a lot tweaking in AI for a specific design undertaking?
Anna: Sure, generally I’ll make a spreadsheet to maintain monitor of what inputs labored and what didn’t. I’m going via a number of iterations to tweak and refine it. Sure, generally hundreds-to ensure the design aligns with my private aesthetic. Usually, the AI-generated designs don’t match my type initially, so I spend a major period of time refining the prompts and making changes till the design actually displays my imaginative and prescient and model. I may also go into Photoshop to regulate colours, tweak the design, and even change the mannequin’s face.
My alter ego – a woke cowboy named Dusty Trials, got here to me in a dream. I created a tune and it took me 160 tries. I made it utilizing AI out there on iTunes https://music.apple.com/us/album/boy-lost-in-queens/1749932341?i=1749932342 and Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/monitor/5hsxYJyeNykLPvMDHHakNl?si=dc13868fa9c6493d. I’m presently making a Dusty Trials music video.
Francesca: Are these AI generator instruments costly and are they Mac and PC suitable?
Anna: I exploit each my PC and my Mac to create AI content material. Steady Diffusion is free, and I exploit it and my VR headset on my PC. I exploit Midjourney on my Mac and it’s roughly $30 a month. I additionally use DALL-E on my Mac, which is now inside ChatGPT, and I pay $20 per 30 days .
Anna Leighton’s Annatarian Magical Thriller Core – AI Trend Week Season 1 (Picture Credit score: Anna Leighton)
Francesca: What sort of information base do you could create AI-inspired style?
Anna: You want be laptop savvy and have persistence. Realizing packages like Adobe Photoshop, have a background in style design & costume historical past, and possess expertise & a style degree assist rather a lot.
Francesca: Will you be creating extra content material for AI Trend Week – Season 3?
Anna: Sure. I need to create designs that may be simply produced and bought. This subsequent time I’ll do one thing that isn’t as advanced and due to this fact not so costly to provide.
Francesca: Will AI-generated patterns be subsequent?
Anna: Sure, it’s solely a matter of time.
Francesca: What’s subsequent in your horizon?
Anna: I’m inquisitive about designing for a significant style home. Moreover, I’m excited to be creating an AI style design lesson collection for the College of Trend. I’m captivated with exploring the intersection of know-how and creativity, and these tasks enable me to push the boundaries of what’s doable in style design. Sustainability is a key focus for me, and I combine eco-effective design rules into my work, creating style that not solely sustains but additionally provides again, makes a distinction, and transforms the trade.
So inform us, how excited are you to discover ways to create AI style?
