PIXELZ Newsletter

The Rise of Craftmanship - fueled by AI

For a long time, I had been trying to understand where this trend of prominent shadows in standard PDP images had come from. I don’t have a background in photography or photo studios and I often wonder what goes on behind the scenes that I’m missing out that brings these trends to life.

In my attempt to understand it, I’ve settled on my own theory. All of my theorizing came from watching a series of Instagram Stories from emily_elsie. She’s a photo director who uses her Instagram to discuss trends, cultural moments, and how it’s all captured. Recently, she had a series about the resurgence of the blue and orange color palette (this is a whole other conversation for another day).

She went on to talk about Gregory Crewdson’s work (a new to me photographer) and the recent Grammy Awards. The ties that bind here are the use of colors and the purposefulness of each.

Cue the lightbulb in my head going off. The shadows in PDP images or the content creator I recently saw on TikTok explaining how to get the paparazzi style flash in images. Images are becoming images again. It all seems to be saying: this was well crafted, this was purposeful. To find ways to leave our human mark and creativity on images. Whether or not this was part of anyone’s conscious thought process, I would like to think this is what we are moving towards. We are finding ways to not push back against AI but rather find ways to tap into new levels of our creativity and coexist with generative AI. It's happening to all of us. I have to stop myself from relying on the em-dash lest I be accused of using AI to write this newsletter. I'm reworking structures and sentences to get my point across to ensure my work is just that—my work. See what I did there? So, what do you think? Is AI maybe just making us better humans (at least creatively)?

Pixelz Pulse

Here's your update on all things Pixelz:

  • The date and location for the first FLOW: Local is set! Join us in Barcelona on April 3rd for a night of networking and learning. This event will take place in Spanish.
  • Last Call! It’s your last chance to sign up for FLOW: North America on March 19-20.
  • Catch up on the most recent FLOW Show podcast episodes:
    • Episode 9 - Turning "No" into a "Yes" as a creative with Ashley Chappell
    • Episode 10 - In-house vs Freelance Creatives: Creating a Culture Of Collaboration with Michael Zubcic

Hot Links

A few things from around the internet:

  • From my research into Gregory Crewdson, enjoy the behind-the-scenes of his shoot with Marc Jacobs - particularly the last 1.5 minutes.
  • An update from the Wirkin-gate: the Walmart Birkin and Hermès seem to be co-existing peacefully.
  • Probably one of my favorite uses of Generative AI in e-commerce so far is from furniture company Wayfair. Read about it here or see a demo of it here.