Creatives WithAI: Through Her Lens: Where Photography Meets AI with Tigz Rice

Tigz Rice: 00:00:05

It's the ability to take that intangible thing from your head and go, "okay, I would like to create, so instead of being...having to make it, for example, with your own hands, having the ability to describe how it is in your head into maybe 'voice to text', to then generate an image, and being able to say, okay, well, these are the ideas I have. So the creative process is still there. It's just giving us more access to things we wouldn't necessarily have had access to in the past.

And that's really exciting.

Lena Robinson: 00:00:35

You're listening to WithAI FM.

Hi, everyone, welcome to Creatives WithAI. I'm your host, Lena Robinson and today we have a really interesting guest who I met October last year.

I'm going to look at the name of what we went to. It was called 'Women Podcaster Creators Meetup', and we did it at Amazon and we hit it off straight away for a couple of reasons.

A) she's my kind of lady, this is Tigz Rice, everybody, and B) she is what's called an 'empowering portrait photographer', also does videography and content creation, and I'll let her go into explaining more about that in a minute, but very much about providing empowerment and courage for women, particularly with amazing photography. She also happens to be a real expert in the Adobe community for, has been...for over a decade.

She's been shortlisted...I'm looking through my list because it's so massive, shortlisted for:

Digital Woman of the year in: 2021

- Also shortlisted for Digital Creator of the year 2022

ng Businesswomen in the UK in: 2023

'S I think they're called, in: 2020

So welcome, Tigz, and I'd really like you to tell the audience about your journey, about how you've gone through your career and how you've ended up talking to me today about Creativity and AI.

Tigz Rice: 00:02:35

Sure. Well, first, thanks so much for having me.

It's such a pleasure to be here and I know we've been trying to get this in the diary for a little while now, so thanks. Thanks for your patience.

Lena Robinson: 00:02:44

You're welcome.

Tigz Rice: 00:02:47

So, I mean, that was a fantastic intro. Yeah. My name is Tigz Rice. I describe myself as an 'Empowerment Photographer' and I have been helping people reconnect with their bodies and level up their digital visibility for the last 15 years. I started, or my background is actually illustration and graphic design, that's what I trained in at University, and I fell out of love with drawing, so picked up a camera and thought, "this feels like a good place to start" in terms of keeping my creativity going, and fell into the world of burlesque. The glitter, the sparkle, it drew me in like a magpie. And, yeah, I absolutely fell in love with it.

So I spent the first ten years of my career traveling the world, photographing burlesquers and the legends of the stage. I went to see Miss Exotic World in Las Vegas, which was such an experience.

So, yeah, so the first ten years were predominantly photographing the stage in theatre's and performers. And people then started coming to me saying, "I love how you're documenting this. I would love to do that, but I'm not a model, I'm not a performer. Could you help me feel that way about my body?" And so the, the boudoir side of everything kind of fell into place there as well.

And then when: 2020

Lena Robinson: 00:04:35

So I'm not surprised because so many people have, let's be honest, have the most uninspiring, boring photography that you can ever imagine on any of their biographies or on their LinkedIns or anything. So, yeah, I can imagine that was pretty popular.

Tigz Rice: 00:04:53

Yeah. I often describe them as the corporate mugshot, as like, the forced headshot that they make you have when you join a company.

So, yeah, I'm on a mission to.Change that because some of them are just horrendous. And you sit there going, why would.You put that up?

Lena Robinson: 00:05:06

I mean, you can understand why a lot of people end up putting up...which I know it doesn't really work, but they end up putting up, like, holiday snaps and things like that, because it's like the alternative is just, like, bland.

Tigz Rice: 00:05:18

Yeah, yeah. Plain white walls in the office by the...by the big desk, sort of trying to get that little bit of plain white wall to shoot on.

So, yeah, yeah, Wherever I can remove one of those with something else sort of you know, really makes you shine and shows your personality in a photo. That's what I love doing.

Lena Robinson: 00:05:37

I think that's a really beautiful thing to be able to do.

Which leads us on to what would be really interesting to find out from you is obviously we're here to talk about Creatives WithAI, and the AI and its impact on, rom your perspective, are you using it yourself at the moment?

Tigz Rice: 00:05:57

Yeah, it filters in. I think it's been filtering in naturally, slowly over the years anyway.

I've been a long, long time Adobe Photoshop user and I remember when, I think it was just when I was in my last year of University and they bought in like some of the content awareness features in terms of like fill and heal and so yeah, especially in terms of removing wires from photos or removing people from backgrounds, I'm definitely leaning in and using sort of the AI generation features there played around a bit in Midjourney. So 'text to image' creation and the odd, the odd bit of ChatGPT.

I have to admit I'm not a huge user of it, but I think it's just filtering slowly and into our lives anyway.

So yeah, some, at some points I have been like, "yes, let's try this brand new thing" and others it's like, "let's see how this actually sits with my workflow".

Lena Robinson: 00:06:57

And how do you think that it's impacting on the industry as a whole? What's your sort of viewpoint on...particularly around the photography that you're doing? Like what's, what's, what are you seeing?

What's your view on, on that at the moment?

Tigz Rice: 00:07:16

I think it's a really interesting time for photography for many, many years and maybe not so much recently. But, if you go back into like many decades ago, photography was seen as..."it was proof". A lot of people said "if it exists in a photo it's real".

And I think also to some extent we still have that because there's that phrase pixel. "It didn't happen". And so back in the day we were like, photographers were considered a 'reliable source, a trusted source'.

So you know, that's, if you look at, when you sign forms you can see that photographers are actually listed in there with legal professionals and teachers and people of high rankings. So it's been really interesting watching that shift over the last few years. As you know, editing, retouching are becoming more predominant.

We're, we're more aware of it as well. Not to say it didn't ever exist. People retouched in the dark room.

So I think there's been a real interesting shift that people are less likely to believe the contents of a photo now. We're more likely to be questioning the reality of photos.

And with generative like 'text to image' generation, I think it is opening up this world of creativity. I do not think AI is completely there yet. We're still ending up with six fingers or, you know, some random things going on there.

So on one hand it's opening up that maybe photos aren't the be all and end all of trust anymore.

But then I also think there's this, I feel like there's going to be a split at some point between the AI content generation of creativity, but then this amazing space, especially in the world of empowerment and boudoir, potentially of honest documentation. And so it's going to be interesting.

I feel like there will eventually be a split where both will exist, both will have a place and who knows, who knows how that's going to ride out. But it's an interesting time for photography. For sure.

Lena Robinson: 00:09:19

It is an interesting time. I mean, what's your thoughts on...because obviously a lot of the work that you're doing is, is about giving women in particular belief in themselves an honesty and truth, truthful kind of courage and self belief and confidence. You know, we know that a lot of women do suffer for not having enough confidence. Not just women, loads of people I think.

So where do you think the...is it's going to go with, to your point between the truthful confidence and making somebody look like.

You know, we know for photography for a long time has had an, there's been an issue around making something look perfect, whatever the hell perfect is. What's your sort of view on where AI should or shouldn't sit? Or do you have a view on that with regards to the confidence and the truth and things?

Tigz Rice: 00:10:21

I think that everyone should have a personal choice on how they want to be seen and for some people, and I'm already kind of seeing the split in the industry between there's the highly polished, highly edited, the glamour filters, even in selfies and you know what, like I like a filter occasionally if I'm really tired, I will absolutely put a filter over it. So, you know, but I...I think there needs to be choice and I believe both should exist so that people feel comfortable in saying this.

Whether it's, "I want to be the most authentic, natural version of myself and I would love for my cellulite and my rolls to be in the picture and just leave me as my perfectly imperfect self", but there is also a place for "I want to be the fantasy version of me that I've always wanted to be", and both are so valid and so important. So both should exist.

Personally, when I photograph, I tend to lean more towards the authentic, unfiltered side of things, especially when I show clients their photos.

I want them to be able to see the beauty in them before the retouching takes place and then have that discussion on how they want those final images to look. But yeah, both are so valid and I think it's important for us that we have both so that people have that choice.

Lena Robinson: 00:11:43

Yeah, I think...I hadn't really thought about it from a choice perspective, but I think that is quite important.

And we all need to feel comfortable in how we are presenting ourselves, whether it be in, and we obviously will share Tigz different links to go and see her work because it's extraordinary. But you've got that two sides. You've got the, the boudoir personal side of things, but also the business side of things.

And, and some people, that's quite a different version of self as well, which I think is quite an interesting area that you're kind of stepping across the two different personal and, and business. Because I think a lot of people do, do a separation. Yet it's not an un...Iit's not an untruthful, it's just a different facet of themselves, isn't it?

Tigz Rice: 00:12:32

I think, I think we show up, some of us may have different versions of ourselves that we choose to bring into different spaces, and especially neurodivergent people as well, who may find that they need to mask in specific scenarios to help them. You know, there is so many reasons that we might show up or only bring portions of ourselves. Whether that's, you know, even me as an online person.

And I mean, I don't want to speak on your behalf, but perhaps you as well, you know, as a, as a person who exists predominantly in the online space, there are, there are facets of me that I'm like, those are off limit for people on the Internet. They're things I keep for my inner circle.

And so, you know, there are safety reasons why we might not show up as our full, our full embodied self as well.So yeah, it's important to cater for that and say, "hey, how do you want to be seen by your loved ones or perhaps a significant lover" if you're sending photos to them versus "how do I want my boss to see me on a Monday meeting at 9:30 in the morning"? Probably not the same version of you but it's not to say that both aren't real, just that we have these different facets that we have to split to maintain a certain social responsibility.

Lena Robinson: 00:13:51

No, that's true actually. I mean, it brings me to an interesting point because the, the facets brings me to the point around creativity and what creativity actually is.

So when you've got it in relation to AI, like how do you describe creativity and then how do you then relate that to the world of AI?

Tigz Rice: 00:14:14

Creativity for me, I think is the ability to express ideas and imagination.

And so for me, creativity could be, I think that encompasses writing, drawing, music, photography, anything that takes something that is intangibly in here, whether that's a thought or idea or perception of the world and makes it something that other people can see experience here. So yeah, in terms of creativity, that's how I would describe it. And I cannot remember the second part of this question.

Lena Robinson: 00:14:47

With your description of creativity, how are you then relating that to how AI fits into the world of creativity from your perspective, whether it be photography or what you're other things that you're doing?

Tigz Rice: 00:15:05

Yeah, so I think the really interesting thing about AI is that it's giving people more tools, or access to tools that you might not have had before. So I, for example, absolutely love music. I have very little skill. I mean I did play some instruments at school, but I wouldn't know how to start with it, but having the ability.

One of the tools that I use in my video process is Epidemic Sound and it's got this AI feature in there to say how long you want it to be and it can actually take the beats of these royalty-free music tracks and then say, okay, well I need it to fit to this and it's something that I wouldn't have been able to do in the same way I've been playing around with Adobe. They, they have incredible tools out there for 'text to image' as well. So there's a feature in there and it's called 'paper'.So it's one of the boxes you can tick and you can choose to make sort of illustrations.And I just, I've always loved Illustrator as a tool, but I've just never had maybe the patience to sit down and learn it and learn about all the textures and everything else. And so I can create work in this paper style that I absolutely love that I would just never have had the...I would never.

Well, I don't want to say never because I probably would at some point if I had the time, sit there and do it, but I Have the ability to express myself in ways that I haven't had the chance to, or don't have the skills or time or money to invest in the resources to do and at least try it out and see if I might like that.

And I feel the same for maybe disabled artists as well, who maybe don't have the, you know, if we're talking, like, maybe doesn't have fine motor skills or has always wanted to create something. It's the ability to take that intangible thing from your head and go, okay, I would like to create.

So instead of being...having to make it, for example, with your own hands, having the ability to describe the words that you...or describe how it is in your head, into maybe 'voice to text', to then generate image, being able to say, "okay, well, these are the ideas I have and create". So the creative process is still there. It's just giving more, us more access to things we wouldn't necessarily have had access to in the past, and that's really exciting.

Lena Robinson: 00:17:40

It is really exciting. It's an interesting point because I was at an event a couple of years ago and they were...that they'd gathered us all together to sort of contribute to a white paper on AI. And I was asked that question about, like, "where do I see one of the best uses of AI"? and because I was just getting The FTSQ Gallery up on its feet at that point, I was really thinking about the artists I had.

I had an artist that had been working with somebody with multiple sclerosis, on a way of doing, had been an artist, but had had to stop it because of the disease and had helped that person.

And then I thought, "well, what if AI was capable of helping somebody who had had those visions, was an artist, either had been in the past or had always wanted to be, but to your point, hadn't been able to physically". Like, that's an amazing tool to be able to utilise, to your point. And I think this has come up as a discussion on the show before as well, about "it's the vision, the tool is just the, you know, AI is just the tool that enables the vision".

And it was like, oh, wow, that's opening up a whole new world for people that have potentially been sad and frustrated because of some kind of physical disability, whether it be an accident, or something that's developed, or something that they've always had, to then be able to create the thing that was always in their head, I think that's beautiful.

Tigz Rice: 00:19:10

Me too.

Lena Robinson: 00:19:11

That's really cool.

Tigz Rice: 00:19:12

The art is the concepts, Yeah, I mean, sure. I mean you can argue with painting, it's also the brushstrokes and it's the personal touch, but I think it's the being able to get that idea, that concept down, and express it, that is the important part of what makes art, art.

Lena Robinson: 00:19:31

Yeah, and I think a previous conversation I had with one of the other people, so it's Michael Cawley and he was, he's a UX designer and he was talking about the, the onslaught, what he called the onslaught of AI and the worry that the blandness that's going to happen. And I said one of the things that we ended up talking about though was again it's, it's the tool versus the vision.

And I said though the trick, the truly creative minds will still create extraordinary art and creative output. I'm in that from that perspective, I'm not worried. Are you worried?

Tigz Rice: 00:20:10

I think, I think you could describe this as, you know, we've been through this so many times in the creative world already. You could argue that when DSLRs started having auto features and then started doing your focus and depth of field and your shutter speed for you, that that was, that made it easier. Or the invention of smartphones with cameras and then suddenly everyone has a camera and everyone is a photographer.

But you know, yes, there is an onslaught of mass production, but it is that creative. It's the people doing it differently.

So yes, it will be, there will be more access to photography, art generated content, but the people who are the visionaries, the people that matter, are still going to be able to make their mark.

Lena Robinson: 00:20:57

Well, I'm assuming then from that perspective you're not particularly worried about the future of your business and career.

Tigz Rice: 00:21:06

From that perspective, I mean, I can't stop it so I'm not going to lose sleep overnight anyway, these things, these things are going to happen. So. But no, I think every creative pathway is going to be challenged. You know, writing is having its moment with generative.

I mean I'm going to use the example ChatGPT. I know other ones exist, but you know, writing has the ChatGPT issues. Photographers have the 'text to image' generators. Musicians have had their day. I mean remember what happened with music, and then the whole like Spotify, Apple music, not buying CDs anymore. I mean, but that's gone full circle. People are buying vinyls. We've gone all the way around. I have a vinyl player. Love it by the way.

Lena Robinson: 00:21:59

I've always owned a vinyl player. I still do and I've always owned vinyl. I think it's amazing. So yeah, with you on there but...

Tigz Rice: 00:22:06

Like things go full circle. I mean if music can go. Music has gone from vinyls to, I mean we had tapes, we had CDs, we had mini discs, I mean they were short lived, but...and then we've had iPods, and we've gone through streaming services, and now people are actively choosing to go back to technology that existed, gosh, 60, 70 years ago in fact probably even longer. But yeah, I'm like thinking of the heyday of records but music has like, it's done the full circle so you know everything.

It's worth exploring the technology. But at the end of the day things either move on for good or they were, they roll around again.

Lena Robinson: 00:22:51

Yeah. My prediction based on what you've just said, very similar is I think we've seen so many patterns.We saw it with social media, we saw it with photography, we saw, you know, to your point, there's so many and it tends to be the same pattern over and over again. So I'm with you on the, the fact that I think it will, it will settle in and then it will, to your point, become just the norm for things of how it's used.

But I do still think that the extraordinary bit, which is the human mind, which challenges what exists anyway as opposed to, you know, anything to do with AI and LLMs and so forth, which is looking back at data to create forward. I think humans do the "forget what's happened, let's do something completely bonkers and different" which is what makes humans so bloody amazing.

It brings me to a good point then around a bit more of a newsy thing which is around copyright because we know that there's conversations in the zeitgeist at the moment on articles and different things with likes of Paul McCartney and different music people and artists and so forth, worried about copyright. And I would imagine that's something you've thought quite a bit about and have a view on.

What is your view with regards to copyright and AI or just copyright in general?

Tigz Rice: 00:24:13

It does.

Copyright does worry me in terms of a lot of the programs that we're using for AI, especially ones that have been around for a while don't necessarily have training on ethical sources. I know that when the lion, when that first came out, there was a website that you could go on and you could check if your work had ended up on there.

And so my book cover has ended up in there quite a few times and also I do a lot of work for the Underpinnings Museum. It's a free resource all about underwear through the ages.So we've got things dating back hundreds of years, and a lot of that work, for some reason, has ended up in there as well.

So if you're potentially trying to create anything in AI based on historical undergarments, it's likely training it on some of the work that I have produced. And I've never given permission for my work to be in any of these. So, you know, again, I'm not losing sleep over it. I don't really know.

I could probably fight a little bit harder against it. I've chosen not to, like, you know. But, yeah, unfortunately, not everything that we're training on, or AI is being trained on, has all of the right permissions. And I don't know how we fix that at this point because I'm not sure that people want to go back and start training these AI systems again.

Lena Robinson: 00:25:57

Or taking in even maybe. I don't know.

Tigz Rice: 00:26:00

Yeah. And so I'm aware that if my work is in there, who else's work is in there? Who am I inadvertently copying or taking ideas from without...without intent?

I don't think anyone's doing this with intent. But, yeah, it's a. It's a tough one. And so, yeah, the ethicalness of...the ethicalness of it is questionable, but I think if we had the ability to do it with the full permission of the artists putting their work in or the training materials, that would be a very different story.

Lena Robinson: 00:26:40

It does seem to be...it's around position, permission and credit where credit's due. It's also something that I've been thinking a lot about is, you know, I love art history, and if you look back at art history, the whole reason different movements happen, like Cubism or Dadaism or what have you, was because there'd be a group of people that would be bouncing off each other and inspiring each other, which has always brought me to the thought...and it's something that whizzes around in my head a lot, is "what's the difference at this point between inspiration and copying"?

And it's not something I've come down with an answer yet, because it's hard to tell. Like, is the...is the learning side of the AI taking...using it as inspiration, possibly, or is it copying? I don't know. What's your...do you have a view on that? Copying versus inspiration.

Tigz Rice: 00:27:38

d Patents Act, I believe it's: 1998

[NB - we checked and the Act is actually dated 1988 and there's a link in the show notes for you to review].

And it talks about the amount, it talks about copying versus, you know, we're talking plagiarism and basically copyright in general, and I believe the infringement comes in at like 10%. I think it's actually really, really small. Don't quote me on this. Please go read it.

[NB - we checked it, the 10% is actually an industry fallacy - read the Act, there's a link in the show notes for you to review].

Lena Robinson: 00:28:12

If it. We'll find it. We'll stick it in the notes, everybody. We'll find the link. You go read it.

Tigz Rice: 00:28:18

But I believe, especially when I was at Uni and the conversation of copyright versus inspiration came up quite a lot, and I believe it's like a. There is like a 10% ish threshold that people use when they're talking about the difference between inspiration and plagiarism, and, yeah, so it's a really interesting line there in terms of...but how, you know, is it that it's recognisable? Because I've seen pictures go up where artists have used my work, and I can, I recognise the photo that they've used of mine. That is the premise of the artwork that they've used now to be.

Most of them will at least send me a copy of it and say, "hey, by the way...", or tag me in something. And, you know, it's nice to see artwork. It's nice to see it. It's nice to know that it's inspiring other work. But yeah, if...if the original artist can see the photo, their photo in the artwork, you know, where is that? Because that would then be my pose, my composition, my lighting. So I guess it depends on. Yeah. So where. Where is the 10%?

Is it, that it was the photograph, or is it the composition, the lighting, and the pose? But then also is it mine or is it the person who did the pose, like, who directed the shot? So it's a whole little whirlwind of everything.

So, yeah, I don't know that there is. If this figure of 10% that I kind of went through Uni feeling was that the one. It's very hard to really define what it is.

And really, I think it comes down to opinion.

Lena Robinson: 00:30:00

Yeah. I mean, I'm assuming there'll be lawyers out there that will go, well, it's not opinion, it's law. But like, to your point, like, how do you...how do you define. Determine it? Define it? It's a difficult one. The 10%, interestingly enough, is higher than I thought it would be. I thought it'd be lower.

Tigz Rice: 00:30:19

You know what? I'm gonna. I'm gonna fact check myself after this as well and double check it. But it's not that high.

I remember it being not that high like I think or that might have been like the safe...the safe figure that it was sort of mentioned to me at the time. But yeah, and I'm not sure if it's written into that. But one of the...a really interesting case. I mean it's not AI based but it was a graffiti artist. There was a graffiti artist in the US that did a big mural based off a photo and the photo was recognisable in the graffiti art. And so that became a really big case, the I believe the photographer won. I will try and find that case for you. So we can link that down below.

But that's a really good example of like recognising. Yeah, but then if we're using, you know, we're not necessarily using from small batch sources anymore,we're using entirely trained AI systems with, you know, where are we, are we going to find the thing that it's been trained on?

Lena Robinson: 00:31:25

The more Google image search.

Tigz Rice: 00:31:30

Maybe the reverse image search...Yeah...and also content credentials is now becoming a thing as well, isn't it? So perhaps it will also make things easier to track down.

Although at the moment I'm noticing that if, if you put content credentials into images, they can also be wiped by social media uploading. So it's not necessarily in there for good. Like some...like sometimes it is getting stripped.

The same with all of our EXIF data and metadata sometimes when we put things online. So...

Lena Robinson: 00:32:02

Oh yeah, depending on how you put it up.

Like I've noticed that if you put it up through a third party uploading rather than putting it onto the social or what have you, everything, the meta can completely change.

So yeah, or you put an image into Canva and then you back download it again because you've, you've put a line on it or something and it will completely change the meta. So yeah, no that's, that's true. So you know, that...that's the sort of the 'here and now' looking into the immediate future then.

So, we're looking at sort of like three to five years out. You've been in the industry long enough and you've been around technology with regards to your creativity for a long time.

Like in the next three to five years, how do you see AI shaping the creative world? Like, you know, it's in its infancy at the moment, it's quickly evolving.

Like how are you and your peers anticipating sort of adjusting to all the changes in the next three to five years? What does three to five years even look like for you?

Tigz Rice: 00:33:00

I think it's really even hard because of the speed that everything is going at. It's really hard to know what three to five years might look like. My hope is that I am actually really loving that we've got AI retouching tools.

So being able to especially sort of with Photoshop and even now in Lightroom, like content generation, text to image generate or text to retouching generation, I suppose for me.

So Photoshop specifically, being able to get those wires and things out, if they can bring in more stuff like that for me, that'd be great because it's gonna cut my editing time down significantly. So in some ways I'm so excited to embrace the tools that are coming.

I'm also, I think for me excited that things like Adobe also have extend video so that you can add clips to the beginning and end. So if you haven't shot things.

And as someone who's really just sort of finding her feet in the video world as well, knowing that I've got some tools to help me if I don't quite get the shot, you know, really excites me and it, it's making things more accessible for me to learn.

I think the worry though is, are we using these tools for good and are they going into the right hands and how are we moderating, I think is the word I'm looking for. How are we moderating the content we're putting out into the world with these tools?

Lena Robinson: 00:34:37

I think that's a...an interesting question. I haven't talked to anybody yet that seems to have the answer at the moment or anything that I've understood anyway.

The, I guess like most technology, like there's always that, like it can be used for good or it cannot be used for good. You know, it can be used for bad. We've seen that a lot.

Unfortunately, human beings are what they are and I guess the only way that, that can be somewhat addressed is through law and you know, setting. You know, it's happened with social media, although that's still, still, I think a little bit cowboyish.

But compared to where it was, you know, you and I are both old enough to know what it was like when it first got introduced and it was like, you know, it was like the wild west. Now that's not as bad as it was for sure.

There's still needing to be catch up because people are still these organisations still dealing with paper and so forth, which is just extraordinary. But I do think, yeah, I think law is going to have to come into it to a certain degree, I think.

Ethics, you know, I do some, I do some work with the World Ethical Data Foundation.

So I know there's definitely organisations out there that are working hard to ensure that technical areas, including AI, that, that it's in, in human rights and things are being protected ethically. But I do think that there's. Yeah, there's a long way to go, I think.

Tigz Rice: 00:36:17

Yeah. And I think, I think that's really, you know, if we're looking at the future of it, I think the tools that we are creating are wonderful.

I think the real issue we're going to have is moderation of what it's being used for and whether it's being used for good or not so good. But yeah, the human mind works in mysterious ways sometimes and, you know, wonderfully.

Lena Robinson: 00:36:44

And not so wonderfully.

Tigz Rice: 00:36:47

So, yeah, I think that's my biggest concern moving forward is just the ethicalness of how we're choosing to use these tools because we're now in a world where things, things don't go away. If you put it out, you put it online, it's there.

And I think it's that remembering and educating the younger generations that the things that we're creating, saying, doing, using text to generate and create are just, you know, you cannot get rid of them from, for, and, you know, even if you're creating things for good and you think it's good and it hasn't quite gone the way that you want, like maybe your intentions will misalign slightly or it got taken out of context. Like, it's still there, it's still, it's still going to be there forever. So.

Yeah, in a...in a world of increasing content generation, I think it's just the education around using that mindfully and respectfully.

Lena Robinson: 00:37:45

Yeah. Are you, have you ever been. And I didn't preempt this question, by the way, so I'm throwing a curveball at you...have you ever been involved in anything to do with the education side of whether it be mentoring or helping younger people with anything to do with the work that you're doing, creativity or anything that's something you might, might be interested in doing in the future?

Tigz Rice: 00:38:10

Well, for a very, very short time. When I graduated, I did actually teach GCSE and A level graphic design, so I have done some work within education.

I normally find, because the work I do within the boudoir scene is sort of, well, it's adult content. Regardless of how you see it, it is for over 18, so my involvement within the education system has been somewhat limited because of the choices I have made with my career. So I'm very open to it and I do offer mentoring for, say, other photographers, but generally speaking, the education system, and I completely understand it, I'm not always the perfect fit or the perfect role model, so I do what I can.

Lena Robinson: 00:38:59

It's an interesting one. I've just...Education, I think, seems to be coming up quite a lot. So I'm just looking at my notes.

Education seems to be coming up as a topic of conversation where that's where I think we're going to get it right, is educating well and that and education can be at all levels. You know, I'm still getting educated and I'm...I just turned 52 last week.

You know, I think that, that there's a whole group of people older than me even that are going to need, you know, if they don't want to be left behind, they're going to have to be educated. So, yeah, it's an interesting area because I do think that that's where we'll make. I think humanity will. If we're going to get it right, it's going to be through education. Because I think there's a lot of fear at the moment through a lack of education around AI.

Tigz Rice: 00:39:48

I think it's the unknown power of what we're creating and it's, you know, I mean, change is scary. All change is scary. So, yeah, we have, we have some very fast moving, fast evolving technology in our hands.

Like it's one of the fastest growing technology periods that we've been through.

Lena Robinson: 00:40:08

And it is.

Tigz Rice: 00:40:09

Yeah. Life may not even look the same in five years.

Yeah, I constantly think we're getting closer to that, you know, in Wall.E, when they all end up on the spaceship and like everything is touched to go and our chairs just move around for us. Like even ten years ago, however long that film came out, it just felt so wild that that might be the thing.

looks at the future and like: 2030

Lena Robinson: 00:40:48

They've tried to have those, like from Back to the Future, they've tried to have those floating hoverboards. Yeah, I bet you somewhere there's some scientific geeky person, I'm using it in the nicest way, created a lightsaber.

I bet you there's somebody that's created one somewhere.

Tigz Rice: 00:41:05

I would love for that to exist. You know, we, we can never. That was what was predicted that we'd be like around now.

And I mean it looks very different and I don't think, I don't know, I mean I think we predicted self-talking machines or like, you know, fridges that can order food for you. I feel like those were things that we kind of expected to happen.

I saw, actually, I saw a clip, it was going viral on TikTok the other day of a guy that had just got out of prison. Um, and he was trying, he was shouting like Coca Cola into the machine, expecting it to do it for us. But I mean that's not necessarily wrong. Right?

Like so, you know, and I've got, you've got your...I mean, I'm not going to say it because there's one sat next to me, but our machines that we can talk to and say, "hey, add this to my shopping list" or whatever. So, you know, it's not unreasonable.

Lena Robinson: 00:41:59

Do you know what? I've seen that a lot on movies and things where people have been in prison for like, you know, 30, 40 years kind of thing, and they come out like the world must be mad compared to when they went in. You know, like it just, it would be like you've gone, you've jumped forward in time. I mean it must be crackers. I mean, I guess I see things on

TV, but there's nothing like experiencing like, you know, having a, having a machine.

To your point that you, you know, my, my lodger comes in and she, she doesn't turn the lights on, she just tells it to turn the fairy lights on and like there's no, you know what I mean? Like there's so many things and to your point, you know, the ordering of food through your fridges and r it automatically puts the list together because it's noticed that you haven't got enough, you know, cheese or milk or whatever. Like the world that they must be coming out into, oh my goodness, must be absolute bonkers.

Tigz Rice: 00:42:58

I mean, try speaking to yourself like 20 years ago, like trying to, I can imagine trying to have a conversation with teenage me who had just had a mobile phone and at that point you could only send ten text messages a day. Ten. That was it. That's all you were allowed to send.

And now I've been explaining to that 15 year old that okay, well now I have a phone that my friends can send me 10 different WhatsApp messages a minute and my emails ping every five seconds and I'm so contactable and that 15 year old mine would have been...

Lena Robinson: 00:43:29

Like, no, well, try being my age. And when I was 15, there wasn't even mobile phones. There was...I remember being at school and the Xerox machine had a thing that you wound really, that is how old I am. But oh my God, here's the thing. I know, right? But here's the thing is that we've adapted. Like, I've adapted.

Like I'm, you know, doing stuff on my phone and I'm doing stuff on my iPad. And like at the moment, here I've got my phone with some notes on, I've got my iPad, I'm talking to you, recording this.

And there's people my age that I know that are getting left behind, but there is also a whole lot of people like me. And I think it's probably because I've been in the, in the tech and creative world for a long time...like, I'm curious and I think something you brought up before, which I think is really key. You sound like you are happy to play with different things and I think that self education is being driven by that playfulness and that willing to give something a go, right?

Tigz Rice: 00:44:34

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's. It's literally all about. It's about the play and not everything's right for all of us. You know, I've picked up tools. I...I'll be honest, I just don't understand ChatGPT. I mean, I do. People show me great things that it does. And one of my friends, Scott, sends me things like, "look what I did on ChatGPT".

He's done these like deep dives, the whole marketing, branding things. My brain does not think that way. I don't think to put words into something and get blocks of text out of it.

But you give me a 'text to image' generator and I'm like, okay, Well I want 69 and I want it cinematic and I want these undertones and I want this kind of color palette. And so it's finding the ones that work for you.

Lena Robinson: 00:45:19

Yeah, no, I agree. And I think there is, you know, like the idea, like I know what Midjourney does. I think it's amazing. If I was to go in there, I'd be lost.

I wouldn't even know where to start. Interestingly enough, the secret that I found about ChatGPT, and I think cause of the world you originally were...and you'll get this...I brief it like I'm briefing a creative. I talk to it and I write what I need exactly the way I brief an old school creative or not even old school, just any kind of creative brief.

And I think because I've taken that approach with it and I think about, you know, I'll load an audience and I'll load in, you know, maybe a methodology or tool that I've created in my previous, you know, consultancy world and I'll load all these things up and say "based on all of this and based on what you remember, I've already done on this thing before and he's here's different places you should look and put in some things". I literally treat it like I'm creative and 99% of the time it will come out with what I've asked.

But it comes down to that ability to know how to brief, right?

And I think because I've taken that approach to it, but that if I went into Midjourney, I bet you if I tried that it probably would, probably wouldn't work, I wouldn't think. But I don't know. I do need to go into try, you know, to your point, playing a bit more with different things.

But yeah, you're right, I think there are different tools for different things, different activities. I mean I use it quite a lot for just the research. Like I love research.

But I also know for me to do a proper deep dive into a company that I might need to do some research on, it will take me two or three days. Even though I've got a form that I use for myself and a format and a way of doing things, doing desk research would take me days and days. It's micro seconds. I load in the company, I load in my form that I've always used to get the information because I know I want a certain amount of information.

It comes back in seconds. Like it's a combo of me and it anyway.

So that's kind of three to five years out...way into the future. I was going to ask "where do you think it will go?" But actually I'm going to ask it in a slightly different way.

"Where do you hope creativity and AI, in relation to the world that you're working and living in, looks like in 5 to 10 years time, what would you hope it's gonna look like?

So you're looking at the impact and where you think sort of new, you know, create the new creatives, for example, that are coming up through the ranks. Like compared, what's that going to look like in 5 to 10 years time or beyond, do you think or do you hope?

Tigz Rice: 00:48:06

What I hope it looks like is making creativity more accessible. To people again. I feel like creativity for a long time has been...There has been a financial block on people getting into certain creative arts, whether that's instruments and not being able to afford those. Maybe it's tools. I mean, cameras aren't cheap. We're talking thousands of pounds for, like, basic stuff these days. And so what I would hope is that partly the education side of things is taught more in schools again, but also I know that creative subjects are falling off the curriculum in favoUr of STEM.

And so what I would love to see is that it makes it more accessible for young people specifically to be able to explore creatively and give them that little spark of passion that goes, I could do something with this. Because it worries me that we're not bringing that through schools anymore.

In the same way that someone like me who did art and graphics and design technology, and very much, Well, I mean, if it came under creativity or romance languages, I was there. Have that now because we're focusing so much.

And don't get me wrong, STEM is also so vitally important, But for those who have that creativity and that spark within them that just needs a tool, we should be giving them access to these programs so that they can find that. And because the end of the day, when everything goes, We saw it through lockdown, the thing that when it comes down to basic human need is creativity.

We need artists, we need new musicians, we need joy in our lives. And so my hope is that we are empowering the next generation to go beyond even what we have and explore.

Lena Robinson: 00:50:06

I think the exploratory thing is really interesting. And you're right. Like when you think back at what we all leaned into during the pandemic, which put a spotlight on humanity, was we all leaned into other things we'd done in the past. So I, I picked up...Re-picked up photography. I re-picked up my knitting. People got back into baking or started baking or creating things.

And I think, yeah, you're right. Those...those areas of joy. like, I think what they're getting wrong with the STEM thing is it's an either or. And it shouldn't be. Like, when you look back at when in history of when have been the best times, it's when those two things together. You know, Da Vinci is a prime example of a person that would, in this day and age, would have been STEM and art creativity together.

Like, he was extraordinary for that. And I think to your point, one of the things that I know, I was talking to an artist friend of mine, Anna...shout out to Anna Cowie one of my artists, she is from New Zealand and she was looking at...she's got a young son here in the UK, but she's understood that in New Zealand they're actually calling it STEAM. So the Art is being put into it.

And I know she had, I think, ex-tutors and things from her day at art colleges back in New Zealand coming over and trying to tell people about that. And I think, you know, you can't, like, if we were to lose all our...and this is one of the things I desperately hope doesn't happen...we know if we were to lose all our beautiful libraries or our art galleries or museums or any of those things or, or, you know, concert halls or, you know, we know that when we didn't have the ability to go and see a concert or go see something, you know, a piece of music being played or, or going to the art galleries, we were all finding it really difficult, you know.

So, yeah, I think that's a, that's a very good, good thing, you know, that I think we need to be tapping more into, is that making sure that the young ones coming up through don't forget that bit of it. Yeah, yeah, no, that's so true. Well, look, it's been an absolutely lovely chat. I've learned some things. It's made me think about some things as well.

I think AI, to your point is something that we should need, not need, we should be playing with, not be afraid of, but also be mindful of the ethical side of it. I'm really excited to see what you continue to do.

If you've got any projects that you're working on at the moment or coming up that you're sort of the next steps for you. What's coming up for you?

Tigz Rice: 00:53:07

I have got quite a few workshops coming up, photography ones. Nothing with AI in, unfortunately. Unless you, unless you count the things that are in the cameras, I don't worry.

Yeah, so I've got some, I've got some of those coming up. I'm also working on a course at the moment as well. So, yeah, it got bits and pieces.

Lena Robinson: 00:53:26

You are educating.

Tigz Rice: 00:53:28

Yeah, yeah, I'm working on...I'm working on one about posing and sort of self...self posing. So how to feel more confident for yourself in front of the camera. So that's, that's in the...in the works and then, yeah, just playing, playing with things, keeping curious and seeing where, seeing where things go.

Lena Robinson: 00:53:49

I suppose because you travel the world quite a bit. I know over sort of the December, January time, I think it was, you went to Japan and you've...you do lots of other things. So, I'm definitely looking forward to seeing if you've got any more of those kind of projects coming up this year or next year.

Tigz Rice: 00:54:08

I have. I still actually have all of my content from Japan. I have not edited any of it, so we've got lots of that. I actually. I went to the TokyoLabs.

I absolutely love them. They're. Have you ever heard of them?

Lena Robinson: 00:54:25

All right.

Tigz Rice: 00:54:26

They're giant art installations, interactive art installations, so huge rooms. This one in particular that I went to had giant light bulbs hanging from the ceiling so you could kind of walk around and sort of have that experiential play. So I've got a couple of bits that I've shot, like self portraits in there. Did a photo shoot with a geisha, so I still have to edit those.

I can't believe I've not done it yet. I've got a couple of trips. I was in Prague just before that as well, so I've got some...have a project that I call 'Door of the Day' and I go around taking photos of really interesting doors. So I've got loads and loads of doors to do. But yeah, a couple of trips planned this year. Prague again, actually. Absolutely love that city.

And then, yeah, future trips to Japan in the mix, but nothing soon.

Lena Robinson: 00:55:16

So, yeah, it's on my bucket list. Japan, because it's a place of...from a cultural perspective, maybe not so. Although I still want to go and see the city of Tokyo. But I'm...I've definitely been...maybe it's because I remember watching the original Shogun and things like that, but I def. I desperately want to go to the countryside and experience villages and things. I think an extraordinary country with an extraordinary culture and history, you know, its contribution to the world is massive.

Tigz Rice: 00:55:48

Continues to be an amazing city, but yeah, it's that. So I've been learning Japanese now for four years.So, when I go out there, I can sort of talk my way off the beaten track and sort of get more of these sort of countryside Edo period experiences. So, yeah, yeah, absolutely do it. Even if you've just got a few words. Totally worth doing.

Lena Robinson: 00:56:09

Excellent. Excellent. Well, look, I want to say thank you very much for coming on. It was well worth the wait. I knew it would be.

I really appreciate the time that you've given us today and I'm looking forward to seeing what you continue to do in the future. I think it's.

Yeah, it's cool to talk to somebody that's doing what you're doing with photography in a very different way, just generally, but just also to see how you utilise the AI to give you. Maybe it's just freeing you up time, if anything, you know, to help you with stuff.

Tigz Rice: 00:56:42

Yeah.

Lena Robinson: 00:56:43

Yep. So that's good. Well, look, thank you very much for coming on today.

Thank you, listeners, for listening to both of us have a chat and make sure as what Tigz has been doing and what I continue to do is go out there and continue to be curious when it comes to creativity and AI. See you later.

Tigz Rice: 00:56:58

See you later.