Animators face pressure to use AI tools that devalue their creative process

Professional animators are grappling with how to navigate generative AI tools that clients increasingly expect them to use, even when the technology often fails to deliver the quality or efficiency promised. The debate reflects broader tensions in creative industries about whether AI represents a useful new tool or a threat to artistic labor and process.

What you should know: Many animators report that AI has already reshaped their commercial workflows, typically in ways that reduce their pay and creative input.

• Clients now arrive with AI-generated mood boards and reference images, asking skilled professionals to replicate these rather than draw on their creative expertise.
• Expectations have shifted dramatically, with clients expecting animators to work at the speed of AI tools like ChatGPT or Sora.
• Some clients explicitly request AI use, while others create impossibly tight deadlines that implicitly pressure artists to adopt the technology.

The real-world impact: Commercial animators describe concrete ways AI pressure affects their work and income.

• “It feels like AI is teaching them that this stuff can be generated really quickly, but it can’t,” said animator Sam Mason, who has worked with major clients like Coca Cola and Toyota. “They still, at this point, can’t get the AI to do a finished result. But what it does is devalue the whole process by creating this expectation that an artist can create an infinite amount of possibilities in a short amount of time.”
• One animator “faked” using AI on a project, completing work traditionally while telling the client he had used generators, because it was the only way to meet expectations.
• Another had his budget cut when he insisted on using traditional processes instead of AI.

Why artists resist: Beyond practical limitations, many animators describe an emotional disconnect when using AI tools.

• The technology doesn’t yet work well enough for professional standards.
• Constant updates and new tools create exhausting pressure to keep up.
• Most importantly, artists report feeling “haunted” or “emptied out” when using AI, tied to the loss of creative process.

The ethical dilemma: Industry experts point to fundamental problems with how AI tools were developed and deployed.

• Most image and video generators were trained on billions of images scraped without creator permission.
• “The most ethical and practical solution is to train models on your own work,” said animator Saad Mosajee, who has created work for Apple and other commercial clients. “Unfortunately, accountability in terms of data sets and training models is not something that’s gained traction, but I find that to be really unfair and a bit oppressive because a lot of these people never consented to their work going into these models.”

What a middle path looks like: Some animators see potential if AI tools were redesigned with artists in mind rather than their bosses.

• “For traditional visual artists to have any use for these tools, they need to be built expressly to interface with physical skill-based inputs like drawing, sculpting, and performance,” said Isaiah Saxon, co-founder of animation studio Encyclopedia Pictura.
• Ethical datasets and applications designed by the creative community could allow AI to function as a genuine tool rather than a threat to workers.

The bottom line: While AI evangelists argue the technology represents inevitable progress like previous creative tools, working artists face immediate pressures that force them into uncomfortable compromises between embracing and rejecting the technology entirely.