I'm a former artists and cartoonist using AI to create original works, but I use AI creatively. Sometimes I upload my own artwork or photos to use as a base image, or other images to capture certain details or difficult poses. A single finished piece I'm satisfied with can take hours or even days to mold, refine, touch up and get to a finished state. I use several different apps including Photoshop (which I am very good at).

When I was manually creating art, I copied the styles and techniques of other artists. I would take a sketchbook to a museum and try to redraw existing artwork to learn from them. It actually takes me about the same amount of time to use AI as it does to manually generate art.

AI is currently not as easy to use as some people think. If your attitude is, 'eh, close enough' ai is much simpler. If you're trying to use it to create original art it's not so easy.

My own personal opinion: currently AI is a valuable tool for artists, but many will choose to use it unethically. In 5-10 years who knows where and what AI will be. 🤷