genAI workshop @unirsm

From November 30 to December 1, I was invited by Elena Cavallin and Corrado Loschi, to run a workshop on generative AI for designers, mostly around the use of MidJourney for design ideation and product communication.

The class was attended by ~50 bachelor students who experimented with prompting, scraping the internet for great prompt examples and styles, and experienced firsthand the excitement and frustration that comes with trying to obtain specific compositions and details, as one would expect to do in design processes.

Through the exercises of the workshop, students were also invited to experience and reflect upon how easy it is to fall into stereotypical ideas we hold, such as regarding gender, race, and professions. Particularly, students were invited to generate stock images for web job advertisements, and, with no surprises, most of the generated images revealed traditional stereotypes, such as doctors as white men and secretaries as young women.