My Collection With Try it on AI: When AI & Fashion Collide
Is the future now? Here I share a secret I’ve been keeping…everything that went down while working on this AI fashion project.
A couple months ago artificial intelligence (AI) really freaked me out. I associated it with high-schoolers cheating on their essays, and podcasts featuring regretful AI founders who were coming to terms with the overly powerful and occasionally racist beast they’d created. So when Try it on AI, a company specializing in AI-generated headshots, reached out to me, I was hesitant to say the least.
On the other hand, as a freelancer everything is worth considering. Why not open my mind and at least hear the pitch? It turned out, Try it on AI was soft launching a new “shoppable” feature that allowed their users to not only create headshots, but also buy the items generated in their images. How?! I’m not going to lie, it sounded kind of cool.
After a few meetings and some lessons on how to use their creative studio, I was fully ensconced. Here’s the process:
Upload your selfies to create your AI model (it will take about a day to receive your studio model after you’ve finished uploading).
Once you have your model, select Semi Casual Studio and select styles By Kyoko Harris to generate images from my collection.
Click on the generated images to shop them!
Play around with it from there! You can type in text prompts, download and re-generate images.
Have fun playing around with it. You will probably see some hilarious pictures along with the cute ones!
Here are a few examples of the images I uploaded to create my AI model. It was interesting how the photos I took came out a tad robot-ish when I followed their image guidelines:
Guidelines from Try it on AI included: Soft smile, chest up, natural lighting with varying backgrounds and outfits in each image.
Two of the looks I curated for women once my model was ready:
Here are a couple of the men’s looks:
Click and view the product details to shop the collection:
Try it on AI’s director of social media Abby Rifkin sat down with me to discuss more about the collection:
Q1: What inspired you to pursue fashion styling?
A: I have been expressing myself through what I wear since I was a little kid. My sister and I used to walk around the grocery store in feather boas and jelly sandals, thinking we were the best dressed at Target. Maybe we were! I didn’t seriously consider styling as a career path until I was an assistant fashion editor at The Wall Street Journal. That was the job that helped me realize I could provide a service to people while doing something I love.
Q2: What’s your signature style?
A: Classic and minimal with a bit of modern funk. I am a huge proponent of investing in pieces that are easy to mix and match, and that can be worn throughout the seasons and trend cycles. I’d like for every piece to be functional and purposeful, without being predictable. Including a pop of color or a funky accessory can be a simple way to zhuzh up the more traditional or preppy styles I am often wearing or putting together for clients.
Q3: Walk us through your process of selecting outfits for your AI Headshot collection…
A: The key factors I consider when styling are silhouette, color scheme and price point. For this collection, I wanted to select capsule pieces that could be worn throughout the “in-between” weather that we’ve been stuck in recently. I also considered the sorts of outfits people tend to take headshots in: professional, sleek and stylish clothing that doesn’t take over the photo.
Q4: What trends influenced your collection?
A: A trend I have really enjoyed lately is the “shirt sandwich” or triple-layer look. I love outfits that might, at first glance, look complicated but really aren’t. For this collection’s women’s looks I drew inspiration from The Row, Loewe and Tory Burch, and for men I drew inspiration from Hermès and Officine Générale.
Q5: How do you see the role of AI impacting the fashion industry, particularly in terms of styling?
A: I see AI giving us a chance to get uncomfortable and loosen our grip on control. We love to be in control, especially in fashion. I see AI shaking this up and making us embrace something we don’t yet fully understand. It’s a little intimidating to be honest, but I think the more we embrace it the less scary it will be.
Q6: Looking ahead, what excites you most about the intersection of fashion, technology, and AI? And how do you envision it shaping the future of retail?
A: I am really excited to see fashion become more accessible through technology and AI. While working on the shoppable collection with Try it on AI, I was able to see myself in looks I was excited about before having to purchase the items or travel to a store to try them on. As a consumer, there is a lot of power in that.
Check out Abby’s full blog post on the project here.
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With that, thank you so much for being here. This post was a little different, so I hope you enjoyed it or, at the very least, got some laughs. Until next week wear, or generate, something you love. xx
Yours Truly,
Kyoko
I retain 100% of the sales commission from shoppable collection purchases. My sincerest thank you to Try it on AI for working with me on this project!