What do I want to do with my life?
In this day and age, defining what I want to do as a career for the rest of my life is quite difficult to define. It almost seems like every day another industry is automated to the point of irrelevance and another interest of mine is dead in the water.
I wanted to be an illustrator, but Image Generation models have made commissioning new artists obsolete.
I wanted to be learn 3D modeling and design, but now you can drop a 2D image into a Model Generator and have it do almost all of the work for you.
I wanted to be a Webpage Designer, but now any layman can use Large Language Models to generate everything from a webpage to working video game code. Plus, it seems like everyone likes using these (in my humble opinion) garbage, clunky CMS systems instead of learning to code in HTML and CSS anyway, so I’m starting to wonder if that knowledge is going to be obsolete as well.
I don’t like the idea of using AI as an excuse to lose my passion in things, but I’ll be damned if I spend years of my life and money learning a new industry that will be entirely automated within 6 months. As a relatively young person in 2025, I feel almost entirely directionless career-wise.
I want to be able to provide for myself without selling my soul to corporate America. I don’t need a million dollars. I’d like to own a house. I’d like to have a family one day. I’d like to do something that I’m passionate about. But that seems less and less likely with every passing day.
As you can probably tell, I’m a certified AI automation hater, and I think I’ll always be that way. It’s like a weapon. Weapons aren’t evil in themselves, but when used in the wrong way, they can wreak destruction on humanity. If everything becomes automated and there are no entry level positions for people anymore, who will be there to consume your products?
All in all, I have no idea what I’m going to be doing as a career. And that sucks to say years into a college program.
Who are some of my favorite designers / inspiration?
I love illustration, and have too many favorite artists to count. My favorite artist would probably be the late Kim Jung Gi, a South Korean man who could do the most complex, detailed illustrations with only a brush pen. He would never do underlying or construction work before starting a piece, he would just go straight to it. Since he worked with ink, any mistakes would be magnified. But he rarely made them. He passed away only 3 years ago, and his death was felt by the entire artistic community.
Another big inspiration to me are visual effects studios such as Industrial Light and Magic. I’m big into scale modeling so seeing the behind the scenes productions of my favorite films and looking at all the miniature work is just as satisfying to me as watching the actual movie. Matte paintings in film are also amazing to me. I love seeing human beings come together to create something larger than life.
Good looking Web Design?
You probably don’t care about my favorite artist or special effects studio (understandably so) but I don’t really know any famous web designers. I think Apple’s website looks clean (even though I despise them as a company). They use nice and colorful hero images and their design is nice and symmetrical.