Generative AI is changing creative production economics

What is real today

The reliable use cases: rapid concepting (10 visual directions in an afternoon instead of a week), variations at scale (one core concept, fifty platform-specific cuts), voiceover production in any language, and 'second-rounds' on visuals that previously needed a reshoot.

What is still unreliable: complex brand-safe video, precise text in images, photo-realistic people in specific scenarios. The smart agencies use AI for the parts it does well and keep professionals on the parts that matter most.

The economic shift

A campaign that needed a €15K shoot for hero assets can often be produced for a fraction with hybrid AI/photo workflows — particularly for digital-only formats. That does not mean creative budgets drop; what tends to happen is that the same budget produces multiples more creative variants, enabling sharper personalisation and faster testing.

For destinations specifically, AI is unlocking content that was previously uneconomic: e.g. a per-segment, per-language, per-season creative matrix for one programmatic campaign.

The discipline that matters

Brand consistency, copyright provenance, and brand-safety governance become more important, not less. The agencies handling this well have internal style guides for AI prompts, version-controlled brand references, and explicit rules about which assets can be AI-generated and which cannot.