The benefits and challenges of artificial intelligence image generators for architectural ideation: Study of an alternative human-machine co-creation exchange based on sketch recognition

This paper deals with creative co-design between human and machine. It presents an alternative design method based on an emerging technology of sketch interpretation to support co-creation and collaborative creativity in architecture. This technology embraces spontaneity in design by generating inspirational images linked to the architect's sketches. Our research aims to determine the benefits and challenges of this alternative instrumentation. We are developing a Wizard of Oz test method by immersing several designers in a studio instrumented by this human-machine co-creation technology. We analyze quantitatively and qualitatively the single-designer ideation activity of these subjects. We then investigate the integration of this co-creation instrumentation within the framework of a team design involving several architects. This confirms known benefits such as speeding-up and freeing-up of ideation and highlights the need for designers to evaluate sketched ideas by means of images simulating their real-life rendering, as well as the need for inspiration to materialize the premises of ideas that are still vague.