My Lv 99 Doppelgänger

I remember when AI really started making noise in the creative world. It felt like it happened overnight, suddenly, it was everywhere. The headlines were dramatic. People were talking about the end of human-made art, the loss of originality, the rise of machines that could do in seconds what took us hours. Social media turned into a whirlwind. Artists were heartbroken. Designers were defensive. Everyone seemed to be bracing for impact.

My feed was full of fear. Post after post warning about a future where we might not have a place anymore. And in the middle of it all, I just… watched. Quietly. Not panicking, not rushing to join the noise. Just sitting with the question no one seemed to be asking, what if this isn’t the end? What if it’s the beginning of something new? There was noise everywhere, but inside me… there was a different kind of stillness.

Not panic. Curiosity.

For many, it felt like creativity itself was under threat. At first, I didn’t say much. I just watched.But deep inside, I wasn’t afraid. I was… curious. While others were rejecting it, I kept thinking, How does it actually work? Could this be something that enhances creativity rather than threatens it? What would happen if I didn’t fight it, but instead tried to understand it? In the middle of all the noise, there was a small voice in the back of my mind.It wasn’t loud. It didn’t push. It just whispered—What if you leaned in? What if you learned? What if you explored instead of feared? So I did.

As a designer, I’ve never really been someone who sticks to the script. Rules, expectations, even industry standards—they’ve always felt more like starting points than boundaries. Creativity, for me, has never been about fitting in. It’s about finding space to be curious, to try things that don’t always make sense to others… at least not right away. I remember being told in school and early in my career that anime inspired styles weren’t “professional,” that certain visual languages didn’t belong in the design world. I disagreed then, and I still do now.

To me, design is about expression. And expression has no single look. So instead of staying safe, I leaned into what made my creative voice unique. And when AI came into the picture, I didn’t see a threat. Where others saw a threat, I saw a window. A chance to explore something unfamiliar. A way to collaborate with a tool most people were running away from. What if, I thought, AI could become a creative partner? Not one that replaces me, but one that learns from me. One that echoes the way I think, see, feel, imagine. So I started small.At first, it felt like teaching a stranger how to speak my artistic language. I wasn’t just typing prompts, I was sculpting them. Each one carefully shaped like a message to my creative self. Honest. Deliberate. A little poetic. Like writing letters to a future version of me. But those early results? Disappointing. The images were off. The rhythm of my work was missing. Something about the tone felt empty. Soulless, even.

Still, I kept going. I refined. Rewrote. Tuned every phrase like a stringed instrument, hoping one day it would hit the right note. And then without warning, it did. The image that appeared on my screen didn’t feel like an output.It felt like me. Not a perfect copy. But something close. Familiar. Like a reflection in water slightly rippled, but unmistakably mine. Like something I would have drawn, or maybe dreamed.It was subtle, but powerful. The kind of moment that makes you sit back and think, This is it. This is the spark I was looking for.

From there, I got bolder. knew it was time to put this strange collaboration to the test. I remembered a suggestion from one of my students: “Try DeviantArt.” It had been years since I last visited, but I followed the thread, scrolling through commission requests until one made me stop. A concept rooted in Japanese folklore—The Night Parade of One Hundred Demons. A mysterious procession of spirits, yokai, and legends brought to life in the form of tarot cards. The idea was haunting, layered, alive with cultural depth. I didn’t know the client’s exact purpose, but I didn’t need to.

It felt right. It felt like the perfect story to tell. The request was to turn that into a tarot-inspired illustration. I didn’t know exactly how it would be used, maybe for a card game or a story, but it felt meaningful. It felt like the perfect challenge. The best part? There was no hard deadline. If AI couldn’t handle it, I’d do it myself. That safety net made it feel like an experiment instead of a risk. And in the process, something magical happened. It wasn’t just about the final artwork. It was about how I felt. Like I had created a second version of myself: my artistic shadow that could carry part of the workload and let me focus on deeper storytelling, more intentional expression.

It’s far from perfect. I still have to guide it, tweak things, show it what I mean. Sometimes it gets it right. Other times, not even close. But with each new project, with every little adjustment and prompt I fine tune, I’ve started to notice something unexpected. This was never really about replacing what I do. It’s been about reconnecting with why I do it. AI didn’t take my creativity away. If anything, it pushed me to understand it more deeply. To protect it. To stretch it. To rediscover parts of myself I had forgotten.

It expanded my creative horizons. What I have now isn't just a machine doing my job; it's an extension of my vision. A quiet partner, a digital shadow, a mirror that sometimes reveals more than I expect. I don't fear what's ahead. I'm actively shaping it—with my hands, my imagination, and the echo of my creative self walking beside me. The more I work with it, the more I realize this isn't about replacement. It's about evolution. I don't fear the future. I'm crafting it. With my hands, my imagination, and now, with a digital echo of myself by my side.

I decided to put everything I had learned to the test.All the small lessons, all the trial and error and my design logic, my artistic preferences, the little details that make my style what it is. I poured it all into the prompts, like handing over a piece of my creative mind.

Each time I ran a new version, it felt like the AI was listening a little more closely. It began to pick up on the small things like my sense of rhythm, how I space elements, the subtle balance I like between simplicity and detail. I could see it slowly tuning itself to the way I think.And then one day, it clicked. One version came through that made me pause. I just stared at it, quietly, almost in disbelief. It felt like it got me.

It looked just right. The composition, the colors, and even the emotion behind it all felt aligned. Not perfect, not identical to something I would have done by hand, but something close. Something real. Like a creative echo of myself. Before generating the piece, I had only given it a few guiding lines: emotion, style, color palette, scale, and a bit of structure. I even wove in a few hidden meanings—little things only I would notice, just to see if it could carry the same depth I bring to my own work. To my surprise, it did.