Published for Packaging written By Anne Marie Mohan. Sep 7, 2023
Hemp-infused products company Hempacco uses AI to generate an image of Snoop Dogg that receives his blessing for the packaging graphics for his new Dogg lb-brand gummies. The most challenging part of the graphic design for the packaging for Snoop Dogg’s new Dogg lb Dog Treats Gummies was the image of Snoop himself, which was finally produced using AI tools.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has surfaced as a transformative technology in practically every sector and domain conceivable, with graphic design being no exception. For entrepreneurs Jorge Olson and Sandro Piancone, the creators of hemp-infused products company Hempacco, AI has become an invaluable addition to their extensive packaging design toolkit. Most recently, AI aided Hempacco in overcoming a significant challenge while creating the visuals for a new gummy product for the renowned rap icon Snoop Dogg.
Situated in California, Hempacco manufactures and develops hemp-based commodities under its own label and through collaborations. Their product range encompasses vapes, hemp cigarettes, smoking papers, gummies, capsules, chocolates, shots, tinctures, and a selection of beauty and nutraceutical items, all manufactured across Hempacco’s three facilities—two in San Diego and one in Tijuana, Mexico. Among Hempacco’s notable partnerships is a venture with Snoop Dogg, operating under the brand name Dogg lbs, aiming to produce hemp-derived merchandise.
Ever since the launch of their first hemp cigarette product, Real Stuff Hemp Smokables, in 2017, Hempacco has been responsible for all packaging design internally, under Olson’s leadership. “I’m fortunate to collaborate with an exceptional team of Mexican American artists from the Tijuana-San Diego border region who make my work shine,” notes Olson. “Our advantage at Hempacco stems from our location and our ties with artists. My family background is rich in art; my mother and stepfather are both artists, with him being a retired art professor, curator, and artist, while my cousins are artists too. We’re part of a border artists community, contributing to our unique artistic style.”
Despite having abundant artistic resources, Olson turned to AI for assistance when designing the packaging for the inaugural product under the Dogg lbs brand. The most challenging aspect of the design revolved around the pivotal element: an image of Snoop Dogg.
“We faced considerable difficulty in finding an image that Snoop approved or one for which we could acquire usage rights for our packaging,” explains Olson. “After six weeks of searching for suitable photos, our project was six weeks behind schedule for production. I generated over 200 images using AI for Snoop and the packaging concept. Although I believed some were promising, Snoop and Tiffany Chin, Snoop’s hemp and cannabis CEO, dismissed the ideas. That’s when I decided to seek assistance from the ‘Big Guns.'”
The ‘Big Guns’ Olson refers to is his acquaintance, Gustav Mayoral, the proprietor of AI enterprise Code Agents, whom Olson describes as possessing a rare blend of skills as a software architect, professional photographer, and award-winning artist. “Gustavo deployed his proprietary algorithm to generate Snoop images in various styles and poses. This process took several days until, finally, we struck gold with the perfect image aligning with the Dogg lbs brand.”
Olson reveals that Mayoral’s methodology involves training AI to comprehend the product intricacies, encompassing everything from product specifics to visual and design styles. Once accomplished, the platform is tasked with generating deliverables, such as images, artistic designs, and text. Subsequently, Hempacco integrates these into its standard artwork workflow, involving the entire graphic design team.
The final rendition for Snoop Dogg’s Dogg lbs Dog Treats Gummies packaging features the AI-generated Snoop Dogg image, refined and enriched by Hempacco’s graphic designers, set against a deep purple backdrop adorned with a gold paisley-style motif. At the bottom lies a strip of color—blue, purple, or red—corresponding respectively to the three available flavor variations: Blue Raspberry, Grape, and Cherry Lemon. A QR code directs consumers to an augmented reality feature, Snoop Talk, enabling them to witness an AR-generated rendition of Snoop in motion and speaking.
Regarding their utilization of AI, Olson remarks that Hempacco has thus far harnessed technology to expand their conventional creative process, generating assets such as logos, artistic concepts, lifelike and product imagery, AR, 3D modeling, and voice synthesis. “In the future, as we refine our toolkit, we’ll delve even deeper into automation,” he adds. “For instance, in our pipeline, we’re striving towards enabling AI to conduct online packaging tests, gathering feedback from our target audience, iterating designs based on the results, and even securing pre-orders from our ideal consumers.”
Addressing the pivotal question of whether AI will render graphic designers obsolete, Olson believes otherwise. “I foresee designers adapting their workflows, akin to how computers augmented human capabilities rather than replacing them,” he elucidates. “Presently, individuals like Gustavo from Code Agents and myself employ AI to define our requirements before passing them to designers for refinement, modification, enhancement, and branding. In the future, designers will encompass these tasks independently, with AI prompt programming becoming an integral part of their skill set.”
