I Got ‘Professional’ AI Headshots to See if Photographers Should Worry

Jul 30, 2024

Matt Growcoot

Side-by-side images of the same young man with short brown hair and a slight smile. On the left, he is dressed in a tan suit, blue tie, and white shirt, standing in front of bookshelves. On the right, he is wearing a colorful, patterned sweater, posing with arms crossed.

AI-generated headshots are now a thing. Tech companies can offer hundreds of “professional” images for just $10. The question is: Should photographers be concerned?

The way it works is you upload 10 photographs of yourself to the website — in this case, I was using PhotoPacks.AI — and wait for roughly an hour before receiving your AI images.

PhotoPacks urges you to pick good quality, high-resolution photos with good lighting that include a variety of angles, clothing, and expressions. The better the training data, the better the output from the AI model. The foundation model for PhotoPacks is Stable Diffusion’s SDXL

-A black-and-white portrait of a man with short hair and a clean-shaven face, wearing a suit and tie. He is looking directly at the camera with a neutral expression. The background is plain and out of focus.

-A smiling person with short brown hair and blue eyes is wearing a gray shirt. They are seated indoors with a blurred background of a window and a wall with some objects. The lighting is soft and natural.

-A young man with short brown hair is wearing a light blue button-up shirt. He is standing against a plain gray background and looking straight at the camera with a neutral expression.

‘It’s You, But It’s Not You’

It’s quite weird seeing AI images of yourself. So I posted them to my Instagram to see what people thought.

-A young man with short, brown hair and blue eyes is looking at the camera. He is wearing a yellow sweater with a navy blue, red, and white striped collar. The background is a solid pink color.

The people who don’t know me in real life seem to think they are really impressive. One cameraman declares that’s “headshot photography dead right there” while another describes the images as “so real.”

However, the people who do know me in the real world say that while the technology is impressive, it is still too “uncanny valley.”

“It’s really unsettling to see little glimpses of your actual face surrounded by things that don’t look right,” says my colleague Jeremy Gray.

-A man stands outside on a snowy street wearing a dark knit beanie, a thick scarf, and a heavy winter coat with a fur-lined hood. Snow lightly falls around him, and blurred buildings line the background. He looks calm and content.

-A man in a beige suit stands on a rooftop with a city skyline in the background during sunset. He has short hair and is smiling slightly, with his hands resting on a glass railing. The sky is a gradient of soft, warm colors.

The most common response from friends and family is: “It’s you, but it’s not you.”

A New Business

I spoke with the PhotoPacks founder Jeremy Gustine who tells me the business is receiving interest from people looking for “LinkedIn photos, photos for websites, and social media profiles.”

“The audience tends to skew younger (20-40), and many of them are looking for something cheaper and more convenient than a professional headshot,” Gustine explains. “I think people are interested in it both for the novelty and the utility that it provides.”

-A person with short brown hair and a subtle smile stands with their arms crossed. They are wearing a colorful sweater with a geometric pattern of green, blue, red, and purple shapes. The background is plain and gray.

I can certainly attest to the novelty — it has been quite fun sharing these with friends and family. But more seriously, I asked the Denver-based CEO if he thinks the technology could eventually replace photographers.

“I think it is very possible that in the near future (five years or so), the technology will progress enough that it will be cheaper and easier to get even higher-quality and customized photos than professional photographers can provide,” he says.

“In the absence of that, AI will absolutely become a tool that photographers will use in post-processing, much like they do with Photoshop today.”

-A man with short brown hair wearing a light blue polo shirt stands against a plain blue background. He is looking slightly off-camera and has a neutral expression on his face. A small pen is visible in the pocket of his shirt.

-A young man with short brown hair and fair skin is smiling subtly. He is wearing a light grey t-shirt and is in front of a plain, light-colored background.

But is using an AI image of yourself — a weird verisimilar representation of you — in a professional capacity ethical?

“I acknowledge that not everybody will be comfortable with it,” says Gustine.

“I see it much like using Photoshop to improve lighting and enhance images. That being said, there are plenty of unethical ways to use the technology, for example when one uses it to deliberately mislead others.

“As long as one is honest about the source of their photos then I think people are generally okay with it. It will become ubiquitous in the future so I think we, as a society, will grapple with some of those issues and arrive at a place where it becomes the norm.”

- A man with short hair, wearing dark sunglasses, a white t-shirt, and a black leather jacket stands confidently on an urban street. The background shows buildings, a red and white storefront, and a blurred tree in the distance.

-A man with short brown hair stands outdoors, leaning against a railing. He is wearing a light-colored jacket over a gray V-neck shirt. The background features a soft-focus cityscape with tall buildings and trees basking in the warm, setting sun.

Will I Be Using My AI Headshots Anytime Soon?

I’m not going to use an AI headshot for professional purposes. While it is pretty damn close, it’s no cigar and the guys in the images just ain’t me.

Also, there are still too many mistakes like the weird hands and asymmetrical reflections in the eyes. The technology may improve to a point where it does render headshot photographers obsolete. But then again, it might not.

-A man stands outdoors in a snowy urban setting, wearing a black beanie, a layered brown and grey jacket, and a dark coat. Soft snowflakes fall around him, and blurred background buildings are adorned with lights. The man gazes calmly, with a slight smile.

-A man in a tan suit with a navy tie and pocket square stands in front of a bookshelf filled with books. He has short, dark hair and a serious expression, posed in a professional setting.

It’s worth pointing out that the company that owns the foundation model used to make these headshots, Stable Diffusion, is being sued for stealing over 12 million copyrighted photos to train it with.

These legal wranglings, coupled with potential training data shortages, and the technology’s perceived unpopularity make the future of AI uncertain.

In 2024, we’re in a Wild West period with the ground shifting beneath us almost daily. AI images are likely here to stay and will remain entwined to the photography space for the foreseeable. How it all plays out is anyone’s guess.