5 Gen AI Use Cases to Hack 2D Art Development — Part 1: Backgrounds (Text to Image)

This is a 5-part series exploring a different Gen AI use case for 2D art development in each part. We ran a successful pilot at Tintash to streamline our development workflows by leveraging Gen AI. Now, we’re sharing our findings and providing complete documentation for you.

Imagine transporting players to a magical medieval realm or a vibrant cartoonish countryside with just a few clicks. Creating stunning backgrounds that set the scene, evoke emotions, and bring stories to life is a crucial yet demanding task in art development. The journey from concept to completion is filled with creative challenges and requires significant time and effort, but what if we told you there’s a transformative way to streamline this process?

This entire series is about finding innovative solutions to enhance the creation of high-quality artwork. In the first two articles, the focus will be specifically on creating 2D backgrounds. In this part, we will explore how you can leverage Gen AI to create 2D-rendered backgrounds using textual prompts (text to image); in the next part, we will do the same via visual prompts using reference images (image to image).

To see a complete range of results produced by the selected AI tools, we tested each tool on three different in-house projects completed in the past — let us call them Case 1, Case 2, and Case 3.

Case 1: Background of a whimsical kids’ game set in a lush green field, and dotted with ancient rocks and medieval castles.

Case 2: Background of a whimsical childrens’ game set against a lush green field, adorned with a charming windmill and vibrant flowers, all rendered in a playful, cartoonish art style.

Case 3: Background of a lively nail salon setting, with shelves lined with colorful nail polishes and large windows flooding the space with natural light.

The Different AI Tools Available

There is a variety of free AI tools out there which you can use for creating 2D backgrounds via textual prompts, including:

• Artguru
• Freepik
• OpenArt
• ImagineArt
• Leonardo.Ai
• Tripo.Ai

Our Choice of AI Tools — Artguru & Freepik

From the available options, we selected Artguru and Freepik for their exceptional ability to produce stylized backgrounds. Both tools utilize straightforward textual prompts, allowing you to achieve the desired results with a basic prompt and making the process simple and user-friendly.

Artguru

Artguru is free to use, offering 8 tries per day per account, and it only takes 30 seconds to sign up with your Google account. It offers several advantages, including:

• Uncomplicated Prompts: It utilizes straightforward textual prompts.
• Background Variations: Artguru generates a range of game background variations — some closely matching your prompts while others may diverge.
• High Image Quality: The image quality is consistently excellent.

There’s also a premium version of Artguru available, with the following bundle details:

Freepik

Freepik is free to use, offering 20 trials per day per account, and it takes only 30 seconds to sign up with your Google account. It offers several great features, including:

1. Reimagine: This unique tool allows you to upload a reference image and receive multiple variations (3 tries per day). The free version generates its own prompt, but the premium version allows you to customize the prompt, ensuring better and more tailored results by combining key points from your prompt with the image. Here’s an example:

2. Simple Prompts: Freepik uses straightforward textual prompts.

3. Prompt Enhancer: This AI-integrated feature refines your prompts to produce even better results.

4. High-Quality Backgrounds: It generates stunning stylized backgrounds that closely match your desired outcomes.

5. Variety of Screen Sizes: Freepik offers great variety in screen size ratios.

6. High Image Quality: The image quality is consistently excellent.

Freepik also comes with a premium version, with the following pricing plans:

Our Process & Insights

Case 1

Prompt 1: Create a stylized 2d game background. Add rocky formation in the background. Add grass in the foreground. Leave a space in the foreground for two characters to stand. Add a large green field in the foreground.

Prompt 2: Create a stylized 2d game background. Create a cartoonish environment. Add rocky formation in the background. Add grass in the foreground. Add a large green field in the foreground.

Case 2

Prompt 1: Create a stylized game background. Create a bright cartoonish environment. It should have green trees. It should have green fields with colorful flowers. Add a hut far away in the background. Add clouds in the sky and a few birds as well. In the foreground, leave some empty space on the green field.

Prompt 2: Create a stylized game background. Create a bright cartoonish environment. It should have green trees. It should have green fields with colorful flowers. Add a windmill far away in the background. Add clouds in the sky and a few birds as well. It should have rainy weather. In the foreground, leave some empty space on the green field.

Case 3

Prompt 1: Create a 2D stylized game environment. The game is about a nail salon where customers come and get their nails done. Create a background of a nail salon. It should have windows and shelves with nail polishes in the background. It should have a front camera view.

Prompt 2: Cheerful and illustrated 2D game locale highlighting a lively nail salon. Bright windows at the back of the space provide a luminous backdrop for the shelves brimming with an array of nail polish in a spectrum of hues. Positioned centrally in the scene is a desk.

Prompt 3: Joyful and animated 2D cartoon setting highlighting a lively nail salon. Sunlit windows at the rear of the space create a radiant backdrop for the shelves brimming with an assortment of nail polish in a vibrant range of colors.

Current State of Gen AI: Key Findings

The results produced by both tools are impressive and closely match our desired outcomes. While there have been a few instances of unsatisfactory results, the overall performance has been great. However, the outputs are not immediately game-ready and require minimal adjustments from the art team, typically taking a maximum of 3–4 hours.

Benefits

• These tools are best suited for generating stylized backgrounds and environments with uncomplicated, simple textual prompts.
• An added advantage is that even if the results don’t perfectly match your desired outcome, you can still utilize certain elements. For instance, we could extract rocks, trees, and castles from the generated backgrounds to use as props in the games.

“With Artguru, we quickly generated a variety of background elements, which we then integrated into our game after some polishing. The time saved was incredible.” — Madiha Ali Azam, Senior Artist at Tintash

Shortcomings

• These tools aren’t ideal for creating backgrounds that require precise details. For instance, in Case 3, we needed a desk positioned directly in front of a character in the foreground. As shown below, both Artguru and Freepik failed to produce the desired results.

• Artguru struggles with following negative prompts.
• Both tools have limitations in creating images in custom screen sizes or resolutions. Freepik offers various options of screen ratios so it may not be a problem for you. Artguru, on the other hand, offers just the three aspect ratio options (1:1, 2:3, 3:2), hence customization beyond these is a problem.

Before vs After Comparison

Before AI

• Reference collection: 1–2 hours
• Concept art: 5–6 hours
• Feedback: 1 hour
• Illustrating: 9–10 hours
• Total time: ~ 20 hours (over 2 working days)

After AI

• Concept image uploading and analyzing time: 1 min (max)
• Textual prompt: 10 mins (max)
• Prompt refinement (iterations): 20 mins (max)
• Downloading the image: 5 mins (max) for Artguru, 3 mins (max) for Freepik
• Feedback cycle: varies by client or team ~ 1 hour
• Adjustments by the artist: 4–6 hours (max)
• Total Time: ~ 8 hours (1 working day)

As you can see, these tools can help save your art team up to 9–10 hours.

Additionally, with Freepik, using the Reimagine feature (especially the paid version) can further enhance your efficiency. All you need to do is upload an image and provide a prompt, and it will generate various versions in a similar art style. This could increase your time savings to 11–12 hours.

Parting Thoughts

Both tools have shown promising results, with Freepik outperforming Artguru by delivering better outcomes in less time. Although both tools produced great image quality, the renders didn’t accurately match with our reference images from the actual projects. Consequently, it’d have required 3–4 hours for an artist to refine the assets and make them game-ready. However, overall, leveraging AI tools can help save significant time compared to the process of creating these backgrounds from scratch.

In Part 2 of this series, we’ll explore how to use Gen AI for creating 2D Backgrounds using reference image prompts — stay tuned! If you’re curious to learn more or have questions about integrating AI into your art projects, reach out to our art studio here to start a conversation. We’d love to hear from you! For regular updates, you can also follow us on LinkedIn.