What's new in Creative AI – Details, episodes & analysis

Feb 27, 2025 By Emma Wharton Love and Jules Love, founders of Spark AI

Welcome to the February/March edition of What's New in Creative AI!

We’re here to give the latest in AI for creative industries! This month, we cover OpenAI’s roadmap (GPT-4.5 and GPT-5), Google’s Gemini updates, and the rise of AI-powered research tools. Plus, we dive into AI copyright rules, cutting-edge AI image/video tools, and how brands like Hugo Boss are using AI models.

💡 AI prompting strategies for 2025
📧 Gemini’s impact on Google Workspace
🎨 Ideogram & MidJourney’s new creative tools
🎬 AI video in 4K & the future of Sora & VO2
⚖️ Copyright, IP & ethics—what creators need to know

Join us for expert insights, trends, and strategies to stay ahead in AI.

🔗 Live Q&A on AI Copyright & Ethics – March 4 Register here
📍 AI in Agencies: The Robots Are Coming – March 18 Tickets available here

Listen now & stay ahead in creative AI! 🎧✨

Love, Emma, Jules & Team Spark

Spark's regular 30 minute podcast on what's new in creative AI - everything you need to know to grow your creative business and career in a world with AI. We cover:
— Latest updates to AI tools and new launches
— AI news and gossip relevant to creatives
— AI creative campaigns out in the wild
— How we are using AI within our business
Featuring Jules Love and Emma Wharton Love

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At Spark, our mission is to empower marketing and creative agencies to confidently adopt and apply AI – turning uncertainty into inspiration. We help you cut through the noise, stay ahead of change, and build bold, creative work with AI in your toolkit.

Learn more about how we support teams, run workshops, and create clarity in a fast-moving space:
👉 wearespark.ai

Spark's regular 30 minute podcast on what's new in creative AI - everything you need to know to grow your creative business and career in a world with AI. We cover:

— Latest updates to AI tools and new launches

— AI news and gossip relevant to creatives

— AI creative campaigns out in the wild

— How we are using AI within our business

Featuring Jules Love and Emma Wharton Love

-------------------------------------------------------------------

At Spark, our mission is to empower marketing and creative agencies to confidently adopt and apply AI – turning uncertainty into inspiration. We help you cut through the noise, stay ahead of change, and build bold, creative work with AI in your toolkit.

Learn more about how we support teams, run workshops, and create clarity in a fast-moving space:

👉 wearespark.ai

We’re back from Cannes Lions with a lot to unpack.

Spark's regular 30 minute podcast on what's new in creative AI - everything you need to know to grow your creative business and career in a world with AI.

We cover:

— Latest updates to AI tools and new launches

— AI news and gossip relevant to creatives

— AI creative campaigns out in the wild

— How we are using AI within our business

Featuring Spark AI co-founders Jules Love and Emma Wharton Love.

Learn more about how we support teams, run workshops, and create clarity in a fast-moving space:

👉 ⁠wearespark.ai

🚨 We're back! And there's a lot to catch up on.

In the latest episode of What’s New in Creative AI, we dig into the biggest shifts shaping the future of marketing, content and creative work - and share some major Spark AI news. 👇

🎙️ In this episode, we cover:

• The launch of our book Shift AI for Agencies - now an Amazon #1 bestseller
• Why the cost of AI content is collapsing (and what that means for creative value)
• The “infinite content” problem - and 4 things that will stay scarce
• How brand experiences are evolving
• What happens when content, code and labour all become basically free
• What WPP Open Pro and Figma’s Weevy deal tell us about the new agency landscape
• 3 mega-shifts in media, including agentic buying and AI-powered browsers
• Claude Skills, Synthesia video agents, and Copilot’s latest upgrades

If you lead a creative team or agency, this is your quick, clear and critical update on what matters now in AI - and what’s coming next.
📕 Grab the book: [https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1781339511/]
🧠 Join our newsletter: [https://www.wearespark.ai/spark-intelligence-ai-newsletter-for-creative-industries]

In this episode of What's New in Creative AI, Jules and Emma, co founders of Spark AI connect three threads: new research on what AI fluency actually looks like and how to measure it, hard data on where AI creates real commercial value for agencies (and where it doesn't), and a growing burnout problem that nobody's addressing properly. Plus updates on what's happening at Spark AI. What we cover:

1. The 11-Point Fluency Check: How to measure if your team is actually skilled or just frequent users.
2. The Valuation Hit: Why only 1 in 4 agencies have updated their contracts - and how that’s giving acquirers a negotiation lever to lower your multiple.
3. The Exhaustion Paradox: Why AI is saving time but leaving teams more tired than ever (The "workslop" cycle).All the links we refer to in the pod: Spark AI news and servicesAI Accelerator:https://www.wearespark.ai/ai-acceleratorBook: Shift – AI for Agencies:https://www.amazon.co.uk/Shift-Agencies-adoption-operating-transformation/dp/1915483161Subscribe to the Spark Intelligence Newsletter:https://spark-intelligence.beehiiv.com/subscribeFuture of Skills & Hiring Report:https://www.wearespark.ai/future-of-skills-hiring-ai-agenciesJules LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/juleslove/Emma LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emmawhartonlove/Section 1: AI FluencyAnthropic’s AI Fluency Index Research:https://www.anthropic.com/news/ai-fluency-indexEthan Mollick’s One Useful Thing:https://www.oneusefulthing.org/Section 2: AI & agency commercials and performanceWebinar: AI Strategy, Profit, and M&A with Rory Spence:https://www.wearespark.ai/ai-strategy-agencies-2026-profit-m-aThe Wow Company:https://www.thewowcompany.com/Section 3: AI BurnoutHBR: AI Doesn't Reduce Work – It Intensifies It:https://hbr.org/2026/02/ai-doesnt-reduce-work-it-intensifies-it

We've dedicated this entire episode to The Spark Report.Our fourth bi-annual benchmark on AI in agencies is out now. We surveyed 70+ agencies, combined that with qualitative research and interviews, and this edition – AI in Agencies: From Activity to Advantage – is about the gap between doing AI and building something lasting from it.Jules and Emma go through all six key findings: where recovered time is actually going, why Shadow AI has become a governance issue, what the 83% vs 15% confidence gap really means, and why the biggest divide in AI adoption now sits inside a single agency rather than between them.Practical, research-backed, and direct.📊 Download The Spark Report: https://www.wearespark.ai/the-spark-report-ai-in-agencies-benchmark📘 Grab our book Shift – AI for Agencies: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1781339511/🧠 Subscribe to Spark Intelligence: https://www.wearespark.ai/spark-intelligence-ai-newsletter-for-creative-industries

We've dedicated this entire episode to The Spark Report.

Our fourth bi-annual benchmark on AI in agencies is out now. 70+ agencies, combined that with qualitative research and interviews, and this edition – AI in Agencies: From Activity to Advantage – is about the gap between doing AI and building something lasting from it.

Jules and Emma go through all six key findings: where recovered time is actually going, why Shadow AI has become a governance issue, what the 83% vs 15% confidence gap really means, and why the biggest divide in AI adoption now sits inside a single agency rather than between them.

Practical, research-backed, and direct.

📊 Download The Spark Report

📘 Grab our book Shift – AI for Agencies

🧠 Subscribe to Spark Intelligence

Spark AI is a consultancy helping agencies and creative teams build organisation-wide AI capability. Together, we'll build the engine that changes not just how your team works – but what your organisation is capable of.Jules and Emma dig into three findings from the Spring 2026 Spark Report: why agencies are saving time with AI but not seeing the benefit, the governance gap that's leaving teams exposed, and the growing distance between how confident people feel about AI and how capable they actually are. Plus a Spark team update and what Jules and Emma have been building.Video chapters:00:00:00 - Intro & Spark Report Update00:03:32 - The Productivity Paradox00:08:10 - AI Governance: The Shocking Stats00:13:54 - IP, Reference Imagery & Creative AI00:15:02 - Confidence vs Real Capability00:18:26 - Spark Team & New Starters00:21:08 - Spark Sessions: New Webinar Series00:22:35 - Cannes Lions 202600:24:04 - Tools We're Trying

Download The Spark Report Harness AI across your organisation – and deliver more for your clients, protect your margins and create opportunities that simply didn't exist before.https://www.wearespark.ai/