Editor’s Note (June 2025):

This blog post reflects our early thinking around AI. Since publishing, we've received powerful feedback from our community and have taken time to reflect deeply. Our stance on AI usage, especially as it relates to human representation and artistic labor, has since evolved. We’ve committed to halting the use of AI-generated human imagery and re-centering real artists in all campaigns going forward. Thank you for helping us grow.

 

The original “Meet the Digital Muses” post has been archived as we reassess how we represent identity, artistry, and creative labor. We’re actively reworking how we build visual worlds, with people at the center.

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AI in the creative world is… complicated.

It can be fun. It can be weird. It can be lazy.

And it can be easy to roll your eyes at another “perfect” digital campaign that feels like it was pulled from the same five prompts and spat out in 10 seconds flat.

We get it. We’re artists too.

That’s why when we decided to experiment with AI for our world building, it wasn’t to hop on a trend or cut creative corners.

It was to stretch the limits of what we could currently do as a small, scrappy team obsessed with product development… but still hellbent on putting a strong creative story out into the world.

So this right here, it’s an acknowledgement. Because if there’s one thing we’re always about, it’s transparency. Our world is weird, wild, experimental… and shaped by the same tensions you might be feeling as a nail artist, creator, or digital aesthete watching all of this unfold.

It’s a look into how and why we’re using AI in a very specific way, and how we’re making sure the real creativity stays in the hands (and brains) of humans.

When we build visuals, campaigns, muses, and moments… it always starts with the real real. The real product. The real swatch. The real artist behind the keyboard. (Ask us to say real one more time...)

AI just happens to be the tool we’re using to manifest the future before we can photograph it IRL.

 

 

Not Here to Defend AI, Here to Direct It

A lot of AI-generated beauty visuals feel like they were made by someone who thinks a French tip is the peak of creativity. Or someone who’s never swatched a pigment in their life.

That’s never been our vibe.

At Function of Vex, AI might be part of the medium, but it’s definitely not the message. And when we build with it, we’re starting from our actual formulas, our colors, our brushstrokes. We style the looks in-house first, live on nails, with real product and pigment play, before we ever enter a prompt.

What you'll see in our campaigns? It's not AI “invention.” It’s recreation. Our team taught the model what our work looks like by actually creating it first.

This isn’t a fantasy. It’s a sketch of what’s possible.

We don’t use this technology to replace photoshoots. We’re using it to prototype the ones we want to produce when the time is right and the creative stars align.

Call it manifestation. Call it wishful thinking. A casting call, if you will.

Whatever you want to call it, the creative direction? Still ours.

Our Muses: Not Models, But Markers

Soon, we will introduce you to the 8 muses we've created for personifying our Vexverse. Each muse represents something bigger than a campaign. Each represents a facet of our brand’s future. They’re a manifestation of where we’re headed.

They’re not just styled avatars, they’re creative placeholders for future shoots. They help us visualize mood, energy, pigment, and polish until we have the full chops to bring the full vision to life.

We build each one around real products. The gel they’re wearing exists. The design language comes from our actual play sessions. The styling is guided by real-world references pulled from the same cultural codes our community lives and breathes.

We treat them like collaborators, not tools. They aren’t stand-ins, they’re part of a growing mythos, helping us sketch a visual universe we hope to manifest fully someday.

You’ll meet them all in our next post. And just like always, when we work with real photographers, stylists, or collaborators (before, now, or in the future), we credit them loudly and proudly. Because we’re not just here to build visuals. We’re here to build with people.

We’re not anti-collaboration. We’re just early-stage. Let us cook.

 

Why We’re Doing It This Way

We're sitting in a space that’s deeply creative, subcultural, and emotionally tuned in.

So yes, we know that some of you will clock the AI and feel uneasy.

And it’s not just about jobs. It’s about values… authenticity, community, intimacy in creation. The fear isn’t just about losing work. It’s about losing cultural meaning.

We feel that too.

But our brand doesn’t just exist in this landscape. We shape it. Carefully. Intentionally. With awareness and a lot of thought.

Right now, our resources and priorities go into what we care about most: product development. That means complex formulas, product research and engineering, experimental pigment combos, and testing batches until they actually meet our standards.

We’re a micro team with mega vision.

So we get scrappy. We use AI not as a shortcut, but as a sketchpad.
Something that lets us show you the vision now, instead of waiting until we can shoot it later.

The AI work isn’t replacing artists. It’s giving us space to prototype, storybuild, and dream louder. Eventually, we want these ideas to lead to real-world shoots and real opportunities for the brilliant creatives in our orbit. And we’ll never stop crediting the people who make that possible.

This is creative direction, not creative substitution.

Where the Real Creativity Still Starts

We don’t think AI is the future of beauty.
We think you are. The artists. The visionaries. The creators making pigment feel personal.

That’s why we never use AI to design a product, mix a shade, or shape our formulas. That’s real-world work. Human work. The kind you can’t fake, prompt, or generate.

The lifestyle visuals you see in our campaigns are inspired by the art we’ve already made. The swatches are real. The brushstrokes are ours. The references come from our studio.

We never want to blur the line between a fantasy and a lie.

Because when it comes to creating pigment-forward products that actually work, and building a visual world that feels like ours, the creative control stays where it belongs… with real artists.

 

Up Next: Meet the Muses

Each muse is designed from scratch to embody the worlds we build here at F(VEX).

If you're ready, Meet the F(VEX) Muses in the next blog, and get ready to dive even deeper into the Vexverse.

And if you're here because you're curious about AI and art and how it all plays into the future of creative work? Stick around.

We’ve got thoughts. We’ve got pigment. And we’re just getting started.