Fortnite Maker Confirms How It Uses Generative AI to Help Create Concept Art and Designs for New Skins

Fortnite maker Epic Games has offered a rare glimpse behind the scenes at how it designs new character skins and in-game locations — and shown how certain stages involve the use of generative AI tools.

In a video published to the Unreal Engine YouTube channel, Epic Games shows how a new Fortnite character is designed and iterated on by hand before being modified using an AI prompt to look more like a 3D model.

The video makes a clear distinction between the ideation stage and later changes made by AI generation — and all of this still in the concept art stage, before any asset is recreated in-game. But the footage also shows how AI generation will create unwanted additions or errors, which then must be identified and corrected in a further design pass by the (human) artist.

“The design is king, AI can generate generic stuff all day, but that’s not what we’re doing here,” an Epic Games staff member says. “It just skips ahead in the timeline so [the artist] can focus on honing in on the design and crafting it exactly how he wants it to be.”

The video’s publication follows repeated questions from Fortnite fans over potential AI