Articles · AI Design
Can you use AI-generated images in client work?
Copyright, terms of service, lookalikes, contracts. What to check in practice, in order. Written from Korea, with the US for comparison.
Translated from the Korean original. Read in Korean
After a month or so with an image generator, one day the thought hits you: can I actually put this in client work?
The answer isn't simple. Does copyright arise? Do the tool's terms allow it? Does the contract forbid it? Does the result resemble someone else's work? There are several layers, and you can get caught at each one separately.
I'm not a lawyer, but I've laid them out in the order you'd check them in practice.
First, a disclaimer. This isn't legal advice. The relevant laws, rulings and terms of service keep changing. For anything big, check with a lawyer or the client's legal team. This piece is based on Korean law, with the US for comparison; rules differ by country.
Copyright belongs to people
Korea's Copyright Act defines a work as "a creative production that expresses human thoughts or emotions". The key is the word "human". The basic interpretation so far is that output made just by entering a prompt is hard to see as something a person expressed, and the AI copyright guide published by Korea's Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism pointed broadly the same way.
The US is similar. The Copyright Office has refused to register AI output without human creative contribution. In the case of a comic book containing AI images, the images were left out, and only the parts a person did, like the text and arrangement, were recognized.
In practice, that means this: if you deliver an AI-generated image as is, there's a good chance nobody owns the copyright on it. That also means it's hard to stop a competitor from using the exact same thing. Once a person composes, edits and sets type on top of it, rights arise in the parts that person made.
So the question comes down to one thing: how long, and how exclusively, will this be used?
A background for a single banner is nothing to worry much about. A logo or a mascot you'll use for ten years is a completely different story. You'd be making something you can't protect into the face of the brand.
Terms differ by service
Separate from copyright, each service sets its own conditions for how you may use its output. They differ by service and change more often than you'd think. Before signing up, I check four things.
- Is commercial use allowed? Some services allow it only on paid plans, or require a higher plan depending on company size.
- Do they transfer rights to the output, or just grant permission to use it?
- Are images I make public by default? For client work, this is the most dangerous one.
- Are my uploads used for training? If you upload drafts or logos to work on, check whether you can turn it off.
Some services state that their training data is limited to licensed material. Adobe Firefly is the best-known example, and on some plans it even promises indemnification if a dispute arises. In advertising or in-house work at large companies, that one condition can decide which tool gets used. The character of each service is summarized under AI tools.
Does it look like someone else's?
Sometimes you clear both copyright and the terms, and still get caught here.
If a generated image resembles a famous character or logo, that's a problem under both copyright and trademark, even if you never put that name in the prompt. If a face resembles a specific person, portrait and publicity rights come into play. This is where to be most careful when using AI people instead of model photos.
Putting a living artist's name in a prompt and using the result commercially is an area where legal opinions differ. Before that, it's also a question of the reputation you build in the industry.
Just running a reverse image search once before delivery catches most big accidents. It takes thirty seconds.
Using it without saying so is the riskiest
AI clauses are showing up in contracts more and more. Some ban it outright, some require you to disclose and get approval first, and some allow only specific tools with verified provenance.
The most common accident is using it without saying so. If it comes out later, it becomes a matter of trust, not of the work. On the other hand, if you mention it up front, most clients say it's fine. Not many clients get angry about hearing a background texture was made with AI.
Saying it isn't hard either. "The pattern background was generated with AI; I did the editing myself." One line like that is enough. If you freelance, it helps to prepare this as a document alongside your contract. Resources like standard contracts are collected under Freelance.
Rules requiring AI-generated content to be labeled are also appearing country by country. For advertising or public-sector projects, it's safer to check the guidelines for that field separately.
Records are everything
Looking back, the conclusion is simple. For images you'll use briefly and throw away, use AI without much worry. For brand assets you'll keep for a long time, don't use AI-only output. When people appear in an image, check once more.
And whatever the case, keep a record.
The habit of making a text file in the project folder and noting the tool, the date and the prompt. The most tedious thing, and the most useful. Someday when someone asks, "How did you make this?", this is what separates those who can answer from those who can't.