Adam Snavely
Dec 10, 2024, 03:05 PM ET
It's not an easy time to be a Cityzen, with Manchester City lost in a malaise of draws and losses the likes of which the Pep Guardiola era has never seen. So to cheer up supporters this holiday season (and quite possibly to just start looking ahead to next year), the club and Puma have released a text-to-image AI kit generator to fans as a contest to design the club's 2026-27 third kit.
The cynical among you might look at that intro and think "you know, it sounds like Puma and City are finding a way for fans to do work for them while activating a partnership with an AI company," but just look at what Manchester City players Éderson, Stefan Ortega, and Rico Lewis have already created with the AI generator tool!
A net. For a goalkeeper kit? Groundbreaking. This particular text-to-image AI generator is made in partnership with DeepObjects, which describes itself as building "the first truly decentralized design studio" in their Twitter/X bio. One of the most common concerns with AI image generation at large are the library of images these programs use to "learn" and the blurry line of plagiarism they create.
There isn't much info on how DeepObjects and Puma trained this kit creator, but the generator's site does require users to check an agreement which lets Puma and City make adjustments to your generated design. Presumably, to make sure any image copyright issues are resolved, along with ensuring the kit looks good and sponsors and badges remain legible.
As for the generator itself, it certainly steers clear of much in the way of obvious cultural touchstones (my prompt to make a kit using the final scene of Martin Scorsese's The Departed only returned variations on a Gilded Age candlelit dinner), and it can be a little finicky to get what you want if you have really specific images in mind. Trying to create a pattern out of a crowd of people all dressed like Morning Glory-era Liam Gallagher returned several kits made of cartoon women in headscarves, as opposed bucket hats and anoraks.
If you're clever, people that are possibly not City fans can sneak in some less-than-kind references to the club, like the financial charges brought against the club by the Premier League.
If we had to guess, we'd say City isn't going to use this design.
Anyone that wants to enter the competition can do so by entering prompts in the Puma AI Creator, adjusting the pattern size, colors, collar type, sponsor and badge colors, and more. Once you've registered with the site, you're given 15 Design Credits, and each text prompt you enter uses one Design Credit. You can gain more Design Credits by reviewing other people's designs, allowing them more bites at the apple of AI kit design. For every text prompt you enter, you'll get up to four variations on your prompt, and with 15 Design Credits by default, that's a lot of potential designs.
However, contestants only get two official entries into the kit design competition by default -- a number which can also be increased by reviewing other fan designs.
A shortlist of the best designs will be created by a combination of fan reviews and kit experts from Manchester City and Puma, who will create their list of 10 favorites. From there, a public vote will be held to determine the winning kit fans will see on the pitch in 2026-27.
Cityzens that want in on the contest will have until Dec. 20 to enter their designs. The public voting on finalists designs will begin in Jan. 2025.
At the end of it all, a real-life kit will emerge next season. Ivan Dashkov, Puma's Head of Emerging Marketing Tech, called the kit creator a way for "emerging technology bringing fans closer to the game they love." But to be perfectly honest, most fans will probably be satisfied with a design that doesn't include hands with too many fingers.
