This is just my 2 cents...but it's very possible that the deluge of AI images has really affected a lot of pin-up artists. Doing their kind of art takes an incredible amount of time and effort and not many people can achieve that level of work.. until now. With a few well written prompts, any random person can generate tons of similar images. There has also been a lot of scrutiny on whether the artist has started to use AI to aid their artwork now (ie: Neoartcore, Dandon) and this has caused a lot of strife amongst fans and patrons who feel short-changed and I'm pretty sure the artists are well aware of what's happening. There was even a recent case of some fella blatantly copying Sakimi's work, modifying it with AI and then calling it his original art.
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A lot of them have either reduced their output or stopped altogether citing burn-out as the main cause. Can we really blame them?
I can only surmise that Sakimi's change and her deviation to a more comic style is simply to differentiate her work from AI. It's still really good art and for the moment, AI can't really do comics. Honestly, I'm not really a fan of her comics and I do prefer her earlier pin up works but it's better than her giving up totally.