Imagining a Character's Background

Yes, “imagine” is a pun. I like puns.

While I’m working to get the graphic novel finished, I’m now also putting together some promotional stuff I brainstormed over a year ago.

While doing that, I found out Grok’s “Imagine” image and video generator isn’t just for smartphones anymore. So I set it up on my desktop. Just for giggles, I tested to see if it could generate some videos that supplement the bare-bones origin story of TurboKnight in the book.

Here’s some minor wonkiness that’s typical. I had to edit the image manually to make the C.O.’s pants khaki, but it couldn’t decide what color to make his jacket. It put chevrons on flight suits and even tried turning a U.S. Flag patch into a chevron (FYI putting “NO CHEVRONS” in the prompt makes it add even more chevrons, as in this next image.

Imagine doesn’t generate video straight from text on the normal interface. But if you give it the starting image, it can run with it. It can even generate the starting image you use, though. About 5% of the time, it may give you something usable (depending on what you’re trying to accomplish). I’m still learning how it works and all it’s peculiarities.

One of the many facts I didn’t know starting out was that it can also generate sounds. When I turned the sound on, I noticed it was adding music and, occasionally, rudimentary sound effects—like footsteps. So I started listening every time it generated something…and for one clip it added a voice.

I put a sentence in quotation marks, added it to a prompt, and ran it. Lo and behold, it generated the voice, too. It even had the character’s mouth move—but with synchronization borrowed from a ‘60s Godzilla movie.

In this one note: 1. tall skinny aspect ratio I didn’t know how to change at first 2. an almost photorealist style Imagine REALLY wants to generate every single time 3. the C.O.’s uniform looks more German than American 4. ribbons on bomber jackets, worn over Class B uniforms.

Back to TurboKnight: One day in early 1945, he was shot down by German ground fire during the Bulge. I thought it would be cool to have him sitting at a pilot’s briefing before that last fateful mission. You know the kind—you’ve seen it in a dozen WWII movies. So had George Lucas before adapting it into a sci-fi context for the scene before the attack on the Death Star in the first Star Wars movie.

I think the quote probably pushed the limits of Imagine’s running time for a clip (six seconds?), but it did the voice not half-bad.

I probably went through 40 images before getting this one, then about 10 videos before getting one I settled for. AI goofiness included it hopelessly distorting the map of Fortress Europe; putting chevrons on the officers; getting the uniform colors wrong; showing pilots wearing Class A uniforms (including neckties) with their flight helmets; wearing headsets during the briefing or helmets partly made of their hair; the commanding officer stepping off the stage onto thin air; all the pilots responding vocally in unison, “Yes sir; about time!” all of them moving in perfect synch—including universal left-handed writing.

In this last image, Imagine gave the pilots a later-generation flight helmet than what was used in WWII—probably Korea or maybe even Vietnam vintage—but it’s obvious it’s not gonna be perfect and it took a long time to even get to this point.

For those who might be wondering: “SHAEF” stands for “Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Forces.”

Speaking of the Graphic Novel:

If you like comics, visit Virtual Pulp Press, where I’m posting episodes of my new ensemble superhero graphic novel, Threat Quotient. I plan to launch a campaign for the print version in the spring, but you can read it digitally for free in the mean time.

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