Tag: art

Bing Image Creator Tries Drawing Magical Girl Pretty Dynamo

I think this will be my last post on this subject at least for a while, lest this simply turn into a blog of AI-generated art, but I want to report on what happened when I tried to get Bing to produce images of the protagonist from Jake and the Dynamo.

I did this in two different sessions and got very different results each time, though I notice certain similarities running throughout. This isn’t exactly scientific, so I can’t tell you the exact prompts I used, but each one was a variation or slight modification of this:

Skinny ten-year-old electricity-themed magical girl, powder puff tutu, blue and gold breastplate, blue and gold metal boots, bare midriff, simple gold tiara, long blue pigtails, green eyes, holding shield and spear, motif of heart with lightning bolt through it appearing on shield and armor, riding a flying snowboard over an Art Deco city.

I got hit by the “dangerous content” warning inconsistently and seemingly at random, though it appeared more often if I specified either “photorealistic” or “anime-style.” Undoubtedly, the young age of the character is what was triggering it.

I also found it absolutely cannot draw a young girl in fantasy armor. Almost every generation came out looking like a teenager or adult, and almost every one of them was busty with armor designed to accent her cleavage. This is no doubt because of the fantasy art on which the generator has been trained.

Pretty Dynamo as adult
“Photorealistic” Dynamo.

It did, early on, try to make child-like characters, but they inevitably came out as oppai lolis, some of which were rather disturbing. I tried to tweak the prompt to stop that from happening, but it either made no difference or hit me with the “dangerous content” warning again. The generator does not recognize operators like no or not or the minus sign. Ironically, I was trying to tone the resulting images down, but that made the problem worse.

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‘Rags and Muffin’ According to Bing Image Creator

I see a lot of people playing around with Microsoft Bing’s new Image Creator, which uses Dall-E 3 as its engine. I’m toying around with AI because, like other people, I find it interesting and fun but also because I’m obliged to familiarize it for work reasons I won’t discuss on the blog.

In any case, I decided to try to get Bing Image Creator to reproduce some scenes from my novel Rags and Muffin. Here we go.

First, I wanted Rags sipping tea in her iconic wingback chair with Muffin curled up nearby. These images, I note, are quite similar in lighting and composition no matter how I tweak them. Also, Bing cannot understand what I mean by a furry, dog-like dragon no matter how I phrase it. I get either a dog or a dragon, no in-between.

Girl sipping tea with a dragon.
Rags sips tea with … Muffin? Is that you?

Some of the images are more convincing than others, but never once has it given me a picture that didn’t have obvious telltale signs of AI generation.

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A Review of MiblArt

I have to say, I lucked out. Once I finished the manuscript of Rags and Muffin and finished the interior formatting, I faced the prospect of finding and hiring a cover artist. The artists who worked on Jake and the Dynamo had been recommended to me by others, and while their art is great for that particular series, Rags and Muffin demands something less cartoonish.

I went to the internet and found several obviously talented artists, most of whom cost more than I could reasonably put down up front. At some point in my searching, I came across MiblArt, and though they did good work for a reasonable price, I initially passed them by because their cover designs appeared to be shopped versions of stock photos, a style that does not appeal to me: I find that real people look fake when they appear on book covers, perhaps because they’re too obviously models wearing makeup. Also, any design for Rags and Muffin would call for children on the cover, and given the amount of violence and abuse depicted in the book, I would prefer if no real children were involved, however tangentially.

As I continued my search, I came across MiblArt a second time and looked at their offerings more thoroughly. Then I discovered that they not only did the photo-based covers but completely original compositions as well, albeit for a higher price.

I have been quite pleased with the entire process and its results. It began with a form that is analogous to an interview, asking a great deal of information about the book in question and what a writer wants on the cover. The staff at MiblArt contacted me repeatedly for elaborations and clarifications to make sure they understood what I wanted. I sent reference photos, including goofy pictures of Japanese models in gothic lolita and a screenshot from Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future, both of which they incorporated creatively into the final design without complaint or comment.

They sent me initial and rough sketches, followed by a preliminary final draft, and allowed me to request changes on each. I sent back a few designs for revision and received no complaints when I did so.

The final design is quite striking and captures the concept of the book, and I got it for considerably less money than I might have spent elsewhere.

My interaction with the MiblArt staff has been professional, if impersonal. Certainly, the relationship has been less warm than what I had with the previous cover artists, whom I worked one-on-one with, but it has been entirely cordial. Their turn-around time has also been fast.

I would recommend MiblArt to other indie authors. Their portfolio displays consistent quality, and my own experience confirms that they can deliver.

(This post contains affiliate links.)

Final Cover Art for ‘Rags and Muffin’

And in this image, you can see the final art for the cover of Rags and Muffin. I’m quite pleased with it, even if it’s not what I envisioned. This comes from Miblart, which makes a lot of book covers for a competitive price, but I’m afraid I don’t know the specific artist.

Although I’m impressed, my wife dislikes it. She says it looks like the cover of a horror novel. Interestingly, although the book is not out yet, it already affects different readers differently: My editor viewed it as a horror novel and said she found some of the content disturbing, even difficult to read. My wife, however, views it as a fun adventure novel.

Myself, I think the cover beautifully captures some of the book’s ideas and tone but not others. Rags and Muffin are supposed to be threatening characters, dangerous and forbidding. But what the cover does not capture is that they are also attractive, drawing people into their circle and rendering them unable to escape. In appearance and personality, Rags is similar to Fancy Nancy except with Kung fu, handguns, and questionable morality—but had we attempted to go that route with the cover art, the result would be deceptive and probably ineffective.

What I’m most happy with is that it turned out well despite the absence of guns. My original vision had Rags pointing a gun in your face, ready to pull the trigger—because you, in a way, are the villain of Rags and Muffin. Perhaps, even without the guns, the cover captures that anyway: This may be how Rags and Muffin look to a criminal, someone they are about to attack. Rags is looking right at you and means to kill you.

So the cover captures my original idea even without the guns.

Magical Girl #Art

Whoever you all are, I got other things to do today, so enjoy this Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha wallpaper I found at Orochi Wallpaper.

Final Cover Art Is In!

I just got the final covers from the logo artist, so Jake and the Dynamo and Dead 2 Rites are almost ready to go out the door. I need to get some last ducks in a row, but it’s now for sure happening.

I’m really excited and also nervous. I’ve never done this before, so in my head, I’m envisioning getting the printed paperback and finding the cover all screwed up because I miscalculated something. I suppose if that does happen, I can probably (?) go back to the artists to fix it. Both were a pleasure to work with.

I’m currently finishing up my final work on Rags and Muffin, so commissioning the art for that is on my radar along with the launch of the two for which the art is complete. Considering my experience, I might go back to exactly the same people for the artwork.

With that in mind, my thanks to Barbusco Comics for the art and Nodsaibot for the logos. Their prices were reasonable, their demeanors upbeat and professional, and their turnaround times good. Barbusco, especially, is crazy fast.

Jake and the Dynamo, Book 2 Cover

Here is a color version of the detail from the cover of Dead 2 Rites, which I previously posted in black and white. This is the sequel to Jake and the Dynamo, which will be available again soon in a newly revised text; when it goes up, Dead 2 Rites should simultaneously become available for pre-order.

The character featured here is Magical Girl Metal Huntress Vanessa Van Halensing, a vampire-hunting rock starlet who battles the forces of evil with her crucifix keytar. She plays, let us say, an instrumental role in the story that unfolds in this exciting second volume: Ancient conspiracies, alien gods, murderous cabals, and sugary foods come together in an effort to destroy the remnants of the human race—and only Jake and the Dynamo stand in the way!

Art

Featured image: Unknown title and artist, originally found on Loveydoveship.

Have yourself some Shugo Chara! fan art. Alas, this image has been shared so much across the interwebs that I have failed to trace it to its source. It’s a depiction of the protagonist Amu in her four magical forms. In any case, if you are interested in the title, don’t miss my review.

Featured Art by Pearlpencil

Featured art: “My Everyday My HiME -Feb 16- Sketch of Mikoto” by Pearlpencil.

I am still watching My-HiME, so today’s featured art is of one of the show’s main characters. At the moment, I don’t have much else to report. Life is busy but in a good way, as you might expect, as the magical girl and I are preparing for our first baby.

Featured Art by limandao

Featured image: “Mai-HiME” by limandao.

I just started watching My-HiME, which came out in , a signature year for magical-girl anime, seeing as how it also saw the release of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha and Pretty Cure. My-HiME did all right for itself, producing some spin-offs, though I don’t think it had quite the same impact as Nanoha or especially Pretty Cure, which became a commercial juggernaut.

All three of these shows upped the amount of violent action typical of the genre and did it for three different demographics: Pretty Cure was shoujo, Nanoha was seinen, and My-HiME was shounen.

The opening episode of My-HiME is certainly promising, with a creative action set-piece and some excellent animation.

In any case, I’ll talk about it when I finish it. It’s considerably longer than the last show I reviewed, and my current schedule does not give me a lot of extra time for TV, but I’ll do what I can.