Example of negative prompts

• nsfw, worst quality, low quality, depth of field, blurry, greyscale, monochrome, 3D face, nose, cropped, lowres, text, jpeg artifacts, signature, watermark, username, blurry, artist name, trademark, watermark, title, tan, muscular, loli, petite, child, infant, toddlers, chibi, sd character, multiple view, Reference sheet
• NSFW, lowres, text, error, missing fingers, extra digit, fewer digits, cropped, worst quality, low quality, normal quality, jpeg artifacts,signature, watermark, username, blurry, artist name, humans, castle, solo, bad face, deform face, nude, scantily clad, deform hands, nude, naked,  text, cropped, out of frame, worst quality, low quality, jpeg artifacts, ugly, duplicate, morbid, mutilated, extra fingers, mutated hands, poorly drawn hands, poorly drawn face, mutation, deformed, blurry, dehydrated, bad anatomy, bad proportions, extra limbs, cloned face, disfigured, gross proportions, malformed limbs, missing arms, missing legs, extra arms, extra legs, fused fingers, too many fingers, long neck,easynegative, ng_deepnegative_v1_75t, negative_hand, bad_pictures

Deviantart and AI Artworks

DeviantArt is a popular online platform that allows artists and creators to share their work with a global audience. 

The website has a vast collection of digital art, traditional art, photography, and other creative works, making it an excellent resource for inspiration and networking. 

DeviantArt also has a strong community aspect, with groups and forums dedicated to various art styles, mediums, and interests. This allows users to connect with like-minded artists, get feedback on their work, and collaborate on projects. 

Additionally, DeviantArt offers various tools and resources for artists, such as tutorials, stock images, and brushes, making it a valuable resource for both beginners and professionals. 

Recently with the AI trends DeviantArt has implemented an innovative approach to AI-generated artwork. The website has a feature called "AI Generated Art" that allows users to upload artwork that has been created with the help of AI algorithms. 

This includes artwork generated with neural networks, machine learning, and other AI techniques. The artwork is tagged as "AI Generated" and is given a unique copyright status, which allows artists to retain ownership of their work while acknowledging the contribution of the AI algorithms. This approach is designed to recognize the role of AI in the creative process while ensuring that artists are properly recognized and compensated for their work. It's an interesting and forward-thinking approach that highlights the potential of AI in the creative arts.

Overall, DeviantArt is a fantastic platform for artists and anyone interested in the creative arts, and is definitely worth checking out.

But there is this little trick I found quite useful, when wanting to credit an artist for a picture, after downloading an image, you will in the file name a code that can be pasted into an url shortener and get back to the place it was taken from.

for example this file 'just_a_cute_cat_in_a_red_bag_by_trumanbrown_dfjtqpo-pre'

correspond to this picture :

Like this picture

it contains this code 'dfjtqpo'

and when adding this code to the url shortener fav.me/

like so fav.me/dfjtqpo

you will be redirected to the creator's page 

Pretty neat

Comparison portrait combining Scarlett Johansson, Kristen Bell, Christina Aguilera, Angelina Jolie, Heather Graham

 A while ago this question was asked on this blog

What if a crazy scientist would create the perfect model by combining :

Scarlett Johansson

Kristen Bell

Christina Aguilera

Angelina Jolie

Heather Graham

Now with the assistance of AI (stable diffusion) and this website

it is possible to get several portraits:

The prompt used:

one perfect female face mixed of (Scarlett Johansson, Kristen Bell, Christina Aguilera, Angelina Jolie, Heather Graham), looking at viewer 

Helpful Resources for AI prompt

Helpful Resources

• Lexica.art - A prompt search engine
• Public Prompts - A collection of prompts for creating unique styles
• Promptbook - A generalized prompting guide
• Prompt Mania - A Stable Diffusion prompt builder

Disney Animator REACTS to AI Animation!

Very insightful to get director & animator, Aaron Blaise's opinion on the AI animation transformation

It takes the pencil out of your hand, and put the camera instead!

It is just a filter! 

Confirming that having a consistent style is the real challenge, here in both AI and traditional generation.

There is a rotoscope feels to it (this was used for Fire & Ice for example, and Lord of the Rings mostly in the end)

this new technology will reduce costs, and number of people involved ; this will enable smaller studios to produce good animation. 

Preparing a LoRa (low Rank) dataset

In my previous article, I asked to prepare a dataset of a few pictures, to train a LoRA model

This is actually paramount for successful results later, and therefor I will go deeper into that process

First gather about a dozen pictures of the same subject, this could be a character, a celebrity, or yourself (to create your avatar)

choose various background, various clothes, various face expression, angles etc ... the more divert the better

then resize the pictures to 512x512 pixels, and save it with no too much quality loss 

the name of the pictures should be 1.jpg, 2.jpg, 3.jpg etc ...

After this is done, open a text editor and create 1.txt, 2.txt, 3.txt for each pictures

In that file describes the pictures, using a keyword that will be the LoRa keyword (its name) make it simple and unique, something like Gdlf for Gandalf or Hptr for Harry Potter 

then add the variations made in the picture, the hair style, the background, the angle, the clothes etc ... separated by comma.

Here is an example:

1.jpg is

1.txt will contains:

cbpk, white hair, looking at viewer, leather jacket, yellow abstract background

The LoRa will be cbpk.safetensor (for Cyberpunk)

lexica.art is crazy good

exica.art/prompt

prompt:

highly detailed portrait of a sewer punk lady student, blue eyes, tartan hoodie, white hair by gustav klimt , art neuveau, atey ghailan, by greg rutkowski, by greg tocchini, by james gilleard, by joe fenton, by kaethe butcher, gradient yellow, black, brown and pink color scheme, grunge graffiti tag wall background

https://lexica.art/

Example of AI applications

Examples of AI Artwork

 

Using this negative prompt:

nsfw, (worst quality, low quality:1.3), (depth of field, blurry:1.2), (greyscale, monochrome:1.1), 3D face, nose, cropped, lowres, text, jpeg artifacts, signature, watermark, username, blurry, artist name, trademark, watermark, title, (tan, muscular, loli, petite, child, infant, toddlers, chibi, sd character:1.1), multiple view, Reference sheet

Transform Your Selfie into a Stunning AI Avatar with Stable Diffusion - ...

Tsu interview : Andrea Giovagnoli

Q1: Let’s start with the common question, if you can introduce yourself.

My name is Andrea , I'm a graphic designer and video maker who has a deep love for everything related to art and graphics in general.
I have two cats and a dog, they are my passion and i also love the world of anime and manga.

Q2: How did you get into tsu.co

I joined Tsu.co because a friend of mine, an artist, showed it to me and i thought it could be fun.
Well i'm not an artist but i live thanks to my "artworks", but this is another story.
I love art especially Japanese art and i admire many of my artists friends.

Q3: What are the required qualities of an artist?

Heart and passion, nothing else.

Q4: What are your visions of art for the future ?

I really don't know what can happen, i'm an expert of viral marketing and i can say that augmented reality and social media marketing will be the future of advertising,
but nobody can say how art will change in the future and i think that this the reason of art being wonderful

Thanks for the interview Andrea

you can join her network at http://www.tsu.co/gara1978

AI and singularity

Grammar and syntax as a filter

Using a stream of knowledge base (be it erotic literature, postmodernism, or legal documents) through grammar and syntax filters would enable an artificial intelligence apply to generate an infinity of text combinations, it is in essence what the megahal project is doing, using the previous dialogs as a database for further conversations.

 Here is an example of automatic generated text (with the link below)

'Do you have anything in mind? ,' he whispers, his voice low, and dark desire unfolds throughout my body as everything in my body tightens.

'Okay,' I breathe .

'Good,' he growls, his breathing harsh.

'Don't make me wait,' I whisper.

He runs his nose along my jaw, and I'm quaking like a leaf. His mouth is on mine, tasting, exploring. He plants a soft wet kiss on my lips, and a pulse of warmth pools inside me. He plants a soft kiss on my lips, his eyes glowing with lust, raising uncontrollable urges in me. His hand tightens around my hair at my nape, pulling my head back as we kiss. My subconscious glares at me.

generator is : http://www.xwray.com/fiftyshades?id=2341

Another interesting generator for post-modernism article : http://www.elsewhere.org/pomo

But as always, the catch is that the AI doesn't have a clue of what make sense or not -- that's why singularity scenario where robots or AI are taking over the world are completely idiotic and unrealistic.
 
#artificial.intelligence
#automated.text
#limitation

Interview with Peileppe

On the last post I was featuring Katybear and was interested to know about her motivation to do cosplay and I mentioned that cosplayer usually receive no income but starts to get attention from other artists in the form of Fan-art.

Today I have the privilege to interview Phillip Koops (aka Peileppe) a cartoonist that made a fan-art for Katybear

Can you give a short bio ?
Okay, I'm a Freelance designer, comic artist, developer and father of two kids
I studied Finance and Accountancy and moved from France to Ireland, and then Czech Republic where I live now.
After 8 years in the call-centre environment (I worked as tech support for Apple, and then presale support for Hewlett-Packard) I started freelancing and doing my own comics (called call-centre Grinder).

Did you study in any art school?
I’m mostly a self-taught person. I learned through trial and errors.
But I learned oil painting, and how to use charcoal and graphite in extra school activities during my teenage years.

Can you tell us someting about your typical working method,  the tools of your trade?
I use open-source software : Gimp mostly, Krita, and myPaint for digital work
But the fan-art was done with Manga Studio - I did a series of portraits.
Otherwise I draw by hand and then scan the result - and finish the work with my wacom bamboo.

Why I will never join facebook

Be a part of a "tribe"

facebook isn't the first social group that ever existed - before facebook was bolt.com (or recently orkut.com), or even now many other underdogs like hi5.com, Netlog, Tagged, Bebo co-exist, even with the previous leader of the pack which is unable to regain popularity myspace.com...

Social group website, works more or less the same way ... you create an account, you post photos, videos, links and interact with "your tribe" - be it your close family, your co-workers, or simply people that are sharing more or less the same hobbies.

Now being successful as a social group is not easy - you have to provide an attractive website, with ease of use, you have to be aware that some people will post things that are not "politically correct" or might even be illegal (in some way - like links to download of mp3 or 'bootleg' movies etc ...).

And even in many instance, the most annoying of all, porn - the all invasive porn that will find the way into any sort of network to spread.

That's the reason you will have this 'report button' - and that link will suddenly disappear, and sometime users account...

Now for the social group provider, the only thing that really count (at the beginning) is to spread like wildfire, so the first case of "porn invasion" or abuse from users will be ignored. Because the step after acquiring a large user base, is the step where user get trapped with this particular website.

Enter the Trap

After your friends, co-workers, etc ... are trapped, then basically this website will become the way you will interact with them by chat, or messages left on their timeline, the problem is that on this platform - you are under surveillance, under scrutiny of marketers, business poll, advertisers, and psychologists that are trying to manipulate, control, and brain-wash people.

And at some stage, you will have to make this choice to stay in because the interaction with your "tribe" is more important - or you will just figure out, that enough is enough and wasting your time in being part of an experiment to turn you into a lab rat, is definitely going too far.

The tactics they're is using to give the impression that it constantly grows - is that you can't ever delete your facebook account, it will stay there "deactivated" ... ready for you to reactivate it (because they know you will be back anyway).

At first (like in any abusive relationship), the partner is showing all his "attractive" side, and wants you to be part of what looks like an interesting and passionate symbiotic relationship - and as soon as you are part of it, it decides (without your accord) that well, some things should be different, and then it starts doing thing in secret, and you will feel more and more like you have been duped, you have been foolish to even start dating this asshole, but it's too late ... now he has all your stuffs, and the more you wait the harder it will get.

And that's the reason you will never find me on facebook.

Image Credit :
http://www.geekculture.com/joyoftech/joyarchives/2019.html
http://www.geekculture.com/joyoftech/joyarchives/2017.html

Additional Credit :
http://www.moreofit.com/similar-to/www.hi5.com/Top_10_Sites_Like_Hi5/

An offer you couldn't refuse

Interviews are welcome

I feel like it would be beneficial to open my blog to other people and allow them to have a place to post about their services or hobbies.

If you are an artist, freelance, cosplayer, linux developer, aspirant designer, comics writer, reiki master, spiritual healer, clairvoyant etc ... and be interested to post an interview on my blog. Here are the questions template I would use - send the completed interview to my email address

Questions

These would be the questions (feel free to modify them, as you like)

1. Can you give a short bio ?
2. What got you into "your field of expertise" ?
3. What are the required qualities of a "person in your field of expertise" ?
4. What are your visions of "your field of expertise" for the next years ?
5. What do you wish "your field of expertise" would be in the future ?

Please then add any of your links you'd like to share

Example of an interview with Katybear - found here.

P.S : As the editor I keep the right to decline posting or review part of the interview - or to discontinue this service anytime.

The service is free but donation are welcome.
See static page for more details http://alashazam.blogspot.com/p/open-for-interview.html

Brutal capitalism

Starting your own business

Many people nowadays are deciding to make the step, and start their own business, it's in the air ... The days of being an employee for life in a company is over, now people have to change career at least every 2 to 4 years.
And the prospect of having a boss in a corporations that lead a race to the bottom (term devised by Seth Godin) isn't a daily motivation.

But what are the alternatives?

The first thing obviously is to do a bit of soul searching, and understand what makes you unique and then to launch a career as an entrepreneur.
Of course we hear a lot about freelance writer, internet expert, web-designer, or virtual call-center agent, life coach, private tutor and any sort of consultant. 

But at the end of the day ... all these people are discovering that they just have switched their employee's seat for an even tougher job - where this time they have to be the employee, the decision-maker, do all the administrative tasks, and more every-day... because of aggressive deadlines, difficult customers, or a bad payment.
They find the hard way the not so glamorous side of having a business of their own, which offer many challenges like the need to build a network of customers, and build up trust with them, and all that takes time... time when the competitors starting now are making huge discount to enter the market.

So after a while, things can get ... challenging.

And that's because the economy has entered a new phase, a new revolution - and is accelerating the movement, I call this "Brutal Capitalism" and things are getting weirder and weirder ; when you start to realize that jobs like "webcam model" are basically starting to appear as viable business model or an attractive solution for young girls.

Because confronted with the choice of uninteresting jobs paid with minimal wages, they happily turning themselves into sex workers.



This is my rant for the day. Maybe "Brutal Capitalism" isn't hard enough .. "Hell Capitalism" could be more suitable.

How to add a bitcoin donation button

How to add a bitcoins donation button on blogspot

Step 1. open http://coinbase.com and log in your account

then go into "Tools" and follow instructions

Step 2. Press Generate Button code

and copy the code from here : 

Step 3. Open Blogger.com and go to "Layout" add a "html/javascript" item on your layout

and paste the code :

And voila!

Comic books aren't dead

Comic books aren't only for middle-aged geeks!

You might hear that the comic industry is not what it used to be, given the current financial crisis, the bad economy, it's one of those sector that suffer the most ... that sales are dropping ... that starting as a comic artist is really tough, that since many web-comics are available for free people would be mad to buy comics, you might hear that after the book is made (and that is still a very long and painful process compared to other medias) usually the finished book won't sale much, and you will not be able to make a second season, that the audience isn't the typical teenager, but actually more like people in their forties, ... you may hear a lot of things but if you're a fan of comics, and you had fun reading them ; you will know that comics still have their place between the new iPad, and the 3D theater sensation.

The comic book's battery won't run out of juice, and will never have a broken display! that's a given. And sharing comic book with friend is always a nice thing to do.

But except from the current circle of usual geeks and nerds (awkwardly portrayed by the bunch of fake in the Big Bang theory) -- it lacks  a bit of enthusiasm.

And then comes this girl  who goes by the name "comicbookgirl19", who will put a smile back on the face of eveeeeeery comic book fans. Just watch her show, you'll be hooked in no time!
 
http://www.youtube.com/user/comicbookgirl19
http://www.facebook.com/Comicbookgirl19/

Comic book are magic!

This is a selected video of comicbookgirl19 presenting the comic book "Flex Mentallo" - because there is an interesting twist in the story - because the 2D Universe of the comic book, intertwines with our 3D world  ; the reason being that the writer Grant Morrison, (who is a magician) introduces his pop magic in his creation with the use of sigil.

Part 1



Part 2 



comicbookgirl19 website : http://www.comicbookgirl19.com/

And as a bonus some links - featuring Moebius the grandiose French artist (RIP great man) :
BD Gest' - Preview FINAL INCAL Les quatre John Difool
http://www.comicbookbin.com/lincal001.html
http://joglikescomics.blogspot.com/2009/04/desastre-hurlant-t4-is-man-good.html

How to import Mypaint file into Gimp

MyPaint is a promising free drawing application easy to learn because very intuitive (not like his big brother Gimp).

What is particularly great with MyPaint is the ability to use the interface only through keyboard shortcuts ; allowing to focus more easily on the drawing itself.

Of course to use MyPaint with optimum result you should have a graphic tablet, because it relies heavily on pen pressure to get most of the nice effects.

MyPaint comes with an impressive package of brushes and backgrounds but as you save your file natively you'll notice it's a weird format .ora (open raster)
that isn't compatible with Gimp (2.6) - unless you had a small plugin called file-ora.py (it's a python script)

That particular plugin used to be available at the Gimp's registry but it's now located here (to download it click on "Raw blob data" on the right or click here).
Then move that file into the /.gimp-2.6/plug-ins directory and don't forget to make that file executable (chmod +x file-ora.py) after that 2 steps Gimp will recognize .ora files as it would for .xcf file.

If you are interested in learning how to use MyPaint check Ramon Miranda's youtube channel.

NB : The new version of Gimp 2.7 will be able to open .ora file without this addon

Lytebox blogger image-wrapper widget update (Nov 2011)

If you're stuck (or puzzled) because the solution posted in the previous article
How to add a "pop up" window wrapper for your Images in blogspot
doesn't work anymore ... don't panic!

The author (GeekPinoy) has changed the path to his files (go back to his original post). Which means you have to change the html template which contains the old paths (in Yellow) hosted by wimg.co.uk to the new path (in white) hosted by googlecode.com :

After the new path is entered and saved in your html template, it will work again.