sholio | I should be in bed but I'm doing this instead

I learned tonight that Microsoft has a brand new, extremely powerful AI image generator built into Bing that is both very good at generating to specification, and also free (for now).

https://www.bing.com/create

So naturally I started trying to make it give me Biggles and EvS, as you do.

I started with "wwi aviator confronting a German spy in a tent in the desert, lamplight and shadows, realistic style" and got this:

It really wanted to give them beards, but that last one - leaving aside that the person he's meeting is CLEARLY not EvS - is really a very credible Biggles:

Some intermediate stages with prompts such as "a blond-haired wwi aviator in the desert meets a German spy wearing Arab garb and riding on a camel, realistic style" resulted in various innovations including EvS riding a camel that was flying a giant German flag from the saddle. A+++ spying, very sneaky.

But eventually I figured out that the trick is to tell it to give me a dashing spy with piercing blue eyes, which resulted in this romance-cover-style EvS:

dark-haired man on a camel with bright blue eyes looking directly at the viewer in a romance novel pose

(A bit too modern-looking, this is EvS in the 2005 movie adaptation of Flies East in which he is played by Pierce Brosnan, but HNNNGGGHH.)

And when I added in a handsome blond WWI aviator, I got easily my favorite of the bunch:

looks a bit like a pulp illustration, blond man looking to left with dark-haired man wearing turban leaning in behind him, both extremely hot

This one didn't really nail them as well (or at all), but it definitely figured out the romance aspect:

dark-haired man in foreground, out of focus blond man in background leaning in as if for a kiss

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Hehe
They do get better, don't they? And more romantic. Steel-blue eyes: check. Handsome, if hardly delicate, Biggles: check.

Shame about all the facial hair. AI must have a thing for it. :D
Hmm. Did you try to add in "cleanshaven" as a directive?

I did not! I may have to try again tonight when I have time ... though someone just told me it's already become un-free or in the process of becoming un-free - bummer!

I think it is free, it was a miscommunication

Oh no, how rude of it. :(

(no subject)

sholio - 2023-10-03 18:41 (UTC) - Expand

sweetsorcery - 2023-10-03 19:08 (UTC) - Expand

It really NAILED the 'romantic' bit of the prompt, didn't it! Pierce Brosnan!EvS on a camel is excellent fun. Will it do a monocle and cigarette holder if you ask really nicely, or is it morally opposed to smoking the way ChatGPT was?

Also I am entertained by its commitment to including a Maltese cross in all the WW1-specific ones :-D

I love the idea of a German spy riding a camel with a gigantic German flag, lol!! Yep, very good idea for a spy, that! :D

Love, love love these. It definitely has a preference for Biggles

I asked for Sakhalin EvS:

four ai-generated images of EvS in the Sakhalin gulag

And then I tried for an oil painting style WW1 EvS with the word 'foppish' in the request and got these:

four ai-generated images of EvS in WW1

And since I did not specify male, I accidentally got my favourite of all: behold Erica von Stalhein!

ai-generated female EvS in military uniform with cigarette holder and monocle

The Sakhalin one looks a bit like Mark Hamill after a really rough time.

Oh, THAT'S who he reminds me of! I was trying to figure it out. xD

OH NO THE ERICH IN PRISON ONES

.... actually the ones I love best of these in a "it really COULD be him" way are #2 of the Sakhalin ones (which actually does look like someone who's not very old and has been absolutely *beaten down* by hard living) and #3 in the "foppish" ones which I could 100% believe as a portrait of Erich as a 17-year-old in school right before his spy years. :D

Also completely here for Erica von Stalhein. :D I got a few Ericas when I gave it a set of prompts along the lines of "a dashing blue-eyed spy and a handsome blond WWI aviator flee into the desert together" - this one got it to give me a female spy at least half the time, lol.

No 2 of Sakhalin is a good one, I agree. I told it shackles around the ankles, but as you can see it believes in chains around the neck instead...

Re: oh no this is fun

sholio - 2023-10-03 15:37 (UTC) - Expand

Actually you should get to enjoy (for certain values of enjoy) the absolutely most CURSED set that I did, in which the prompt was (paraphrasing from memory) "an escaping prisoner in a striped convict's uniform escapes on a horse while pulling another prisoner up by the hand." The results were ... not exactly what I had in mind in any way.

(Click to make bigger, if you really want to ...)

ETA: My favorite failure modes here include the cowboy hats and the various attempts to put a convict uniform on at least one horse.

Edited 2023-10-03 14:58 (UTC)

philomytha - 2023-10-03 15:23 (UTC) - Expand

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Oh, and ALSO, I am now EXTREMELY taken with the idea (based on #1 in the "foppish EvS" set) of Erich for about 6 months in 1915 or so having cultivated an Extremely Regrettable fashionable mustache and Biggles finding a picture of it ...

philomytha - 2023-10-03 15:25 (UTC) - Expand

Is that Willem Dafoe? 🤔

I'd find some cross between Foppish #2 and #3 very believable for a young EvS with quite the attitude. :) Also... they're smoking in more ways than one.

Edited 2023-10-03 19:13 (UTC)

viridian5 - 2023-10-04 04:59 (UTC) - Expand

It's definitely twigged the romantic aspect, hasn't it?

Biggles in that second last one has clearly been modelled on Brendan Fraser in The Mummy (and I can't honestly say I'm sad about it, even if it is a bit of a stretch from book descriptions of Biggles :DDD). And Erich von Brosnan on his camel is just glorious.

I really want to see the not remotely stealthy German spy camel...

As requested: stealth camel. (Click for bigger.)

The main problem with this set was that it was really struggling with where to put the aviator goggles and kept choosing wrong ...

sweetsorcery - 2023-10-03 18:47 (UTC) - Expand

black_bentley - 2023-10-04 13:45 (UTC) - Expand

That's the one I couldn't put a name to. Just 'oh, him in the Mummy'. These are really excellent, aren't they?

LMAO.

p.s. I love the 2nd one from the first batch of 4. :D

Edited 2023-10-03 13:20 (UTC)

These are great, although some of them definitely belong on the front of bodice ripper paperbacks.

I'm jolly glad you chose to do these instead. Thank you for that very good decision. A really shame it's now 'unfree' but it looks as though you had good fun. And picking trying to pick the correct parameters must have been very frustrating at times.

It's still available

As the above comment says! I was mistaken and it is still free to use.

Oh, wow that came out so good.

I don't even want to think about how much time I spent acquiring these. 😳 Posted to my own account, because you don't need a comment this massive and spammy.

EvS riding a camel that was flying a giant German flag from the saddle. A+++ spying, very sneaky.
This has come to be my expectation for AI.

You have some good ones below that, though!