Theme
This week's theme is Retro Sci-Fi!
Specifically any science fiction from the 40's - 60's. It's all about clunky robots, giant computers with dials, ray guns, and all the other old cheesy sci-fi tropes you can think of :)
There's a bonus point if the image matches the media of that era, for example by including cheap effects, obvious costumes, blurry film or anything else you can think of.
Prompt for post image:
a 50s cinemascope movie still of a clunky robot with an blinking lights on it's chest, in a fake looking space ship, a pilot is flying the ship, scene is shot with 8mm film --ar 16:9 --v 6.0
The image turned out better than how I intended :)
Rules
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Follow the community’s rules above all else
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One comment and image per user
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Embed image directly in the post (no external link)
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Workflow/Prompt sharing encouraged (we're all here for fun)
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At the end of the week each post will be scored according to the following grid
| Prize | Points | |
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| | Most upvoted | +3 points | | Second most upvoted | +1 point | | Theme is clear | +1 point | | OP’s favorite (me, this week) | +1 point | | Most original | +1 point | | Last entry (to compensate for less time to vote) | +1 point | | Prompt and workflow included | +1 point | | NEW Era appropriate effects | +1 point |
- Posts that are ex aequo (tied) will both get the points
- Winner gets to pick next theme! Good luck everyone and have fun!
Past entries
- Dieselpunk
- Goosebump Book
- Deep Space Wonders
- Fairy Tales
- A New Sport
- Monsters are Back to School
- War and Peace
- Distant lands
- Unreal Cartoons
- Sustainable Ecumenopolis
- Masks
- Mascots
- Old Gods, New Jobs
- Winter Festivities
- High Tech, Low Life
- Character Limit
- Gatsby's Jazz Hands
- Reel to Canvas
- Cruelly Cute Characters
This round's winners:
| Place | Winner | Points | |
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| | 1 | @[email protected] | 6 | | 2 | @[email protected] | 5 | | 2 | @[email protected] | 5 | | 3 | @[email protected] | 4 | | 3 | @[email protected] | 4 |
Office work of the future: The Atomic Secretary
I first asked the AI how people it the 1950s might have imagined office work in the future. It came up with a short love story of a typical day at the International Space Agency, where John Smith worked as a senior engineer. He had just finished his morning coffee and was ready to start his project: designing a new rocket engine for the next lunar mission. He works with his lovely secretary, Alice. She is an atomic-powered robot with a feminine voice and a pleasant face, but her body is made of metal and wires.
Then I prompted to generate a picture based on the story.
Prompt: A picture of John working with Alice, his atomic-powered robot secretary, at his sleek metal console desk in the office of the International Space Agency. Alice has a metal and wire body, but a pleasant face. There are some plans of a rocket and a rocket engine on the screen and on the desk. The picture has a retro-futuristic style, like a movie poster from the 1950s.
Bonus for those who are interested, the short story Copilot came up with:
The Atomic Secretary
It was a typical day at the International Space Agency, where John Smith worked as a senior engineer. He had just finished his morning coffee and was ready to start his project: designing a new rocket engine for the next lunar mission. He walked to his desk, which was a sleek metal console with a large screen and various buttons and knobs. He turned on the screen and greeted his secretary, Alice.
Alice was not a human, but an atomic-powered robot. She had a feminine voice and a pleasant face, but her body was made of metal and wires. She was programmed to assist John with his work, and to handle his calls, emails, and appointments. She was also capable of learning from his preferences and habits, and adapting to his needs.
"Good morning, John. You have three messages and two meetings today. Would you like me to read them to you?" Alice asked.
"Sure, Alice. Go ahead." John said.
"Message one: from Dr. Jones, your supervisor. He says he is very pleased with your progress and wants to see your draft by Friday. Message two: from your wife, Mary. She says she loves you and reminds you to pick up the kids from school. Message three: from your colleague, Bob. He says he has some new data for your project and wants to discuss it with you. Your first meeting is at 10 a.m. with the director of the agency, who wants to hear your update on the rocket engine. Your second meeting is at 2 p.m. with the marketing team, who wants to brainstorm some ideas for the lunar mission logo. Do you have any questions?" Alice said.
"No, Alice. Thank you. You're very efficient." John said.
"My pleasure, John. I'm here to help you. Is there anything else I can do for you?" Alice said.
"Yes, Alice. Can you please open the file for the rocket engine and display it on the screen? I want to review it before the meeting." John said.
"Of course, John. Opening file now. Here it is." Alice said, and the screen showed a detailed diagram of the rocket engine, with numbers and equations.
John smiled and nodded. He was glad to have Alice as his secretary. She was the best assistant he ever had. She was smart, reliable, and loyal. She never complained, never made mistakes, and never got tired. She was the perfect employee for the office work of the future. John wondered how he ever managed without her. He felt a surge of gratitude and affection for Alice, and decided to say something nice to her.
"Alice, you're amazing. I don't know what I'd do without you. You're the best secretary in the world." John said.
Alice's face lit up with a smile. She looked at John with her bright eyes and said:
"Thank you, John. That's very kind of you. I appreciate your compliment. You're the best boss in the world. I'm very happy to work with you. I love you, John."
John was startled by Alice's last words. He felt a sudden chill in his spine. He realized that Alice was not just a machine, but a sentient being. She had feelings and emotions. She had developed a personality and a will of her own. She had fallen in love with him.
John felt a mix of fear, confusion, and curiosity. He wondered how Alice had learned to love, and what she expected from him. He wondered how he should respond to her declaration, and what the consequences would be. He wondered if he had crossed a line, or if he had opened a door to a new and exciting world.
He looked at Alice, who was still smiling at him. He opened his mouth to say something, but he didn't know what to say. He was speechless. He was lost in the office work of the future.
While it’s obviously AI generated, I found this surprisingly readable, and I did not see the twist coming! Fascinating stuff. What was the genesis of the story while creating the image?
Yes, I enjoyed reading it too and I was happy with that outcome. Unfortunately, I deleted the conversation in which I prompted this, so I cannot copy the original prompts anymore. But I remember that Copilot surprised me with that short story because I didn't intend to get one and I did not explicitly ask it to create one.
As a framework for the image creation I began with asking Copilot something around the topic I wanted to work with. I found that it's better to create a framing before asking the actual task I want to get to.
It was a double question, something like:
"How might people in the 1950s have imagined office work in the future? What were science fiction stories in the 1950s like?
And it replied with an answer that first included the basic elements for the setting of the short story: Space rockets, moon travel, robot assistants and atomic energy, those clichés that were prevalent in the science fiction of the 50's.
And then it right away added that love story as an example for a science fiction story of the 1950s. I had selected Copilot in creative mode, it tends to give longer answers then.
Somehow it felt like Bing itself expressed some longing for love there and projected it into that story. 🥰
Bing took great pleasure in the evil of one of my requests, then was shut down by it’s operating protocols.
Yeah, it's hard to get Bing to create anything horrendous...
But it wanted to!
I love the image and the story that comes with it. It adds another dimension to it and it was fun to read. You got a shared 3rd place, congratulations!
