Entering a New Medium: the Oracle Deck

 by Shaun Lawton

                           This image was conjured from nothing but my own chosen words

I've made a turn from analog to digital methods insofar as the materials I use for my illustrations, having once been more often represented by watercolors and magic markers left to be absorbed by white blank glossy photographic paper, I'm now enjoying a degree of creativity seldom imagined by having been introduced to the world of VQGAN + CLIP art (being generated in countless iterations by virtue of AI-assisted algorithms reconfiguring text prompts and source images pixel by pixel into any variety of what might seem to be preprogrammed structures, but more or less stand as randomly-generated abstractions whose forms are interpenetrated by the subtle use of text-harmonics, buried as deeply steeped as the poet behind the wheel cares to steer his or her mind-car into the wild and abandoned field of retrospective analysis of the stored files of human consciousness) and I'm enjoying the readily available new and easy-to-use apps such as Wombo Dream, now appearing on smartphone screens everywhere.  

   The image above (in hues of green against a crimson backdrop) is a detail cropped from a larger image that I generated using the Wombo Dream app on my iPhone. I messed with the exposure (reducing the brightness by around twenty percent, heightening the contrast and shadows respectively, and reducing the highlights), then I altered the hue by one-hundred-and-eighty degrees. I think I dialed the saturation and temperature down and back up until I had that lovely shade of blood red within the interstices of the green networking that appears to issue from the figure like stylized rags of a cape. His head appears within a clear bubble helm or force field; a sort of astronaut presumably in his element. The original image I've referred to as "Jud's Fall," in reference to the character in my story Speed Demon, now published by the Freezine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (in issue # 31).    

   Applying the principles which control the outcome of text-to-image software prompting into exciting and unique ways has led me to begin building various decks and packs of cards with AI-assisted imagery on them into either one grand multiverse deck or perhaps various interesting oracle packs.  (I was led to think of this from the Wombo Dream app, which formats the images into the shape of cards.)  Below is one which resulted from the following text prompt: "Man falls through outer space electromagnetic toward another planet." (Some of my Wombo Dream cards I keep the word prompts, because they are autosaved as 'dream' by the system.)   This one came out rather unique since you can make out a face somewhat grossly distorted behind the translucent space helmet bubble they appear to be wearing.  

 

I'm happy with how this image resulted, especially since the garish hues selected by whichever style on the Wombo app I used can easily enough be manipulated or toned down or otherwise altered, and considering one may utilize any number of websites or apps to further distort the source image, you're looking at a pretty happy online graphic artist, here.  So I went ahead and ran this one through Deep Dream Generator, and here are the somewhat fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants results generated with my initial attempt: 

I chose the "Carina Panorama" template from Deep Dream Generator (for reasons which serve to highlight the scene in my story) and the results fall more or less within the parameters of my vision's range (although I'm not 100% satisfied, it'll do for now). The scope of this processing even seems to have affected the character wearing the space helm. There's definitely a more pronounced "space cadet" look to it, almost reflecting a sort of homage to the "it's full of stars" meme from the 2001 film sequel.  Of course I'm using it for my story, at least for now. I can't believe how it all came together and ended up turning out.  And since I've already generated well over one hundred different oracle cards using the Wombo Dream app, I've got more than enough work on my hands coming up sorting them all out into their respective decks and packs.  Two of my early favorites are the Shape Shifters Pack and the Kaiju Battle Deck.  Collect them all and begin divining the future of your fantasy life...