Hearing God's Voice in the Age of AI

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On Time

I'm still not sure how I feel about using AI to design fabric, but I do like how this quilt turned out.

My Spoonflower fabric arrived Wednesday. I finished the quilt Saturday. She was born Sunday.

I got to present the quilt Tuesday.

I got this one done on time because I used AI to design the fabric. I knew it was the only way I could finish a brand new quilt that fit the pink bow theme quickly.

It feels good to be timely again. I still miss Lizard more than words can say. But that's because I love intensely. Without love, there would be no grief.

Linking up with Alycia Quilts.

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Butterfly Bows

My neighbors informed me last week their June 20th baby is being induced next week. I had planned to make a pink baby quilt with bow-inspired blocks to match the theme of their new baby's room. Given recent unexpected circumstances, I wasn't sure I could get a pieced quilt together on time. I was more than three months late with a quilt for their first baby last year. I didn't want to be late again. I did something I don't do a whole lot because I like for my fabric designs to be my designs. I used AI to create 42 butterfly bows, some with very heavy editing because AI still isn't as good as the real thing. I came up with a cheater panel I am pretty pleased with, given all that's been going on.

I also made some coloring book pages in AI with more butterfly bows, and these required heavy editing, too. Nevertheless, I think this will make an appropriate quilt back. The Spoonflower fabric likely won't be here until after the new baby arrives, but quilting should take only a day or two. And, it will be a one-of-a-kind gift. Maybe one day I can turn some of my real butterfly photographs into butterfly bows with my own artistic talents and Photoshop. Until then, I think this will do.

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Smile! You're on AI!

I'd been seeing the "work" caricatures of my friends and laughing with them at some of the AI-included elements. Most people are able to prompt the image generator with the generic "caricature of me with everything you know about me and my work" and then feeding in fun details, such as my nurse friend who said she's been practicing since the dinosaurs roamed the earth. She came up with the funniest ER image with her in full medical gear riding a T-rex.

AI image-generators don't know much about me, so I knew I'd have to help quite a bit with details I don't necessarily want any AI program to know about me. But I couldn't resist. I wanted an "at-work" image of me to make us laugh, but also to make my friends and loved ones laugh.

I still have privacy concerns, but man, was this fun. I got some really fun images!!!

What I love best is these images brought back some incredible memories for Lizard, and that makes it all worth it.

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Not So Intelligent

Anyone who has followed me for the last couple of years or so knows I often use AI now to illustrate some of my blog posts because, as a full-time caregiver, I just don't get to go out and photograph the world anymore. I miss the photograpahy and exploration like crazy. I still get out when I can. But, unfortunately, sometimes I can't find a real photo in my extensive collection to properly illustrate something I'm writing about. (And I still do NOT use AI to generate my prose. I write every single post that has ever been published here on Snowcatcher, and I don't plan to ever incorporate AI-generated text.)

I also follow a few social media sites that post nothing but AI crochet. It annoys me because so many people who follow such sites have no clue the content is not real, and many are scammed on a daily basis. I enjoy the AI crochet inspiration; I often can create something similar to any AI crochet I see. But I would never, ever, try to pass off an AI image as real. It really irks me that other content producers have no such scruples.

The above video is one of the best I've seen to date (and I've viewed MANY), and I am anxious to share it with you here to help you begin to see the difference between AI and real and to let you know you are not alone if you've been duped. To help you build confidence if you've been duped and feel like you've failed because the AI-generated instructions make no sense and/or you cannot make your work look like what the picture shows.

Crochet is supposed to be fun, relaxing, inspiring, healing and validating. It can be that if content creators quit investing in get-rich-quick schemes. We know that's not going to happen. So let's do what we can on our part and not fall for the hogwash. Enjoy viewing it. Be inspired. But please don't buy into fake crochet.

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Slitherin'

I'm still tempted to put a tail on this gal because she's just getting too long to work with comfortably. Plus, I have those awesome name ideas for five sibblings... or five offspring...

I'll decide in a couple of weeks whether to bring her to an end on the 28th. It will depend how much she curls around me while I work. I can only take so much snake love... :)

In the meantime, I was playing with crocheted temperature snake prompts in AI, and some of the images of the freebie programs are HILARIOUS.

My paid subscription generated much better quality images, including this little video that I think is just adorable! Makes me want to create my own stop motion movie with my own crocheted critters!!!

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Enhanced

I keep hoping for bears in my backyard, but there have been other great visitors to my little neck of plains meet foothills. We had a gorgeous buck in the field on the other side of our fence, but all I had with me was my phone.

We had a Cooper’s hawk on the fence just after sunset, so it was nearly dark, and I had to fully zoom my point and shoot. Both photos came out pretty grainy, so I ran them through Photoshop filters and then an AI program to better illustrate the moments. I’m pretty pleased with the results.

Last weekend I got to sit on the porch for about an hour. I don't get to do that often anymore. I used to watch the birds through my window while I worked from home until 2024. Then we had to take down the birdfeeder from April to November due to bears. Now that most of the garden is going to seed, the birds are feeding again. Watching them from the porch, without a double sheet of glass between us was thrilling.

I've been cutting down most of the wild sunflowers because I didn't want them to overgrow the garden. Now that I've been able to photograph the birds feasting on the wild sunflowers again, I'm thinking maybe I'll let the sunflowers go wild again next year. That will extend my flower season by a month or more, too!

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Friday Fascination

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Wordless Wednesday

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Snowflake Nightmares

my first AI video!

Bet you never expected me to write anything like the title of this post, huh? Fear not. I have not tired of snowflakes. Don't think I ever will. But I am really growing tired of AI renditions of snowflakes.

I sometimes create AI snowflakes, such as smiling or animal crocheted snowflakes, as inspiration for upcoming patterns. MidJourney gives some acceptable results. Sometimes.

NightCafe often breaks my heart. Sometimes it feels like a waste of precious time. They recently came up with a new way to try to keep people like me (who can't consistently achieve desired results) coming back. Users earn points daily to "pay" for their creations without having to cough up coin. I've been doing that all along. I've never paid. (So why in the heck do they even care if I come back???) Now they have a new daily challenge. I earn bonus credits for doing a new image each consecutive day. I had quit using it altogether because it just wasn't helpful in generating art to illustrate my blog posts, now that I can't get out and set up actual photos for everything I write about. I thought the new challenge might be a great way to document just how poorly NightCafe performs for what I need. And boy, was I right! My daily prompt is "smiling crocheted snowflake".

Thankfully, I can set the phone down after each attempt while I wait for the program to render. I keep trying because I'm earned more than 2,000 credits now and because every once in a while, I get something I might be able to use as real crochet inspiration. I keep hoping!

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