NICOLA GINZLER

Senior Graphic Designer
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AI generated images of a fox with blue wings in a desert environment, created using Midjourney and Adobe Firefly software. Type below images reads "See Image 26 for an AI-generated “blend” of these two images."

Firefly Fox-bird Friday

I was recently authorized to try out the Beta version of Adobe Firefly, the company’s offering for AI image generation. Adobe has since thrown open the gates and anyone can use Firefly Beta, no waiting. (This post isn’t about fonts at all, so it’s not really a Font Friday, but this AI stuff is too much fun to pass up.)

Unlike other AI software such as Midjourney (sample, above left), Firefly (sample, above right) maintains relatively ethical sourcing for the images it pulls. Firefly pulls images only from “Adobe Stock”—images for which Adobe holds copyrights—and images in the public domain. The artists who created the original content have been paid for their art and consented to its use—although I don’t know if they’ll be paid any additional money now that the Adobe Stock photos may have a wider audience. Midjourney and similar image generation software pull from all art currently online, without regard for artist payment or copyright status. This means, however, that Firefly has a much smaller pool of images to draw from. Some of their rendering and image-melding for images with a “photorealistic” prompt is pretty crude too, in my opinion. Adding artistic styles such as “watercolor” to the prompts can look lovely though. In any case, Firefly is still in Beta, so I’m sure it’ll improve.

Interestingly, the command for creating an image from prompts in Firefly is /generate; in Midjourney, it’s /imagine. Different views of the same process. Midjourney has a number of other commands. See Image 26 for two images—one Midjourney, one Firefly—put together using the /blend command (click on image to enlarge). It seems to have weighted the Midjourney image much more heavily; I’m not sure why. I’ll explore the weighting feature in future posts.

Image 1b - The background is a photorealistic outdoor shot of the Black Rock Desert in Nevada, where Burning Man is held. The dry, cracked, light-colored playa stretches back to mountains on the horizon, with low clouds above them. The sky is bright blue and the sun is directly overhead. In the foreground is a kit fox sitting on its haunches. It is covered with almost fluorescent bright pink feathers and has a large pair of wings, outstretched, jutting from its shoulders. The insides of the ears and the lower legs are bright yellow-gold.
Image 1 (Midjourney, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator) – The same fox-bird image as Image 2, but the fox-bird itself is vibrant pink, with the insides of the ears and the lower legs changed to yellow-gold. The background has been extended on all sides.

How this all started

Every year, the Burning Man organization hands out a welcome package to people arriving. This includes stickers designed by participants such as myself. This year the theme is “Animalia” and for my sticker designs (3″ x 3″ square) I chose to take that literally. Visit my post Frequent Font Friday to see more sticker designs.

For the fox-bird design (Image 1) I started with the title “(AI)nimalia”: an AI-generated image of an animal. First, I used AI image generation software Midjourney to create the initial image of the fox-bird, then completed the design using Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator.

The fox-bird was originally all blue (Image 2). I brought the image into Adobe Photoshop and changed the blue feathers to vibrant pink and the insides of the ears and the lower legs to yellow-gold. I also made other adjustments to the playa surface, clouds and mountains.

I then brought the image into Adobe Illustrator and added the black bar and text, with “(AI)” bright red-pink and “nimalia / Black Rock City 2023” white. The typeface is Sneaker Pro from Adobe Fonts.

I like the original all-blue image a lot and considered it for this use, but the single-color image doesn’t show up as well in the small 3″ x 3″ format.

The other fox-bird images on this page are experiments and play!

I used the same prompts for both Firefly and Midjourney: “photorealistic, Black Rock Desert, Nevada, with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders,” plus other prompts about lighting and composition.

Below are some images from Midjourney and Firefly. Note that neither platform pays a lot of attention to the “4 legs” prompt.

Image 1 (Midjourney) - Midjourney AI image generation software prompts: photorealistic black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feather 2 wings jutting from its shoulder
Image 2 (Midjourney) – This was the image I chose for the (AI)nimalia sticker design: by far the closest to what I was envisioning. The same fox-bird as in Image 1, but the original color was light blue.
Midjourney image 2 - photorealistic black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feather 2 wings jutting from its shoulder
Image 4 (Midjourney) – Three-legged fox with dark blue feathers and yellow eyes stares ominously at the viewer; wings are down and bedraggled behind shoulders. There are mountains in the distance.
Midjourney image 3 - photorealistic black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feather 2 wings jutting from its shoulder
Image 6 (Midjourney) – Smirking three-legged fox with pale orange downy feathers on its head and chest also has long brilliant blue feathers sprouting from its shoulders and back. A single black feather floats in the air above its head. There are mountains or hills in the far distance.
Image 2 (Firefly) - photorealistic black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feather 2 wings jutting from its shoulder
Image 3 (Firefly) – A skeletal four-legged fox, rendered in a cartoonish manner against a realistic desert background, has dark blue wings open and held high. Tail is detached and poorly silhouetted. Arid hills are in the near distance.
Firefly image 2 - photorealistic black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feather 2 wings jutting from its shoulder
Image 5 (Firefly) – A four-legged red fox with dark blue wings outspread is staring at the viewer. Chest has blue-and-white feathers. Soil has deep cracks and fissures. The sky above the horizon is orange-brown.
Firefly image 3 - photorealistic black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feather 2 wings jutting from its shoulder
Image 7 (Firefly) – Three-legged fox in foreground is either black or in deep shadow from side lighting. One black wing with beautiful iridescent teal feathers juts from its left shoulder. In the distant background, a huge three-legged fox with blue bat-like wings looks across the cracked ground towards the foreground fox. There are black mountains behind it.

The Firefly images became much more interesting with artistic styles specified. I substituted “engraving,” “oil paint,” “Pop Art,” “watercolor” or “woodblock print” for “photorealistic” with the same other prompts and got some compelling results. I tried it with Midjourney as well which was fun too. Midjourney can also mix images together with the /blend command—Image 23 shows a mix of the two images in the header. Click on images to enlarge into a gallery format.

Image 8 - Adobe Firefly AI image generation software prompts: 19th century engraving, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 8 (Firefly) – I added “19th century engraving” to the prompts and got these entertaining results.
Image 9 - Adobe Firefly AI image generation software prompts: child's crayon drawing, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 9 (Firefly) – I added “child’s crayon drawing” to the prompts for this set. I was hoping it would change the entire look of the image, so it would look uneven and scrawled, but it mostly added texture to the large flat areas. I’m not sure where the brown thing in the upper left image came from or what it represents. The fox’s tail? A stray loaf of bread? It is a mystery.
Image 10 - Midjourney AI image generation software prompts: child's crayon drawing, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 10 (Midjourney) – This is much more what I wanted from adding “child’s crayon drawing” to the prompts. Still not scrawled though.
Image 11 - Midjourney AI image generation software prompts: child's crayon drawing, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 11 (Midjourney) – Again, I used the “child’s crayon drawing” prompt but got very adult pencil sketches of our fox-bird. I do like the agitatedly drawn wings in the lower left image.
Image 12- Adobe Firefly AI image generation software prompts: oil painting, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 12 (Firefly) – Adding “oil paint” to the prompts yielded some beautiful results. The new textures are fascinating.
Image 13 - Adobe Firefly AI image generation software prompts: oil paint, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 13 (Firefly) – More images from the “oil paint” prompt. Lively and alert fox-birds!
Image 14 - Midjourney AI image generation software prompts: oil paint, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 14 (Midjourney) – I added an “oil paint” prompt and got some beautiful detail, particularly in the wings.
Image 15 - Adobe Firefly AI image generation software prompts: pop art, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 15 (Firefly) – With all the energy of the “Pop Art” style!
Image 16 - Midjourney AI image generation software prompts: pop art, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 16 (Midjourney) – More Pop Art with plenty of good wing action. I don’t yet know the best ways to get exactly what I’m envisioning, but apparently repeating prompts is a simple way to emphasize what you want to the bot. I repeated “fox with wings” twice and added a further two “wings.” Maybe it worked? I certainly got a lot more wings, and specifically, wings on foxes, this time.
Image 17 - Midjourney AI image generation software prompts: pop art, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 17 (Midjourney) – I’m considering using some of these “Pop Art” images if I redo the (AI)nimalia sticker design.
Image 18 - Midjourney AI image generation software prompts: pop art, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 18 (Midjourney) – More great wings from a “Pop Art” prompt.
Image 19 - Adobe Firefly AI image generation software prompts: watercolor, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 19 (Firefly) – I was pleasantly surprised that using the “watercolor” prompt with Firefly yielded such good results, as I was pretty underwhelmed by Firefly’s performance using a “photorealistic” prompt.
Image 20 - Firefly generation software prompts: watercolor, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 20 (Firefly) – More Firefly “watercolor.” Only three wings among four foxes here, but the upper left fox looks good.
Image 21 - Midjourney prompts - watercolor style, photorealistic black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feather 2 wings jutting from its shoulders
Image 21 (Midjourney) – “Watercolor” prompt. These images and the next four came out very well , with beautiful balanced colors in one of my favorite combinations—orange and blue. The fox-birds mostly have an appropriate number of legs, too.
Image 22 - Midjourney prompts - watercolor style, photorealistic black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feather 2 wings jutting from its shoulders
Image 22 (Midjourney) – These “watercolor” images are less successful, thematically, and less vibrant, but still have good composition.
Image 23 - Midjourney prompts - Japanese woodblock print style, photorealistic black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feather 2 wings jutting from its shoulders
Image 23 (Midjourney) – I love Japanese woodblock prints. These images with that prompt are possibly a little too delicate, but the subjects, “drawing” and colors are good translations of the medium.
Image 24 - Midjourney prompts - Japanese woodblock print style, photorealistic black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feather 2 wings jutting from its shoulders
Image 24 (Midjourney) – Another “Japanese woodblock print” prompt. I kept the stress on “fox with wings” and wings in general in the prompts, but the algorithm seems to have moved to wanting foxes with feather tails.
Image 25 - Midjourney prompts - Japanese woodblock print style, photorealistic black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feather 2 wings jutting from its shoulders
Image 25 (Midjourney) – A third “Japanese woodblock print” prompt. Finally, some wings. The bot completely departed from the prompts in the image in the lower right—a woodland scene in the desert?
Midjourney image 26 - AI generated "Image blend" of Adobe Firefly and Midjourney AI generated images. Prompts: photorealistic, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 26 (Midjourney) – This is a Midjourney “image blend” of the Midjourney and Firefly images in the header artwork. Note that while the prompts for both images included “photorealistic style,” the algorithm has prioritized the cartoonish aspect of the Midjourney image.
Image 27 - Midjourney AI image generation software prompts: photorealistic, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 27 (Midjourney) – The first image used for the Midjourney image blend in Image 26.
Image 28 - Firefly AI image generation software prompts: photorealistic, stylized, black rock desert Nevada with dry cracked ground, there is one fox vulpes macrotis looking at the viewer, 4 legs, brilliant bright blue outstretched feathers 2 wings jutting from its shoulders fox with wings
Image 28 (Firefly) – The second image used for the Midjourney image blend in Image 26.
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