Okay, so my attempt to make a sci fi comedy wasn’t so successful, which was a shame because before I started writing novels, I fancied myself a screenwriter. And while I was lucky enough in life to not only have my words appear on the big screen in a movie theater to a packed, laughing audience, (thank you all the people of Albuquerque who made that happen), it wasn’t remotely close to a day job.
In fact, once my comedy theater troupe all started going their separate ways, I needed to find an outlet for my writing, and it was clear that even though I had written somewhere upwards of nine or so screenplays at that point, none of them were going to pay my bills. I also realized that in order to make a good movie, one that wins film festivals and launches careers, you need to be good at everything.
I was really only good at one thing, writing. I always played a very small part in all the plays. I directed a play once, and had to call in some friends to fix it when I got stuck, and all the technical side of film wasn’t my specialty. I could write and make people laugh when I do. I knew that because of 20 some-odd sketch shows that I did.
I needed something that I was responsible for the success or failure of the project, so I switched to novels. Even though all my formal education was in screenwriting and playwriting (I got an MFA in Dramatic Writing from UNM), I went out and wrote novels. And if you read the first novel I ever wrote, Time Agency, and compare it to The Gladiator Journalist and Other Murderous Flora. You’ll see that I’ve learned a lot about the craft of novel making along the way.
But there is still a special place in my heart for film, thus why I really wanted this AI to work. From the Time Burrito experiment, I already knew that it wasn’t quite what I was envisioning, actors saying the lines in a setting that more or less resembles the University of New Mexico campus. Instead, I got narration with stock footage.
Perhaps I needed to lower my expectations of the technology and maybe just make an audiobook with stock footage, but people gleefully hugging each other with vivid descriptions of death wasn’t going to cut it. Since the AI seemed to be pretty good at making an eerie and forlorn mood, perhaps if I choose one of my darker stories, it would do a better job.
I picked Atmospheric Pressure for my next attempt because it’s set in the bleak future where air is no longer breathable and people live in cities connected by skyways. This whole story was inspired when I worked in downtown Minneapolis for a while. You can travel the entire area without stepping outside, and it becomes a maze. However, I quickly adjusted and would be able to navigate by walking through endless corridors and navigating landmarks such as Erberts and Gerberts or Taco John’s. I could find anything in downtown, but couldn’t tell you the crossroads.
Naturally, a dystopian, authoritarian style government was the best setting for this story, and the oppressed worker class was the natural choice of main character. I gave directions for a dark, quiet, dystopian, forlorn, lacking a sense of hope, despair, and so forth kind of prompt so it’d get the tone just right and minimize the amount of hugging and glee while people die. I knew it wasn’t going to be a movie in the traditional sense, but at this point, all I was looking for was making a neat way to tell an audiobook.
Here’s what happened:
Atmospheric Pressure Attempt 1
Okay, I’ll have to admit, this one wasn’t all that bad, and probably the best of the whole series. It screwed with little things, like the emphasis on credit rating which is more set dressing than an actual mystery. Also, a lot of the outdoor shots were impossible given the plot. I described the atmosphere in the book as so toxic, it burns your skin. The bodies left outside are nothing but bones in a few weeks from the toxicity. All those outdoor shots of a person without a full body suit won’t work, but not bad at all. At least it got the mood right.
Emboldened by my first attempt, and hoping that maybe I could create an Audiobook+ version of the book with this technology, I made a video with the text about what happens when Olson steps into the teacher’s office.
Atmospheric Pressure Attempt 2
Okay, this one just went off the rails. I could forgive a lot of the small stuff like for example the decayed structures were overgrown with plant life when I describe the outdoors as looking more like the landscape of Mars where there isn’t a single thing growing, but the biggest faux pas the computer made was when Olson said “I have your cat,” the original had a video of a creepy little girl in a cat mask holding a housecat.
I regret that I couldn’t get that version back, as with this one I kept trying to shape the video by asking it to make edits to get it more on brand with the story. Unfortunately, I was never able to get creepy cat girl back, or even shape it to a video like the first one. Oh yeah, and that giant blank screen for the second half. I really don’t know what was going on with that, but I have a theory.
My guess is when Duncan tears the head off a stuffed cat to reveal an illegal tool hidden inside was too violent for AI, and triggered a content restriction. While the particular website I used didn’t say there were any such restrictions, I did encounter that on a lot of sites I used. For example, I typed, make me a sword fight in a medieval city into one of them, and the AI said it couldn’t do that because of the restrictions. I even tried adding, like what you’d see in a Disney cartoon or a PG rated movie, and it didn’t want to budge.
My guess is when the story got to the part about Duncan’s suicide, I triggered content protections and after that, it didn’t want to put anything there, even after I tried to put some abandoned buildings or people in gas masks which I know it could do because it did it in the first one. With the second video being a failure, I decided Audiobook+ versions of my book were not going to happen.
Also, what was up with more of those people in a pharmaceutical commercial? Tired of a flaky scalp? Try Scalpra! Warning could cause explosions, failures in nuclear power plants, and world ending tsunamis. Don’t take Scalpra if you are allergic to the apocalypse and enjoy living life. 9 out of 10 patients experience minor side effects such as waking up with organs on the outside of their bodies and uncontrollable stigmata. Illegal in 49 of the 50 states. May cause skin itching.
Despite my first two attempts at becoming an AI filmmaker, I wasn’t done yet. I still had tricks up my sleeve and dare I say, these ones just may work.
Making bills and earnin’ like a baller with l33tskillz4va’s crypto fast cash is not what happens in this book!
But there are killer trees and bloody arena battles. What more could you want? Except sex. That happens too.
It also resolves plot points like certain characters stuck in a painting and what’s Petra’s mom doin’ at that volcano, yo!
I mean I guess there’s stuff like personal character growth and human connection and all that warm, squishy stuff.
But did I mention sex that happens in this book, and magic, swords, battle axes, battles, and plenty limbs being chopped off?
Oh yeah, it’s all in the third Misfits of Carnt!
Time Burrito 