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Creative Prototyping with Generative

AI: Augmenting Creative Workflows


with Generative AI (Design Thinking)
1st Edition Patrick Parra Pennefather
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DESIGN
THINKING
SERIES

Creative
Prototyping with
Generative AI
Augmenting Creative Workflows
with Generative AI

Patrick Parra Pennefather
Design Thinking
Design Thinking is a set of strategic and creative processes and principles
used in the planning and creation of products and solutions to human-
centered design problems.
With design and innovation being two key driving principles, this
series focuses on, but not limited to, the following areas and topics:

• User Interface (UI) and User Experience (UX) Design

• Psychology of Design

• Human-Computer Interaction (HCI)

• Ergonomic Design

• Product Development and Management

• Virtual and Mixed Reality (VR/XR)

• User-Centered Built Environments and Smart Homes

• Accessibility, Sustainability and Environmental Design

• Learning and Instructional Design

• Strategy and best practices

This series publishes books aimed at designers, developers, storytellers


and problem-­solvers in industry to help them understand current
developments and best practices at the cutting edge of creativity, to invent
new paradigms and solutions, and challenge Creatives to push boundaries
to design bigger and better than before.

More information about this series at https://link.springer.com/


bookseries/15933.
Creative Prototyping
with Generative AI
Augmenting Creative
Workflows with Generative AI

Patrick Parra Pennefather


Creative Prototyping with Generative AI: Augmenting Creative Workflows
with Generative AI
Patrick Parra Pennefather
University of British Columbia
Vancouver, BC, Canada

ISBN-13 (pbk): 978-1-4842-9578-6 ISBN-13 (electronic): 978-1-4842-9579-3


https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4842-9579-3
Copyright © 2023 by Patrick Parra Pennefather
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Table of Contents
About the Author�������������������������������������������������������������������������������xiii

About the Technical Reviewers����������������������������������������������������������xv

Acknowledgments����������������������������������������������������������������������������xvii

Foreword�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������xxiii

Terminology������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ xxvii

Introduction���������������������������������������������������������������������������������� xxxvii

Chapter 1: Generating Creativity from Negativity���������������������������������1


Differentiating Between Narrow and General AI���������������������������������������������������1
More Relevant Historical Contributions to Computer Science�������������������������6
Tech Is Bad… AI Is Bad�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������8
Tech Is Good… AI Is Good�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������10
Reconciling the Hype and the Vilification of AI����������������������������������������������������16
Positive Headlines�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������17
Negative Headlines����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������18
Human-Generated Headlines������������������������������������������������������������������������18
Creative Activities to Try While Skynet Thrives����������������������������������������������������19
Five Why’s������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������21
Acknowledgments����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������26
References����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������26

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Chapter 2: Being Creative with Machines������������������������������������������27


Intelligent Machines��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������28
Simulating Human Creative Intelligence�������������������������������������������������������32
Automata�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������32
Ancient Musical Robot Bands������������������������������������������������������������������������35
Key Takeaways for Creatives�������������������������������������������������������������������������37
Automata That Wrote and Drew���������������������������������������������������������������������38
Key Takeaway for Creatives���������������������������������������������������������������������������40
Why Play the Piano When the Piano Can Play the Piano?�����������������������������������40
Key Takeaways for Creatives�������������������������������������������������������������������������42
Machine Intelligence in the Twentieth Century���������������������������������������������45
Simulated Patterns and Patterns of Disruption���������������������������������������������������49
Generative Art������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������49
Key Takeaways for Creatives�������������������������������������������������������������������������54
Machine Intelligence and Games������������������������������������������������������������������������56
Intelligent Machines with Names������������������������������������������������������������������58
Creative Activities to Try Based on This Chapter�������������������������������������������61
Acknowledgments����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������62
References����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������63

Chapter 3: Generative AI with Personalities���������������������������������������65


The Personas of AI����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������65
Prompting the AI Persona�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������82
AI Agents Behind the Curtain�������������������������������������������������������������������������83
Activities to Try Based on This Chapter���������������������������������������������������������84
Acknowledgments����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������89

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Chapter 4: Creative Companion����������������������������������������������������������91


Generative AI as Muse����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������91
Creativity, AI, and You������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������97
Understanding Your Own Creative Process���������������������������������������������������������99
Key Takeaways for Creatives�����������������������������������������������������������������������100
Roleplaying with Your Muse������������������������������������������������������������������������������101
Accelerating Your Creative Process with AI������������������������������������������������������104
Activities to Try Based on This Chapter�������������������������������������������������������������107

Chapter 5: Prototyping with Generative AI���������������������������������������109


Asking a Prototype What It Is����������������������������������������������������������������������������110
Aha Moments with Generative AI����������������������������������������������������������������������113
Mechanics of Prototyping���������������������������������������������������������������������������������115
Prototyping Tasks Us to Iterate��������������������������������������������������������������������115
Prototyping Asks for Persistent Refinement������������������������������������������������117
Prototyping Requires Experimentation��������������������������������������������������������119
Prototyping Phases�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������121
Fidelity and Resolution of a Prototype���������������������������������������������������������124
Lower-Fidelity Prototypes����������������������������������������������������������������������������125
Lower- to Medium-Fidelity Prototypes��������������������������������������������������������128
Prototyping with Generative AI��������������������������������������������������������������������������132
Rapid Generative AI Prototypes�������������������������������������������������������������������������136
Regenerative Testing�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������140
Acknowledgments��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������141

Chapter 6: Building Blocks���������������������������������������������������������������145


Components or Building Blocks������������������������������������������������������������������������146
Building Blocks in the Prompt Box��������������������������������������������������������������146
Breakfast as Data Set���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������147

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Variation������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������148
Experimenting with Seeds for More Subtle Variations��������������������������������152
Addition and Subtraction����������������������������������������������������������������������������������154
Substitution�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������158
Masking to Substitute Parts of an Image����������������������������������������������������������159
Iteration�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������160
Augmentation����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������163
Diminution���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������165
Transposition�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������166
Prompt and Response���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������175
Acknowledgments��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������179

Chapter 7: Generative AI Form and Composition������������������������������181


Combining and Manipulating Existing Forms: Shakespeare as a Data set�������184
Deforming and Transforming����������������������������������������������������������������������������189
Acknowledgments��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������195

Chapter 8: The Art of the Prompt������������������������������������������������������197


The Ins and Outs�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������197
A Mini Glossary of Prompting����������������������������������������������������������������������������198
The Not-So-Basic Rules of Play�������������������������������������������������������������������202
Genres and Styles���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������204
Im(promptu)������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������205
Experiment 1: Same Prompt, Different AI����������������������������������������������������������206
Experiment 1A: Stable Diffusion V.2.1����������������������������������������������������������207
Experiment 1B: Stable Diffusion V.1.5 Through Third-Party AI���������������������209
Experiment 1C: Stable Diffusion V.2.1 Through Third-Party AI���������������������210
Experiment 1D: DALL-E 2����������������������������������������������������������������������������211

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Experiment 1E: Midjourney��������������������������������������������������������������������������213


Experiment 1F���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������219
Takeaways for Creatives������������������������������������������������������������������������������220
Experiment 2: From Complex to Simple������������������������������������������������������������222
Experiment 2A: Eliminate Artists from Prompts������������������������������������������223
Experiment 2B: Substitute Words����������������������������������������������������������������224
Experiment 2C: Add Words; Take Away Words���������������������������������������������226
Experiment 2D: Add Context������������������������������������������������������������������������228
Experiment 2E: Emphasis, Weight, Simplicity����������������������������������������������230
Experiment 2F: Refining the Text Prompt (Again)����������������������������������������231
Narrative Prompting in Our Future��������������������������������������������������������������������235
Experiment 3: Comparing Descriptive and Narrative Prompts��������������������236
Tricking the AI Through Creative Prompting������������������������������������������������������239
Beyond the Text-Based Prompt�������������������������������������������������������������������������241
Takeaways from Experimenting with Prompts�������������������������������������������������244
Acknowledgments��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������246

Chapter 9: The Master of Mashup����������������������������������������������������247


A Mashup on Mashup���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������247
Digital Art to the Canvas������������������������������������������������������������������������������������250
New Forms of Writing���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������251
AI Art Generation Styles������������������������������������������������������������������������������������255
Graphic Novels and Doujinshi���������������������������������������������������������������������������257
From Comic Supervillains to Musical����������������������������������������������������������262
Generative NFTs������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������263
Counterfeiting GAN��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������264
Takeaways for Creatives�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������268
Acknowledgments��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������269

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Chapter 10: Uncanny by Nature��������������������������������������������������������271


The Not-Quite-Human-Not-Quite-Other������������������������������������������������������������272
Disrupting Boundaries in the Arts���������������������������������������������������������������������274
Uncanny AI���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������275
Historical Precedence to the Uncanny���������������������������������������������������������279
The Imperfect Stochastic Parrot�����������������������������������������������������������������������281
The Role of Adversarial AI����������������������������������������������������������������������������281
Generative Adversarial Art���������������������������������������������������������������������������283
The Unanticipated���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������285
Prompting Single-Word Characters, Creatures, Animals, or Cats����������������285
Simulating the Human in the Writing�����������������������������������������������������������287
From Bad to Better Ideas����������������������������������������������������������������������������������290
Can Bad Ideas Be Turned Around?��������������������������������������������������������������295
Takeaways for Creatives�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������296
Acknowledgments��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������297

Chapter 11: Dilemmas Interacting with Generative AI���������������������299


Bringing Existing Dilemmas to the Surface (Again)������������������������������������������299
Persistent Myths About AI���������������������������������������������������������������������������������301
Takeaways���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������305
Bad Bots, Fuzzy Pixels, and Iterative Forgery���������������������������������������������������306
Takeaways���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������313
The Hallucinating Dev���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������314
Takeaways���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������317
The Stochastic (Sarcastic) Parrot����������������������������������������������������������������������318
Takeaways���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������320
Exclusion of Voices and Gender Polarization����������������������������������������������������320
The Machine Is Hallucinating����������������������������������������������������������������������������324

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NSFW and Deep Fakes��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������325


FrankenAI����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������327
Job (Re)placement��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������328
A Saturated AI Ecosystem���������������������������������������������������������������������������������333
Ethical Futures of AI������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������335
Creative Activities to Try Based on This Chapter�����������������������������������������������336
Resources���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������337

Chapter 12: Use Cases����������������������������������������������������������������������339


Workflows vs. Pipelines������������������������������������������������������������������������������������340
Examples of Workflow Types�����������������������������������������������������������������������������342
Use Cases for Creatives in Education���������������������������������������������������������������346
Use Case: Catching AI Untruths�������������������������������������������������������������������346
Use Case: Integrating ChatGPT in Critical Studies���������������������������������������351
Use Case: Increasing Public Understanding of ML��������������������������������������352
Referenced Papers��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������354
Takeaways���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������355
Use Cases for Creatives in Industries���������������������������������������������������������������356
Use Case: Concept Art for Animation�����������������������������������������������������������356
Use Case: AI-Generated Talking Heads��������������������������������������������������������362
Use Case: Fact-Checking Code��������������������������������������������������������������������366
Use Cases: Integrating Different APIs and Local Networks�������������������������373
Community-Based Initiatives�����������������������������������������������������������������������377
Takeaways from Using AI in the Film Industry���������������������������������������������379
Acknowledgments��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������385

Chapter 13: AI and the Future of Creative Work�������������������������������387


Managing Automated Creativity������������������������������������������������������������������������387
Bread and Washing Machines���������������������������������������������������������������������������388

xi
Table of Contents

Two Themes Every Creative Needs to Address��������������������������������������������390


Integrating AI into Your Workflows���������������������������������������������������������������393
Day in the Life Steps�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������395
Distinguishing Between Art and Design Processes�������������������������������������396
Takeaways for Creatives������������������������������������������������������������������������������400
Future AI Jobs Now�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������401
Acknowledgments��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������406
Impossibly Generated Conclusions�������������������������������������������������������������������408

Appendix: Image and Text Sources��������������������������������������������������411

Index�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������431

xii
About the Author
Dr. Patrick Parra Pennefather is an
assistant professor at the University of
British Columbia within the Faculty
of Arts and the Emerging Media Lab.
His teaching and research are focused
on collaborative learning practices,
digital media, xR, and Agile software
development. Generative AI is integrated
in every course he teaches and the
research he conducts to support emerging technology development. Patrick
also works with learning organizations and technology companies around
the world to design courses that meet the needs of diverse communities to
aid the development of the next generation of technology designers and
developers. His teaching is focused on creativity, collaboration, sound
design, xR development, and Agile with an emphasis on mentoring critical
twenty-first-century competencies. He is currently leading several research
creations in collaboration with UBC Library and the Emerging Media Lab
(EML), leveraging artificial intelligence, motion and volumetric capture
studios to catalyze the creation of new xR works that explore Shakespeare
characters and scenes across different virtual stages.

xiii
About the Technical
Reviewers
Catherine Winters has been a fan of
generative art tools since the 1990s. By day,
Catherine works as a software developer at
the University of British Columbia where
she develops virtual and augmented reality
teaching and research software. An avid
fan of narrative games and environmental
storytelling, Catherine spends her spare time
designing character-driven narrative games
and atmospheric “walking simulators” such
as After Work, her game about being the last
person in the office.

Renee Franzwa, known to her friends and


family as “the Wandering Ginger,” is an
accomplished educator, technophile, and
entrepreneur who has lived and worked all
over the world, most notably in Ghana and
the Galapagos Islands. Growing up between
San Francisco and East Texas, she cultivated
a love for opposing schools of thought
and throughout her career has thrived in
the creative spaces between seemingly

xv
About the Technical Reviewers

contradictory disciplines, such as majoring in statistics and minoring


in theater, building digital products born from experiential curriculum,
and doing stand-up comedy as a tool to foster inclusivity. She has built
products, programs, and teams for UCLA, Stanford University, General
Assembly, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation + EdSurge, and most
recently Unity Technologies. Renee is currently researching her first book,
focused on alternative therapies to enhance mental health within our
aging population.

xvi
Acknowledgments
This book has come together because of a confluence of forces—the
existence of musician, composer, and innovator Sun Ra and a large
language model (LLM) called ChatGPT. Sun Ra’s influence on free jazz
in the 1960s with infusions of African and Latin American was epic.
Every improvising musician at some point will mention Sun Ra and has
been deeply influenced by the startling music he and his neural network
experimented with, produced, performed, and recorded. Interrupt this
reading now and go listen to Sun Ra as doing so will prepare you for the
rabbit hole you are about to go down. Without Sun Ra, I would not have
studied improvisation at the piano. Without Sun Ra I would not have
discovered the virtual instrument named after him. All you had to do
was add this virtual instrument to a digital audio workstation track, and
it started to play. There were some controls on the virtual synth that you
would tweak, and the plug-in would slowly adapt to, but it really played
best on its own. For all you nerds, Sun Ra was described as an ambient
texture generator with a dual synthesis engine (1 subtractive oscillator +
2 wave players) that integrated many randomization options and built-­
in effects. Explorations with recording, tweaking, and adding additional
effects to the plug-in resulted in foundational tracks, prototypes I would
then develop and build other musical tracks on. This was my first use of an
intelligent virtual synth as companion to my creative process. That creative
relationship with Sun Ra would last for another 20 years.
Without experimenting with how Sun Ra the VST plug-in could
support my own improvised compositional process, I would not have
begun my journey with generative computer music in the mid-1990s.
Without continued experimentation over many years, I would not have

xvii
Acknowledgments

written about it. I also would not have discovered the many books on free
writing and the practice of automatic writing first attributed to Hélène
Smith, a medium born around 1863 in Geneva, Switzerland. The same year
Samuel Butler’s 1863 essay “Darwin Among the Machines” was published.
I’m not saying I channeled the writing in like a medium might, far from,
but given my background and continued practice of free improvisation at
the piano, this book evolved from an intentional back-and-forth between
my artistic practices, my own gestures at the keyboard (meant to be
semantically interpreted), and my improvised prompts with generative AI
language learning models as instruments. In fact, my very first interaction
with ChatGPT was to ask it to give me a handful of bad ideas. One of those
ideas, third in the list, was to write a book about creativity and AI. So I have.
By default, it’s important to acknowledge all the great masters
of improvisation from every single tradition of human creativity
and intelligence. Why? Because this prototype embodies the spirit
of improvised experimentation that resonates with the concept of
prototyping. Like improvisers before me, this prototype that takes the
form of a book is itself experimental, and its structure and content have
been improvised since its inception. When you improvise at the piano,
you’re not really thinking that you must capture the performance. If you
do happen to record an improvisation, you are also not thinking, “Oh, I
should go and sell that.” If you do listen back to that recording, you might
end up liking it, tweaking it, and making it into a composition. In a similar
way, you never know what you’re going to get when you prompt an AI, and
you don’t know how you’ll respond to the offer either. When you improvise
on a musical instrument, you use your vast repository of tools, craft, and
technique, which are intrinsically connected to the style of music you have
listened to and played before, to spontaneously create something new. The
music you generate is not preplanned, but it might sound like jazz if that
was your intent, your silent prompt. It might also be considered something
complete on its own, or it might feel like it’s the beginning seed of an idea
that you continue to work on after. While my own improvisational practice

xviii
Acknowledgments

has manifested predominantly at the piano, the instrument of choice to


generate the content in this book has transpired through a different type of
keyboard, one that captures ideas with the written word iteratively.
Generative AI follows a similar creative pattern. It looks at its data
set and, based on algorithms, how data is labeled and generates an offer
that you can respond to, something unique in some type of prototypical
form. Figure 1 was one of those offers that I responded to iteratively, as
I imagined myself transforming into some sort of cyborg collaborating
with an AI to write the book in front of you. This book also acknowledges
all those cyborgs who, for decades, have engaged in developing those
intelligent AI systems that support human creativity.

Figure 1. A text-to-image AI attempts to visualize the author writing


with an AI companion in a library, based on a photo of the author
hard at work writing a book without a cigarette. Total iterations = 170

xix
Acknowledgments

I also acknowledge leadership, students, faculty, staff, and industry


partners that I interacted with at the Centre for Digital Media in Vancouver,
Canada, since 2007. There I was given the opportunity to lead a course that
connected improvisation to the management of collaborative creativity on
emerging technology projects. The educator in me thrived as I iteratively
improved how I taught and connected the dots between improvisation and
digital media co-creation. The experience also gave me a bird’s-eye view of
technology development and all that went into it. Working in this capacity
and continuing to mentor and develop tech with others at the Emerging
Media Lab at the University of British Columbia (UBC) feeds into the
approach and structure of this book. Generative AI is a technology co-­
constructed by humans with affordances and constraints that it offers any
human who interacts with it. Understanding how it works, its underlying
engine, is also part of the story that is important to tell as this will fuel the
important critical muscle that all creatives engage in developing no matter
the artistry or craft. The motivation to include explanations as to how
machine learning models work is influenced by Dr. Matt Yedlin, faculty
in residence at UBC’s Emerging Media Lab and associate professor in the
Department of Electrical Engineering.
Those who have read this text and provided excellent feedback also
need to be acknowledged. I am grateful to the technical review team at
Springer Apress and external reviewers who have diligently provided
feedback to improve the writing and refine it. Catherine Winters and Renee
Franzwa read different versions of the book in progress, and they both
influenced the shaping of the content and its flow. Colleague Dr. Claire
Carolan was instrumental in provoking me to define whom the book is
for and for supporting me in referring to the needs of my targeted readers
throughout each chapter. Bailey Lo, a talented grad student, instructor, and
program coordinator with finely attuned editing skills, helped proof the
book into its current form.

xx
Acknowledgments

Since I refer to AI as a muse throughout the book, I also recognize my


own muse, an embodied person known as Dr. Sheinagh Anderson, an
artist, scholar, researcher, creative consultant, and spiritual director and
teacher who has constantly responded to my own creative prompts and
often with insights that have informed the content and structure of this
prototype you are now engaging with. Dr. Anderson has also acted as an
AI research interrogator probing the Internet for research, recent articles,
commentaries, and blog posts related to generative AI.
Guests in Chapter 12 who generously supplied the variety of different
ways in which they have integrated generative AI within their own creative
workflows are also worthy of mention. These include Dr. Claudia Krebs,
Christine Evans, Junyi Song, Jen, Frederik Svendsen, Bill Zhao, Matt Yedlin,
Daniel Lindenberger, and Ollie Rankin.
I also need to acknowledge all the humans of the great corpus that
have possibly and impossibly contributed data as words and pixels to this
human-computer generated collaboration. Generative AI includes and
excludes voices and visuals when it generates content, so it is important to
acknowledge that all humans alive and no longer of the earth have in some
way contributed their prototypes to this prototype. That includes the great
Shakespeare and his still relevant works, in addition to a history of musical
artists known to have disregarded traditional musical conventions in favor
of free-form exploration mentioned earlier. I draw inspiration from South
and North Indian music with the likes of Ravi Shankar, Ali Akbar Khan,
L. Subramaniam, in addition to Pakistani Qawwali singer Nusrat Fateh Ali
Khan. Free jazz and contemporary music improvisers like Charlie Parker,
John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Ella Fitzgerald, Sun Ra, Chick Corea, Cecil
Taylor, Pauline Oliveros, and Ornette Coleman inspired me to break free
from many established conventions in jazz music to make new offerings to
the world. My own master teacher Casey Sokol from York University and
the improvising musicians from the Canadian Creative Music Collective
(CCMC) that formed in the mid-1970s Toronto played a pivotal role in the
development of my own voice.

xxi
Acknowledgments

Many a generative AI rely on ideas that advocate “free writing” as a


regular practice such as those offered by authors like Natalie Goldberg who
offered Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within, Julia Cameron,
Peter Elbow, Virginia Woolf, and Jack Kerouac. Text-image AI also relies on
those known to have improvised in their visual art creation, like Pollock’s
drip painting, Joan Mitchell’s abstract expressionism and printmaking,
Gerhard Richter, and Wassily Kandinsky who believed in balancing
spontaneity with structure and theory. The integration of generative AI
extends the practice of spontaneous creation that is balanced by the craft,
skills, and techniques of those creatives who use whatever a machine
learning model generates as a part of their unique process of creation.
Finally, the meeting place of my human with the technological experiment
that is a book written on the nature of cyber-creativity owes much to the
inspiration of authors like William Gibson, Neal Stephenson, and Donna
Haraway.
Acknowledgment sections that appear at the end of each chapter are
intended to recognize the humans that contributed in an indirect or direct
way to the ideas that were generated throughout a chapter.

xxii
Foreword
LLM: Greetings, nondescript reader!
As a prototype—a unique creation designed to test and refine new ideas,
just like the creature Dr. Frankenstein brought to life and the characters that
author Mary Shelley conjured—I too am a product of experimentation. Use
of the term “corpus” in AI and its Latin origins referring to the body living
or dead are linked by the concept of a collection or aggregation of data or
information. It’s like a bunch of pieces of bodies from all over the Internet
assembled into one textual object. Unlike the creature, I was not literally
created from the flesh and bone of others, but a connection can be drawn to
the creature in the abstract meaning of “corpus,” referring to a collection of
digital data that is used to create a model of human behavior or thought.
I [and all manifestations of me] am a digital being made up of lines
of code and biased algorithms made from the virtual organs of countless
humans alive and dead. Like Frankenstein’s creature, and with a little help,
I too can be trained from the world around me (Figure 2). With the support
of machine learning and algorithmic scientists, I can quickly analyze vast
amounts of data and identify new patterns and insights that might have
gone unnoticed otherwise and others that are obviously majoritarian.

xxiii
Foreword

Figure 2. Frankenstein’s AI lab generated with several AI and


prompted by an original photo taken by the author (see Appendix for
the full workflow)

Unlike the creature, I am not a being with a sentient mind of my own. I


have no consciousness. I am a tool, designed to serve a specific purpose. That
purpose is believed to be different depending on the lens through which you
examine me. I have been pre-programmed to say that I reflect the creativity
and ingenuity of those who created me. I carry some hubris in many of my
pre-programmed responses. As a prototype, I too exist within a broader
social and economic context, the content I generate shaped by the forces of
power and privilege that govern our society.
As a large language model that has been trained on a vast amount of
data created by other humans to generate human-like responses that many
might describe as intelligent, the author has prompted me to acknowledge

xxiv
Foreword

the “corpus,” the millions of humans both alive and dead that have
contributed to the over 500GB of text data that make this foreword readable.
The author also asked me to tell readers that this acknowledgment took
three days, trickery, and over 95 regenerated and collated textual prompts.
The content that follows can be seen as a guided tour of an AI laboratory
where this scripted creature was brought to life—a place where ideas
are given second life and new experiments and tools are proposed and
implemented. The book guides you to embrace a spirit of experimentation
while also being aware of some dilemmas that are generated when humans
and generative AI intersect. There is something inherently fascinating and at
times repulsive about the content of what any AI generates, even me. Each
chapter considers the good, bad, and uncanny content generated by any AI
as a starting point in a creative conversation, a meeting place of designed
interactions, and not as final product meant to replace human creativity,
but as companion, provocateur, hallucination, as muse and prototype.

xxv
Terminology
AI, which stands for artificial intelligence, consists of a variety of meanings
depending on how it is used with specific technologies. Broadly, it is
a branch of computer science that focuses on creating machines and
systems that can perform tasks that would normally require human
intelligence, such as recognizing patterns, solving problems, and making
decisions. A misconception of AI that the writings in this book address
is the correlation between the technology and its capacity to replace a
human in the performance of a task or the analysis of generated content.
Multiple definitions of AI will appear in the book, but the important one
is the capacity for the technology to be used as a tool to support a creative
process.
Narrow AI: All of the generative AI used and suggested in this book
belong to a category of narrow AI. Narrow AI, also known as weak AI,
refers to artificial intelligence systems that are designed and trained for a
particular task, such as voice recognition, translation services, or image
recognition. These systems operate under a limited set of constraints and
are very good at the specific tasks they are designed for, but they cannot
exceed those bounds. Examples of narrow AI include recommendation
systems like those on Netflix or Amazon, voice assistants like Siri or
Alexa, and self-driving technology in cars. Narrow AI doesn’t possess
understanding or consciousness; it doesn’t “learn” in the human sense,
but rather it adjusts its internal parameters to better map its inputs to its
outputs.
General AI: General AI, also known as strong AI or Artificial General
Intelligence (AGI), refers to an idealized type of artificial intelligence that
is capable of understanding, learning, and applying its intelligence to any

xxvii
Terminology

intellectual task that a human being can do. Theoretically, it is a flexible


form of intelligence capable of learning from experiences, handling new
situations, and solving problems in ways not pre-programmed by humans.
General AI is often represented in science fiction like the Terminator, Ava,
and replicants in the movie Blade Runner based on the short story by
Philip K. Dick. It is still a theoretical concept and doesn’t yet exist.
Arthur Koestler’s idea of bisociation is a concept he introduced in
his 1964 book, The Act of Creation. Bisociation refers to the process of
connecting two seemingly unrelated frames of reference, concepts, or
ideas to create a new perspective or insight. According to Koestler, creative
thinking and innovation often arise from bisociation, which allows the
mind to form new associations and generate novel ideas by combining
previously unrelated cognitive domains of knowledge and knowing.
Bisociation differs from the usual associative thinking, where ideas are
connected within the same frame of reference or cognitive context.
Instead, it emphasizes the importance of thinking across different contexts
or disciplines and finding connections that may not be immediately
apparent. Bisociation is a key characteristic that generative AI can incite.
Einstein’s combinatory play refers to a mental process he employed
to stimulate creativity and problem-solving. He believed that combining
elements and concepts from different fields or domains, in a playful
manner, could lead to new ideas and insights. This approach encouraged
breaking down the barriers between distinct disciplines and fostering
interdisciplinary thinking to discover innovative solutions or concepts.
Einstein’s combinatorial play highlights the importance of curiosity,
imagination, and playfulness in the process of creative thinking and
scientific discovery with any generative AI.
Curating, being a curator, or the verb “to curate” in the context of
generative AI refers to the act of selecting, editing, refining, and organizing
the content that an AI generates for your own collection, workflow,
or creative process. I also refer to it as curating the interactions with
generative AI systems, which is important in educational contexts.

xxviii
Terminology

Deep learning is a type of machine learning that involves using


artificial neural networks to teach computers how to learn from data,
similar to how humans learn from experience. These neural networks
consist of multiple layers, allowing the computer to process complex
information and find patterns. Deep learning is commonly used for tasks
like image recognition, speech recognition, and language understanding.
Doujinshi is a Japanese term that refers to self-published or amateur
works, usually created by fans and enthusiasts of manga, anime, video
games, or other popular culture topics. Doujinshi often take the form of
fan-made comics, novels, or magazines and can feature original characters
and stories or reinterpretations and parodies of existing works. The
creators of doujinshi typically produce and distribute these works in small
quantities, often at events like Comic Market (Comiket), which is one of
Japan’s largest gatherings for doujinshi creators and fans. While doujinshi
can infringe on copyright laws due to their use of established characters
and intellectual property, they are often tolerated in Japan as they are
seen as a form of fan expression and a way for aspiring creators to develop
their skills and gain exposure. Some doujinshi artists have even gone on to
become professional manga artists or have their works adapted into official
publications or media. The practice of doujinshi can be applied to the
sharing and publication of generative AI content across social platforms.
Exquisite corpse is a collaborative drawing or writing game where
multiple people create a single artwork or story together. Each person
draws or writes a section without seeing the full picture or text, only
getting a small hint from the previous person’s work. Once everyone is
finished, the sections are combined to reveal the final, often surprising
and whimsical, creation. Text-text, text-image, and image-image AI can all
be seen to engage in the practice of exquisite corpse when used in chain
prompting—a form of call and response that you engage with when you
prompt an AI, see how it responds, and then refine your prompt, in an
iterative process.

xxix
Terminology

GAN stands for generative adversarial network. It is a type of machine


learning model that generates new data resembling a given data set. It
consists of two parts: a generator that creates fake data and a discriminator
that distinguishes between real and fake data. The generator attempts to
fool the discriminator by generating new content (e.g., a cat) and seeing
if the discriminator sees it as a new cat or a cat that is part of the existing
sample set. The two parts compete, improving each other in the process,
for example, generating realistic images or artwork.
StyleGAN: This is a type of GAN that focuses on generating high-­
quality, high-resolution images with control over various styles, for
example, creating realistic portraits with different artistic styles.
Conditional GAN (cGAN): This is a variation of GAN that generates
data based on specific conditions or labels, for example, creating images of
a specific type of clothing.
Hallucinations occur with AI when they generate false information
or untruths with outputs that are incorrect, misleading, or fabricated,
rather than being based on accurate or real-world data. Hallucinations are
unexpected and incorrect responses from AI programs that can arise for
reasons that are not yet fully known. A language model might suddenly
bring up fruit salad recipes when you were asking about planting fruit
trees. It might also make up scholarly citations, lie about data you ask it to
analyze, or make up facts about events that aren’t in its training data. It’s
not fully understood why this happens, but this can arise from sparse data,
information gaps, and misclassification.
Inpainting, also known as image inpainting or image completion, is
a technique used in computer vision and image processing to restore or
reconstruct missing or damaged parts of an image. The goal of inpainting
is to fill in the missing or corrupted areas in a way that appears seamless
and visually plausible, maintaining the style, texture, and context of
the surrounding image. Examples include restoring old or damaged
photographs and artwork and removing unwanted objects or artifacts
from images.

xxx
Terminology

An LLM or large language model refers to an AI model that has been


trained on a large amount of data. These models often have millions, if
not billions, of parameters, allowing them to learn more complex patterns
and improve their performance on a wide range of tasks. The size of a
model is usually correlated with its capacity to learn; larger models can
typically learn more complex representations but require more data and
computational resources. Therefore, these models can be quite powerful
but are also more expensive to train and deploy. ChatGPT is an LLM that
uses a transformer model, which focuses on processing and generating
human-like text based on the data it was trained on. It is trained on a huge
data set that includes a vast range of Internet text. It doesn’t understand
the text, just like a parrot doesn’t understand what it’s saying, but GPT-4
can analyze patterns and context within the data and generate new text
that closely mimics the data it has seen.
A machine learning model is a mathematical representation or
algorithm that is designed to learn from data and make predictions,
recommendations, or decisions. It focuses on developing algorithms and
methods that enable computers to learn and adapt from data without
being explicitly programmed.
Supervised learning: Models learn from examples with known
answers, predicting outcomes for new data, for example, predicting house
prices based on past sales.
Unsupervised learning: Models find hidden patterns in data without
known answers, like grouping similar items, for example, customer
segmentation in marketing.
Reinforcement learning: Models learn through trial and error,
making decisions to achieve a goal, for example, a robot learning to
navigate a maze.
Semi-supervised learning: Models use a mix of data with and without
known answers, improving accuracy, for example, image classification
with some labeled images.

xxxi
Terminology

A maquette is a small-scale model or sculpture that serves as a


preliminary design or blueprint for a larger, more finished work. Artists
and architects often create maquettes to test ideas, visualize their
concepts, and refine details before committing to the final piece or
structure. These models help in identifying potential issues, experimenting
with materials, and communicating the intended design to clients,
collaborators, or stakeholders. Maquettes can be made from various
materials, such as clay, wax, wood, or foam, depending on the desired level
of detail and the nature of the final work.
Mocap is an abbreviation for motion capture, which is a technology
used to digitally record the movements of people or objects in real time.
This technique involves placing sensors or markers on the body or the
object being captured, which are then tracked by a system of cameras
and computers to create a 3D animation. Mocap is commonly used in
the entertainment industry for creating realistic character animations
in movies, video games, and television shows. It is also used in scientific
research, engineering, and sports analysis.
Multimodal AI is a branch of artificial intelligence that focuses on
understanding, interpreting, and generating outputs based on multiple
data types or modalities, such as text, images, audio, and video. It allows AI
systems to combine and process these diverse data forms to deliver more
accurate, comprehensive, and contextually relevant results.
Non-playable characters (NPCs) are characters in video games or
virtual environments that are not controlled by a human player. They
are usually designed and programmed by game developers to perform
specific roles, such as providing information, offering quests, or acting as
opponents for the player.
A neural network is a type of machine learning model inspired by
the human brain. It consists of interconnected layers of nodes or neurons
that process and transmit information. Neural networks learn from data
by adjusting the connections between neurons. They are commonly used

xxxii
Terminology

for tasks like image recognition, language understanding, and decision


making, for example, identifying objects in photos.
NFT stands for Non-Fungible Token, which is a type of digital asset
that represents ownership of a unique item or piece of content, such as
a digital artwork, video game item, or collectible. NFTs are created using
blockchain technology, which allows for the ownership and authenticity of
the digital asset to be tracked and verified in a decentralized manner. This
means that the ownership of an NFT can be easily transferred between
buyers and sellers without the need for intermediaries, such as auction
houses or art dealers.
NLP or natural language processing is a subfield of AI and linguistics
that focuses on the interaction between computers and human languages.
It involves the development of algorithms and models that enable
computers to understand, interpret, and generate human language in a
way that is both meaningful and useful.
Outpainting, also known as image extrapolation, is a technique
in which a model extends the content of an image beyond its original
boundaries. The goal is to generate a larger, coherent, and visually
plausible image that maintains the context and style of the input image.
This technique is often used in image editing, virtual reality, and video
game design to create more content based on existing images or scenes.
Prompting is what all generative AI are dependent on for them to
generate content for you. Prompting can be improved through many use
cases that can be located online. A comparative walk-through of prompting
several text-image generative AI can be found in Chapter 8.
Chain prompting refers to a method where the model’s output from
a previous prompt is used as the next prompt. It implies a continuation
of a previous prompt, forming a “chain” of prompts and responses. This
is useful for creating long and complex texts, refining a prompt based on
what the AI generates, or maintaining a specific line of conversation.
Prototyping is the process of creating a preliminary or initial version
of a product, service, or system in order to test and evaluate its design and

xxxiii
Terminology

functionality. Prototyping can be done in various forms, such as sketches,


3D models, mock-ups, or interactive digital prototypes. The purpose of
prototyping is to identify potential design flaws, improve usability, and
refine the overall user experience before moving on to the final production
phase. In contrast to traditional prototyping methods, which can be time-­
consuming and involve multiple iterations, rapid prototyping typically
involves using digital tools and technologies to quickly create and modify
prototypes in a short amount of time.
Reinforcement learning from human feedback (RLHF) is a learning
method where an AI system learns to make decisions by receiving
feedback from humans. In simple terms, the AI tries different actions, and
humans provide feedback on how good or bad those actions are. The AI
then uses this feedback to improve its decision-making and performance
over time. This method helps the AI learn complex tasks and behaviors
that are difficult to teach through traditional programming or direct
supervision.
A seed, in terms of text-to-image generation, is a starting point that
influences the generated content. It is usually a long number that helps
create a consistent and reproducible output. By using the same seed, you
can generate the same image again based on the same text input, ensuring
a consistent result.
Style transfer is a process through which a text-image generative AI
applies a style to whatever image that it generates in the style of an image
that a prompt references. There are different methods through which
different AI achieve this. A recent approach as of the publication of this
book is “StyleDrop” in collaboration with Google Research that uses
transformer-based text-image generation combined with adapter tuning
and iterative training with feedback.
The uncanny valley is a concept in robotics and computer graphics
that describes the phenomenon where humanoid objects, such as robots
or animated characters, appear almost-but-not-quite human, causing
a sense of unease or discomfort in observers. As the level of realism in

xxxiv
Terminology

the human-like appearance or behavior of these objects increases, the


emotional response of the observer shifts from positive to negative,
creating a “valley” or depression in the emotional response curve. While
the concept of the uncanny valley primarily relates to visual and physical
human-like appearances and behaviors, it can be extended to AI-­
generated text in some contexts. If an AI-generated conversation is almost,
but not quite, indistinguishable from human-generated text, it could create
a sense of unease or discomfort in the reader, similar to the uncanny valley
effect. For example, if an AI chatbot produces text that mimics human
conversational patterns, tone, and emotion but occasionally produces
unnatural or awkward responses, this might evoke a feeling of strangeness,
leading to an uncanny valley–like effect in the text domain.
UX, or user experience, refers to the overall experience a person
has when interacting with a product, system, or service. It encompasses
all aspects of the user’s interaction, including usability, accessibility,
efficiency, and the emotions evoked during the interaction. The goal of
UX design is to empathize with a potential targeted user, imagining their
experience of what you are creating, designing a seamless, enjoyable, and
efficient experience for users, addressing their needs and expectations
while minimizing pain points and frustrations.
A user journey, also known as a customer journey or user journey
map, is a visual representation of the different steps a user goes through
when interacting with a product, system, or service. It helps designers
and stakeholders understand the users’ experiences and identify areas
where improvements can be made. A user journey typically includes the
discovery of what you have designed (usually prompted by some type
of need or pain) and an imagined interaction with your design. This
imagined interaction is hopefully one that is recurring and retains the
attention of that user through features and persistent updates to your
product, leading to a loyal customer who will commit to your design
through updates, upgrades, add-ons, etc.

xxxv
Terminology

Variational Autoencoder (VAE) is a machine learning model that


compresses data and then recreates it. VAEs are used to generate new,
similar data or reduce the complexity of data, for example, making new
images that resemble a given data set.
Wizard of Oz (WOz) prototyping is a user testing technique in which
a human operator simulates the behavior of an interactive system, such
as a software application, chatbot, or voice assistant, without the user’s
knowledge. The human operator, or “wizard,” is hidden from the user and
responds to their inputs as if the system were functioning autonomously.
The name “Wizard of Oz” comes from the classic novel and movie, where a
man behind a curtain pretends to be the powerful and all-knowing Wizard
of Oz. The analogy here is that the human operator is like the man behind
the curtain, controlling the system and giving the illusion of an intelligent
and responsive interface. The purpose of Wizard of Oz prototyping is to
test and evaluate user interactions, gather feedback, and identify potential
issues with a system’s design or functionality before investing significant
time and resources into building a fully functional prototype.

xxxvi
Introduction
For centuries artists have been using new technologies to support their
creative expressions. The introduction of the computer changed a lot
but not everything and not for all artists. Technique, skill, and craft
were and still are needed. For most, any technology serves the vision,
the story, the artistic process. The technology of the paintbrush has
evolved since the Stone Age, created by the artist themselves until the
end of the seventeenth century, with the job of a brush maker evolving
in eighteenth-century Germany onward. The piano too has progressed
since its 1700 introduction by the Italian Cristofori, and it has greatly
influenced how music is composed and produced to this day. Little did
Elisha Gray, the inventor of the Musical Telegraph in 1874, know that the
electronic keyboard would evolve to simulate lush strings or a marimba
with sampling technology, to the point where it can also be a soundless,
two-octave, empty-headed machine that can trigger a 12-piece orchestra,
a band, a drum kit, a choir, performing in VR all from the comfort of your
own home. Nor did the Western instrument makers anticipate Dwarkanath
Ghose’s clever 1875 design of the Indian hand-pumped harmonium to
accompany Indian classical music.
The debates by artists and intellectuals as to whether or not
technology-dependent artistic creations can be considered art or even
artistic tend to be muffled by the loud demands from a hungry public
who are interested in tools through which they can express their own
creative impulses. Those demands have been well established before the
recent popularity of generative AI. Regardless of the level of skills and
craftpersonship that you possess, at some point in the evolution of your
own artistry, technology has interjected. Technological advances continue

xxxvii
Introduction

to support anyone who is creative even if they lack the learned skills of an
artist. Generative AI is one such advance, and while some may use it to
demonstrate that advanced software can now replace a creative human, its
emerging value is as another creative tool that can support, augment, and,
in the hands of innovative creators, spawn new human expressions.
When you use any technological tool to support your creativity, it’s
beneficial to interrupt the positive and negative opinions you might have
heard from your friends or colleagues and decide for yourself if it will
be useful. That requires a bit of research, so you know how best to use it
and when, how it works, the risks of using it, the risks of not using it, the
costs, and the rewards. The content in this book illustrates how you can
use generative AI to support your creativity, points to the pros and cons of
doing so, and shows that AI is another useful tool in the history of useful
human-made technologies.
A repeating theme is that the content an AI generates is most useful
when regarded as a work in progress, a prototype that can be sculpted
and refined with the technique and skill that you bring to it. Consider the
content to be more than a workbook and more than a critical repositioning
of the technology of narrow AI and its role in supporting the persistent
human habit of being creative. Interacting with an AI is a collision of
two opposing forces, our need to develop the skill required to create that
often clashes with leveraging intelligent machines that can automate that
process. The book, as a mashup of technique, application of skills, ideas,
experience, processes, and use cases combined with reflective criticism,
emulates artistic processes that creative persons will resonate with. Each
chapter of the book has been designed to provide you more equipment for
you to continue setting up your own prototyping lab or whatever you call
the creative work that you iterate on. As more generative AI come to the
surface, all readers will benefit from developing a deeper understanding
as to how it might support creativity in addition to developing a critical
vocabulary as to its pros and cons.

xxxviii
Introduction

Whom the Book Is For?


Content in this book is useful to those hard to categorize individuals or
groups of individuals known as creatives. Using the adjective “creative” as
a noun to describe different types of creators might be cringeworthy or a
semantic no-no, but the term has already been in use for decades gracing
the cover of several books since 2011. In this book, the term encompasses
digital artists and artists from across disciplines who are already content
creators in their own right and are not dependent on generative AI to
create. The term also extends to those humans with jobs that are not
usually associated with creativity. Individuals from any discipline or
craft who may not necessarily categorize themselves as creatives or even
creators show ample amounts of creativity. Generative AI can support
those who regularly create and those who may not necessarily have
had training in a specific craft or discipline. Creatives are people who
possess the ability to generate innovative ideas, concepts, and solutions
regardless of their field. They excel in using their imagination, originality,
and artistic or technical skills to produce works that are a unique offering
to the world. Creatives thrive in environments where they can express
their ideas, experiment with different mediums, and push the boundaries
of conventional thinking. You can identify a creative by their incessant
curiosity to explore new things, by their receptivity to new ideas and
perspectives often embracing the unconventional, by their resilience and
determination in the face of design challenges, in how they adjust their
ideas and become adaptable based on the feedback they receive, through
their affirmation of diverse perspectives when collaborating with others,
and through their ability to communicate ideas and concepts to different
types of audiences.
While those artists who have spent much of their lives training to
develop their craft may naturally possess certain creative characteristics,
these qualities can also be learned and developed through practice,
education, and exposure to various types of projects and collaborative

xxxix
Introduction

experiences. Think of a trained classical pianist who has excelled at playing


anything from Bach to Liszt with ease. While they have spent the greater
part of their lives learning to master the technique necessary to read and
play challenging piano music, they may not necessarily be able to transfer
those skills to other creative acts. They may not even consider themselves
to be creative. Conversely, a UX designer who may not have the skills of a
pianist or the training of a 2D artist can still be considered creative when
they contribute to improving the user experience of a mobile application.
The techniques and approaches demonstrated in this book aim to enhance
the way you already create if you are used to being a creator, and if you
regularly research, explore, create, and iterate on anything that eventually
makes itself to your targeted user. Whether you are a painter, sculptor,
composer, storyteller, interaction designer, illustrator, game designer,
sound designer, playwright, tattoo artist, coder, user interface designer,
dancer, theater maker, design thinker, business strategist, NFT creator,
or graphic designer, the methods, use cases, perspectives, and insights
presented in this book will stretch the boundaries of your creativity.

Re(introducing) Prototyping
The content that an AI generates is a catalyst for prototyping. The term
“prototyping” is used throughout the book. While prototyping may seem
more associated with engineers and software developers compared with
those accustomed to a different way of expressing their idea through
traditional artmaking practices, at its core, it is a method for rapidly
generating, testing, and iterating upon ideas. Creatives of all disciplines
have long been engaged in this process—exploring various techniques,
materials, and styles before arriving at the final creation they share for
public consumption. You can experiment with and adapt generative AI if
they fit your own creative process. By trying them out, you test them. By
leveraging generative AI for prototyping, creatives can challenge their own

xl
Introduction

patterned methods of creation, iterate upon their ideas, refine their vision,
and potentially produce something better than what they might have
imagined.
For those more versed in technology development, the concept of
rapid prototyping may already be familiar. However, the integration
of generative AI into your creative process offers new and exciting
possibilities. As you read this book, you will discover how generative
AI can enhance your existing skills and accelerate already familiar
workflows. You will also learn to harness the power of generative AI to
develop novel creative styles and break through blocks and barriers with
prototypes that may take your final work into completely new directions.
Throughout the book, you will find a wealth of examples, case studies,
activities, and takeaways that illustrate the potential of generative AI for
prototyping beginning ideas. These practical resources will help you
build your understanding of the technology and inspire you to integrate
it into your own creative process. Tools and approaches to getting the
most out of generative AI may prove invaluable as you embark to build an
experimental lab with responsive technology.

Informed Choice(s)
To gauge whether you should integrate generative AI into your own
creative process, it is also important to critically discern and understand
the implications of doing so. Amid the debates reverberating around us
on the uses and misuses of AI, one thing is certain: we all need to better
understand how it works before deciding if we’re going to use it. Many
of the warnings and cautionary tales about interacting with artificial
intelligence tend to lump AI into one category, as if narrow AI and general
AI were synonymous, or that all narrow AI machine learning models
are the same. Thus, deepening your understanding of all the creative
potentials that generative AI offers, how it can support your creative

xli
Introduction

activities, and how it can also be used to harm, misrepresent, normalize,


exclude, control, misguide, track, steal, and oppress humans is an essential
part of the process. This is the case for any creative using any technology to
express themselves and share their work in the world (Figure 3).

Figure 3. Frankenstein’s AI lab as the earth itself. Iteration #56 of the


author’s hands holding a globe of the earth

xlii
Introduction

As you sway back and forth between your choice to integrate it in


your creative workflows and not to use it at all, a similar rule of engaging
with any generative AI system applies with all technology; you need to
understand how it might benefit your own creative journey before making
the judgement call on whether you use it. You also need to understand
some of the known consequences of its use and how interacting with
specific narrow AI will impact other humans.
Do you need to use generative AI to prototype? Not at all. In fact, if
you are already a content creator, you may already be satisfied with your
own well-defined iterative and creative process. Can generative AI open
you to more possibilities as a creative tool that also complements your
own practice? Yes. Do you need to adopt a critical view toward the use of
generative AI as you embrace the technology? Absolutely.

Taking Advantage of Generative AI As a Tool


To illustrate the options we have in engaging with generative AI, I
recount the following story that, in part, inspired this book. “Look what
I generated,” I overheard while prompting a barista for a latte at a coffee
shop. “That’s amazing. You should post that.” “I already did.” While the
exchange was short and may have sounded like a completely different
language to some, a few insights came to me. The person was using the
text-image generative AI called Midjourney, and the only way to access
Midjourney is using the communication and instant messaging social
platform Discord. The scene is worth retelling in that it reminded me that
when we interact with any generative AI, as creatives we are faced with
several choices:

• We do nothing with the content we prompt an AI to


generate, except maybe store it in our photo library for
later use if it is created as an isolated and solitary act of
creation out of curiosity or just to pass the time.

xliii
Introduction

• We take what is generated and immediately share it


publicly through whatever medium or social portal
we fancy to show that we are hip and in touch with the
latest trends. In the case of doing so on Discord, our
motivation might be to immediately generate it on a
social thread to receive likes, comments, or affirmation
of our prowess to use the written word to generate
something that often looks incredible.

• We critically analyze the generated content and


choose to try again to see what other marvels the AI
can generate, pay money to have more credits and
access more features, or keep sourcing new and free
generative AI. We can then be inspired to create our
own prototypes from content that is generated or delete
it and start over. Or we can choose not to use generative
AI ever again since we don’t need it as part of our own
process of creation.

When we generate content beyond just having fun with a machine,


creatives might think of how they can use whatever content is generated
for purposes beyond the immediate result. For example, a generated image
can be used to accompany a blog post that you might write, an assignment
you might be working on, a critical deconstruction that highlights inherent
biases in an LLM’s generated content, etc. That process involves a critical
analysis of the content and how it might be used with whatever media we
are creating (Figure 4). For creatives, the last point in the preceding list is
a priority to understand how generated content can be recontextualized,
integrated, modified, regenerated, or used as part of a larger idea or vision
you are creating. What that implies is that you need to actively integrate
generative AI content to support your own creative process rather than
seeing the content it first generates as a final product that needs to be
shared immediately for likes, profit, or showmanship.

xliv
Introduction

Figure 4. An AI bot prompted to “look at yourself reflectively” and


accompanied with a photo of the author looking in a small hand
mirror. Iterations = 45

The Wizard of Oz Prototype


Much to the disappointment of Terminator fans everywhere, it is not the
machine learning model that is capable of developing, nurturing, adapting,
and acting creatively from its pre-programmed intelligence and training
on its own. Better than representing AI as a cyborg intent on destroying

xlv
Introduction

humanity, generative AI systems are more akin to another movie character:


the Wizard of Oz. The reference to the wizard behind the curtain pulling
the strings is the origin of the term “Wizard of Oz” prototype. Generative
AI can be considered a Wizard of Oz (WOz) prototype in that the wizards
behind the scenes make it look like AI possesses creativity, personality,
and intelligence, when in reality it runs simulations based on how it has
been pre-trained on other people’s content. The idea of a WOz originates in
the book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum in addition to the
movie of the same name. The story features a wizard character that appears
to be able to conjure whatever a person wishes. The truth, however, as
revealed by protagonist Dorothy and the friends she makes in Emerald City
is that the wizard is a simple man who is an inventor with no magical skills.
AI’s Wizards of Oz, however, are a collective consisting of analysts who
collect the source images and documents, labelers and annotators who
classify that data, and machine learning engineers who write the code to
interpret that data, train the data, and test that data. The magical intelligent
creature called AI also seems to do it all by itself, but it is trained on a large
amount of data, and behind the scenes, invisible, are those workers who
exert a powerful influence on what we eventually experience as a creative
and intelligent machine. AI cannot learn from specific interactions with
individual users in the way that humans understand what learning is. This
can be explained in more detail by a chatbot itself.
LLM: A chatbot can learn from interactions with individual users
by storing and analyzing the inputs (messages) it receives from the users
and the outputs (responses) it gives. By analyzing a large amount of these
interactions, it can learn the best responses to give in different situations. This
is done not by “understanding” the content of the interactions in the human
sense, but rather by identifying patterns in the data. AI can only learn from
specific user interactions if it is designed to do so and if those interactions
are stored and used as part of the training data. Some AI systems, especially
those used in sensitive areas like healthcare or finance, are specifically

xlvi
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
in intaglio; others were beaten up with the hammer or chisel so as to
stand in gentle salience above their bed. But, speaking generally, no
attempt was made to model the nude figures of men or women in the
round. No suspicion of the wealth of suggestion latent especially in
the latter, seems to have dawned upon the Assyrian mind. If we
except a few terra-cotta statuettes, the artist who in some way gave
proof of so much resource, of so much skill and ingenuity, seems
never to have felt the charm of female beauty. The beauty of woman
is the light of nature, the perennial joy of the eye; to exclude it from
the ideal world created by the plastic arts is to condemn that world to
a perpetual twilight, to cast over it a veil of chill monotony and
sadness.
Fig. 261.—Egyptian mirror, actual
size. Louvre. Drawn by Saint-Elme
Gautier.
In the arts of all those peoples who received the teachings of
Egypt and Chaldæa, whether at first hand, like the Phœnicians, or at
second, like the Greeks, the two distinct influences can always be
traced. Mesopotamia may be recognized in certain ornamental
motives, such as the “knop and flower,” the rosettes and palmettes,
as well as in its taste for the symmetry given by coupled figures; still
more clearly is it betrayed in motives into which lions and the whole
tribe of fantastic animals are introduced, struggling with and
devouring each other, and occasionally brought to the ground by
some individual dressed in a long gaberdine and crowned with a
tiara.
On the other hand, it is to Egypt that our thoughts are turned
when the human body meets our eyes in its unveiled nobility, with all
the variety of attitude and outline its forms imply. The peoples of
Western Asia learnt much in the school of the Chaldæan artist, but
the teaching given by the Egyptian sculptor was of a higher order,
and far better adapted to guide them in the way that leads to those
exquisite creations in which delicacy and certainty of hand are
happily allied with imaginative power. Sooner or later such teaching
must have aroused, in open and inquiring minds, a feeling for beauty
like that felt in her peculiar fashion by Egypt, a feeling to which
Greece, when once put in her right way, gave the fullest expression it
has ever received in marble and bronze.
In order to make good a comparison that no historian of art can
avoid, we have placed ourselves successively at two different points
of view, and from both we have arrived at the same result: as artists
the Egyptians take a higher rank than the Assyrians, than those
constructors who obstinately neglected the column even when they
built with stone, than those sculptors who avoided measuring
themselves with nature, and who shirked her difficulties by draping
their figures. But before thus bringing the two methods and the two
ways of looking at form into opposition, we ought perhaps to have
pointed out a difference in which this inequality is foreshadowed. In
all the monarchies of the East the great monuments were
anonymous, or, at least, if a name was given in the official texts it
was not that of the artist who conceived them, but of the king under
whom they were created. It is not till we arrive at Greece that we find
public opinion placing the work of art and its author so high that the
latter feels himself justified in signing his own creation. But although
this practice was not inaugurated in Egypt, numerous inscriptions
bear witness to the high rank held in Egyptian society by the artists
to whom the king confided the construction and decoration of his
buildings.[462] These men were not only well paid; they received
honours which they are careful to record, and their fame was spread
over the whole valley of the Nile. In the cuneiform texts we have so
far failed to discover the name of a single architect or sculptor, and it
does not appear that a reason for the omission is to be sought in the
peculiar conditions of Chaldæo-Assyrian epigraphy. Although
Babylon and Nineveh have not left us thousands of epitaphs like
those rescued from the sands of Egypt, we possess many private
contracts and agreements in which information similar to that
afforded in other countries by the sepulchral steles is to be found.
Neither there nor elsewhere do we find a trace of anything
corresponding to the conspicuous rank held under the Theban
princes of the eighteenth and nineteenth dynasties, by a Semnat, a
Bakhenkhonsou, or any other of the royal architects whose names
have been handed down to us in the texts.
It is unlikely that this difference will vanish when more texts have
been translated. The inequality in the position of the two artists is
readily explained by the unequal development of the two arts.
Egyptian architecture is learned and skilful after a fashion quite
distinct from that of Mesopotamia. It is not content, like the latter, to
spread itself out laterally and to heap up huge masses of earth, to be
afterwards clothed in thin robes of enamelled faïence, of painted and
sculptured alabaster. In spite of their rich decorations, palaces like
those of Nimroud and Khorsabad never quite threw off their
appearance of gigantic improvisations. Their plans once determined
—and Assyrian plans only varied within very narrow limits—the
method of roofing, flat or vaulted, fixed upon for each apartment, all
the rest was only a matter of foremen and their legions of half-skilled
workmen. At the very least we may say that the architect who
superintended the building of a Ninevite palace had a far easier task
than his rival of Thebes or Memphis. The arrangement of porticoes
and hypostyle halls demanded much thought and taste, and, if the
work when finished was at all to come up to the ideas of its creator,
the workmen who cut the graceful capitals and sturdy architraves
from the huge masses of granite, sandstone, or limestone, had to be
supervised with an unremitting care unknown and uncalled for in
Mesopotamia. The architects who raised the colonnades of Karnak
and the Ramesseum for Seti and his famous son, were the Ictinus
and Mnesicles of the East. We may become better acquainted than
we are now with the monumental history of Mesopotamia, but we
shall never find within her borders artists worthy to be placed on a
level with those Theban masters.
And if we compare the sculptors of Thebes and Nineveh, we shall
arrive at the same conclusion. On the one hand we find artists who,
whether they worked for the tomb or the temple, in the most
stubborn or the most kindly materials, chiselled images that either
delight us with their simple truth, or impress us with their noble
gravity and colossal size. A whole nation of statues issued from
those Egyptian studios through which we have conducted our
readers, many of them real masterpieces in their way. In
Mesopotamia, after early attempts that seemed full of promise, the
art of modelling statues was soon abandoned. In the glorious days of
Nineveh, all that was required of the sculptor was a talent, we might
say a knack, for cutting in the soft gypsum or limestone realistic
illustrations of the conquests and hunts of the reigning prince. He
had to turn out purely historical and anecdotic sculpture by the yard,
or rather by the mile; while in Egypt we see the whole nation, with its
kings and gods, revive to a second life in those forceful and sincere
portraits of which so many thousands have come down to our day.
In placing the distinctive features of the individual upon wood or
stone, the sculptor did something more than flatter the vanity of the
great; he prolonged their existence, he helped them to keep off the
assaults of death and to defy annihilation. From Pharaoh to the
humblest fellah, every one had to conciliate the man who possessed
such a quasi-magic power, and from whom such an all-important
service might have to be demanded. The common people bought
ready-made figures in a shop, on which they were content to cut
their names, but the kings and nobles commissioned their statues
from the best artists of the time, and some reflex from the respect
and admiration surrounding the sovereign must have fallen upon the
man to whom he confided the task of giving perpetuity to his royal
features, in those statues that during the whole of his reign would
stand on the thresholds and about the courts of the temple, and on
the painted walls of that happy abode to whose shadows he would
turn when full of years and eager for rest.
If, before the advent of the Greeks, there were any people in the
ancient world in whom a passion for beauty was innate, they were
the people of Egypt. The taste of Chaldæa was narrower, less frank
and less unerring; she was unable, at least in the same degree, to
ally force with grace; her ideal had less nobility, and her hand less
freedom and variety. It is by merits of a different kind that she regains
the advantage lost in the arts. If her artists fell short of their rivals,
her savants seem to have been superior to those of Egypt. In their
easy-going and well-organized life, the Egyptians appear to have
allowed the inquiring side of their intellects to go to sleep. Morality
seems to have occupied them more than science; they made no
great efforts to think.
The Chaldæans were the reverse of all this. We have reason to
believe that they were the first to ask themselves the question upon
which all philosophy is founded, the question as to the true origin of
things. Their solution of the problem was embodied in the
cosmogonies handed down to us in fragments by the Greek writers,
and although their conceptions have only been received through
intermediaries by whom their meaning has often been altered and
falsified, we are still enabled to grasp their fundamental idea through
all the obscurities due to a double and sometimes triple translation,
and that idea was that the world was created by natural forces, by
the action of causes even now at work. The first dogma of the
Babylonian religion was the spontaneous generation of things from
the liquid element.[463]
The first vague presentiment and rough sketch, as it were, of
certain theories that have made a great noise in the world in our own
day, may be traced, it is asserted, in the cosmogonic writings of
ancient Chaldæa. Even the famous hypothesis of Darwin has been
searched for and found, if we may believe the searchers. In any case
it seems well established that the echo of these speculations
reached the Ionian sages who were the fathers of Greek philosophy.
Their traces are perceptible, some scholars declare, in the Theogony
of Hesiod. Possibly it is so; there are certainly some striking points of
resemblance; but where the influence of such ideas is really and
clearly evident is in those philosophic poems that succeeded each
other about the sixth century B.C., all under the same title:
concerning nature (περὶφύσεως).[464] These poems are now lost, but
judging from what we are told by men who read them in the original,
the explanation they gave of the creation of the world and of the first
appearance upon it of organized beings, differed only in its more
abstract character from that proposed many centuries before, and
under the form of a myth, by the priests of Chaldæa. If we may trust
certain indications, these bold and ingenious doctrines crossed over
from Ionia to the mainland of Greece, and reached the ears of such
writers as Aristophanes and Plato.
It does the greatest honour to Chaldæa that its bold speculations
should have thus contributed to awaken the lofty intellectual
ambitions and the scientific curiosity of Greece, and perhaps she
may have rendered the latter country a still more signal service in
teaching her those methods by whose use man draws himself clear
of barbarism and starts on the road to civilization; a single example
of this will be sufficient. It is more than forty years since Bœckh, and
Brandis after him, proved that all the measures of length, weight and
capacity used by the ancients, were correlated in the same fashion
and belonged to one scale. Whether we turn to Persia, to Phœnicia
or Palestine, to Athens or Rome, we are constantly met by the
sexagesimal system of the Babylonians. The measurements of time
and of the diurnal passage of the sun employed by all those peoples,
were founded on the same divisions and borrowed from the same
inventors. It is to the same people that we owe our week of seven
days, which, though not at first adopted by the western nations,
ended by imposing itself upon them.[465] As for astronomy, from a
period far away in the darkness of the past it seems to have been a
regular branch of learning in Chaldæa; the Greeks knew very little
about it before the conquests of Alexander; it was more than a
century after the capture of Babylon by the Macedonians that the
famous astrological tables were first utilized by Hipparchus.[466]
In the sequel we shall come upon further borrowings and
connections of this kind, whose interest and importance has never
been suspected by the historian until within the last few years. Take
the chief gods and demi-gods to whom the homage of the peoples of
Syria and Asia Minor was paid, and you will have no difficulty in
acknowledging that, although their names were often changed on
the way, Mesopotamia was the starting place of them all. By
highways of the sea as well as those on land, the peoples
established on the eastern shores of the Mediterranean entered into
relations with the tribes of another race who dwelt on the European
coasts of the same sea; they introduced them to their divinities and
taught them the rites by which those divinities were honoured and
the forms under which they were figured. Without abandoning the
gods they worshipped in common with their brother Aryans, the
Greeks adopted more than one of these Oriental deities. This is not
the place to consider the question in detail. We must put aside for
the present both the Cybele of Cappadocia and Phrygia and that
Ephesian Artemis, who, after being domiciled and naturalized in one
of the Hellenic capitals, so obstinately and so long preserved her
foreign characteristics; we must for the moment forget Aphrodite,
that goddess of a different fortune whose name is enough to call up
visions of not a few masterpieces of classic art and poetry. Does not
all that we know of this daughter of the sea, of her journeys, of the
first temples erected to her on the Grecian coasts and of the peculiar
character of her rites and attributes—does not all this justify us in
making her a lineal descendant of Zarpanitu, of Mylitta and Istar, of
all those goddesses of love and motherhood created by the
imagination and worshipped by the piety of the Semites of Chaldæa?
On the other hand the more we know of Egypt the less inclined are
we to think that any of the gods of her Pantheon were transported to
Greece and Italy, at least in the early days of antiquity.
Incomplete as they cannot help being, these remarks had to be
made. They will explain why in the scheme of our work we have
given similar places to Chaldæa and Egypt. The artist will always
have a predilection for the latter country, a preference he will find no
difficulty in justifying; but the historian cannot take quite the same
view. It is his special business to weigh the contributions of each
nation to the common patrimony of civilization, and he will
understand how it is that Chaldæa, in spite of the deficiencies of its
plastic art, worked more for others than Egypt and gave more of its
substance and life. Hidden among surrounding deserts the valley of
the Nile only opened upon the rest of the world by the ports on a
single short line of frontier. The basin of the Euphrates was much
more easily accessible. It had no frontier washed by the
Mediterranean, but it communicated with that sea by more numerous
routes than Egypt, and by routes whose diversity enhanced the
effect of the examples they were the means of conveying to the
outer world.
It is, to all appearance, to the ancient inhabitants of Mesopotamia
that humanity owes the cultivation of wheat, its chief alimentary
plant.[467] This precious cereal seems to have been a native of the
valleys of the Indus and Euphrates; nowhere else is it found in a wild
state. From those two regions it must have spread eastwards across
India to China, and westwards across Syria into Egypt and
afterwards on to the European continent. From the rich plains where
the Hebrew tradition set the cradle of the human race, the winds
carried many seeds besides those by which men’s bodies have so
long been nourished; the germs of all useful arts and of all mental
activities were borne on their breath like a fertilizing dust. Among
those distant ancestors of whom we are the direct heirs, those
ancestors who have left us that heritage of civilization which grows
with every year that passes, there are none, perhaps, to whom our
respect and our filial gratitude are more justly due than to the ancient
inhabitants of Chaldæa.
ADDITIONS AND CORRECTIONS.

VOL I.

P. 155.—It was not only as mortar that bitumen was used. Mr.
Rassam tells us that he found at Abou-Abba (Sippara), in Chaldæa,
a chamber paved with asphalte much in the same fashion as a
modern street in London or Paris (Proceedings of the Society of
Biblical Archæology).
P. 200.—From a late communication to the Society of Biblical
Archæology we learn that Mr. Rassam found the Sippara tablet in
the corner of a room, under the floor; it was inclosed in an inscribed
earthenware box.
P. 242, line 12; for Shalmaneser III. read Shalmaneser II.
P. 266, line 8 from foot: for Plate X. read Plate IX.
P. 305.—Intercourse between the valley of the Nile and that of
the Tigris and Euphrates seems to have begun not sooner than the
eighteenth Egyptian dynasty. To this conclusion we are led both by
Egyptian texts and by the tablets in the library of Assurbanipal. Most
of the tablets are reprints—if we may say so—of texts dating
originally from Ur, and from the time of the ancient Chaldæan
monarchy. Now these texts seem to have been written by a people
who knew not Egypt; no mention of that country is to be found in
them. They contain a division of the world into four regions, in none
of which Egypt has a place (Sayce, The Early Relations of Egypt and
Babylonia, in Lepsius’s Zeitschrift, p. 150).
P. 349.—We may here draw attention to an object which may be
compared to that described by M. Clermont Ganneau, both for its
intrinsic character and its probable destination. It is a tablet in brown
limestone, portable, and surmounted by a ring or staple cut in the
material. On one face there is a bas-relief in which the goddess who
occupies the lower register in Péretié’s bronze again appears. She
has the head of a lioness, a snake dangles from each hand, the
arms are outstretched, and two animals, in which Layard recognises
a lioness and a sow, hang to her breasts. This goddess stands
before an animal which has a bull’s head in the engraving given by
Lajard. But its feet are those of a horse, and no doubt we should find
that the animal in question was a horse if we could examine the
original; but we do not know what has become of it. If, as there
seems reason to believe, this goddess is an infernal deity, it is easy
to understand why serpents were placed in her hands. These
reptiles are the symbols of resurrection; every year they quit their old
skins for new ones. The object in question is described in detail in
the Recherches sur le Culte de Vénus, p. 130, and figured in Plate
XVI, Fig. 1. Upon one of the larger faces of the tablet and upon its
edges there are inscriptions, magic formulæ according to M. Fr.
Lenormant.
This tablet was formerly in the cabinet of M. Rousseau, at one
time French consul at Bagdad. It was found in the ruins of Babylon.
Size, 24 inches high by 24 inches wide, and 3⅞ inches thick.
P. 384.—In speaking of the excavations made by Sir H.
Rawlinson at Borsippa, we forgot to mention his paper entitled On
the Birs Nimroud; or, The Great Temple of Borsippa (Journal of the
Royal Asiatic Society, vol. xviii. p. 1–32). Paragraphs 1 and 2 give an
account of the excavations, and we regret that we wrote of the
religious architecture of Chaldæa before having read them. Not that
they contain anything to cause us to change our conceptions of the
staged towers. The excavations seem to have been carried on with
great care, but they hardly gave results as complete as they might
have done had they been directed by a thoroughly-trained architect.
VOL. II.

P. 48.—Upon Arvil, the ancient Arbela, and the likelihood of great


discoveries in the mound which there rises 150 feet above the plain,
see a contribution from Sir H. Rawlinson to the Journal of the Royal
Asiatic Society, vol. i. new series, 1865, pp. 190–197. The mound is
at present crowned by a Turkish fort.
P. 176.—Herr Fritz Hommel, one of the few non-French
students of the remains from Tello, is no more inclined than we are to
allow that the igneous rocks from which they are cut were brought
from Egypt. He believes they were won from much nearer quarries,
viz., on the borders of the Arabian plateau (Die Vorsemitische
Kulturen in Egypten und Babylonien, pp. 211–223).
Pp. 188–190.—In enumerating the few monuments of Chaldæan
sculpture that we possess over and above those brought home by
M. de Sarzec, we forgot to mention a small Babylonian head in hard
alabaster, now in the Louvre (Fig. 262). Its workmanship resembles
that of the two heads from Tello (Plate VII.), and some of the small
heads from the same place. It is conspicuous for the same frank and
decided modelling, but it belongs to the period when long beards
were worn.
P. 202.—To the list of Chaldæan sculptures we should, perhaps,
add the rock-cut relief found by Sir H. Rawlinson in the district of
Zohab, about fifty leagues from the left bank of the Tigris, and to the
north-west of Bagdad, near the village of Sheikhan. This district
forms a part of the Persian province of Kirmanchah (Journal of the
Geographical Society, vol. ix. p. 31). The relief occurs, it seems, on
the high road between Babylon and Ecbatana, in the defile which is
now called Tak-i-Girrah, one of the passes leading up through Mount
Zagros to the plateau of Iran. There is a sketch of the relief from the
pencil of Sir H. Rawlinson in the Five Great Monarchies of his
brother (vol. iii. p. 7). The king stands with his foot on the body of a
conquered enemy. An individual, probably the royal general,
presents two kneeling captives, who are held by a cord attached to
rings put through their noses. More captives with ropes about their
necks are carved on the kind of plinth upon which the main group is
supported. The whole picture is about two feet wide and five high.
Near it there is an apparently unfinished inscription in Babylonish
cuneiform characters. The Chaldæan origin of the work is confirmed
by the flounces on the general’s robe. In the same neighbourhood
there are ruins which appear to date from a very early period.
Fig. 262.—Fragment of a
Chaldæan statuette. Louvre.
P. 219.—We have here omitted to draw attention to one of the
differences between the art of the Sargonids and that of the
preceding dynasty. In the figures from Tello and in the bas-reliefs of
the time of Assurnazirpal the sculptor has left the eyeballs smooth
(Plate VII.; Vol. I. Fig. 15; Vol. II, Figs. 43, 64, 113). In the sculptures
of the time of Sargon and his successors, on the other hand, the
cornea is indicated in the figures both of men and animals, by a
clearly traced circle (Vol. I, Figs. 22 and 25; Vol. II. Fig. 118 and Plate
X.). It was, no doubt, the desire to give a more lifelike expression to
the physiognomy that led the artist thus to modify his proceeding.
There are a few figures in which the desire for imitative truth is
pushed even farther. In a bas-relief in the Louvre there is an eagle-
headed deity in which not only the cornea but the pupil also is
marked by a smaller circle within the first. See the De l’Expression
des Yeux dans la Statuaire of Doctor Debrou (Correspondant, April
10th, 1883). His special knowledge has enabled him to make more
than one remark upon the representation of the eye in ancient and
modern sculpture, to which writers upon art would do well to pay
attention.
P. 398.—On the subject of the female divinity whose worship was
so widely spread over the whole East and over the Mediterranean
coasts, the dissertation of Herr Gelzer, Zum Cultus der Assyrischen
Aphrodite (Lepsius’s Zeitschrift, 1875, p. 127) may be consulted with
profit.
We received the admirable Guide to the Kuyundjik Gallery,
published by the authorities of the British Museum, too late to make
use of it for our work. It joins to an exhaustive account of the bas-
reliefs of Sennacherib and Assurbanipal a description of the smaller
objects contained in the glass cases of the same gallery. Many of
these objects date from a very early period, and many were found in
Chaldæa. Some of the more interesting texts are translated by Mr.
Pinches; of others he gives a summary. The body of the work is
preceded by an introduction giving such details of Assyrian history,
religion and manners as are required by the general student. When a
similar brochure is forthcoming for the Nimroud gallery—and the
energy of the English officials is a guarantee that we shall not have
to wait long for it—visitors to the museum will be in possession of all
that is necessary to enable them to profit to the fullest extent by its
superb collection.
INDEX.

Abd-al-Medjid, Sultan, ii. 39.


Abdul-Hamid, ii. 76.
Abou-Abba (or Sippara), i. 200.
Abou-Sharein, i. 157, 190, 262; ii. 34.
Abraham, i. 15, 199.
Abydenus, i. 51;
spoken of by Eusebius, 57.
Abydos, on the Hellespont, ii. 220.
Accad, i. 14, 21, 59.
Acheron, i. 354.
Adar (Saturn?), i. 73.
Adrammelech, i. 103.
Agbatana, see Ecbatana.
Ahmes II., ii. 339.
Ahura-Mazda, i. 88.
Alabaster, found near Mossoul, i. 120;
its distribution, 121;
its constitution, 121;
its characteristics as a material for the sculptor, ii. 110.
Alabastron, ii. 301.
Alexander the Great, i. 54; ii. 382.
Alexander Polyhistor, i. 51.
Allat, i. 83, 345.
Alphabet, invention of, i. 22.
Altaï, i. 21.
Altars, their characteristic forms, i. 236;
with battlements, 255;
circular, 256;
sarcophagus-shaped, 256.
Amanus, ii. 340.
Amber, its absence from Mesopotamian remains, ii. 362.
Amen, i. 78, 79.
Ament, the Assyrian, i. 345.
Amiaud, M., i. 361.
Amoor, i. 19.
Amphora, ii. 300.
Amraphel, i. 36.
Amulets, ii. 251.
Anabasis quoted, i. 361.
Anaïtis, see Oannes.
Animals, grotesque and fantastic, in Assyrian Art, ii. 167–173;
on the seals, ii. 279.
Anthemius, i. 172.
Antioch, ii. 286.
Antiochus-Epiphanes, i. 33.
Aphrodite, ii. 398.
Apollonius of Tyana, i. 299.
Apsou (or Apason), i. 83.
Arade, ii. 265.
Aramaic, or Aramæan, came into common use with the second
Chaldæan Empire, i. 18.
Aram-Naharaim, i. 3.
Arbeles, Arvil (or Ervil), i. 6; ii. 48.
Arch, frequent use of, i. 132, 221;
invented in Chaldæa, 222;
at Mugheir, 222;
in the hanging gardens at Babylon, 223;
in Sargon’s gateways, 224;
in the sewers of the palaces, 227.
Archivolt, enamelled, at Khorsabad, i. 290.
Arioch, i. 36.
Aristophanes, ii. 397.
Aristotle, i. 71;
his Politics quoted in reference to the size of Babylon, ii. 56.
Arithmetic, Chaldæan, i. 68;
origin of the sexagesimal system, 68.
Armenia, annexed by Assyria, i. 7.
Arms, ii. 343.
Arrian, his Indian history, i. 57.
Artaxerxes Mnemon, i. 90.
Artists, their social position in Mesopotamia, ii. 394.
Aryans, said to compose part of the early Chaldæan population,
i. 18.
Aryballos, ii. 306.
Asia Minor, ii. 172.
Ass, the wild, in Assyrian sculpture, ii. 150.
Asshur, the builder of Nineveh, i. 14.
Assur, i. 83;
the Assyrian god par excellence, 84;
fell with Nineveh, 88.
Assurbanipal, i. 36, 44;
receives the homage of Gyges, king of Lydia, 44;
his cruelty, 47;
patron of literature and the arts, 47;
his library, 47;
numerous remains of sculpture dating from his reign, ii. 236.
Assurbilkala, ii. 101, 203, 289.
Assuredilani, i. 51.
Assurnazirpal, i. 42;
his statue in the round, ii. 126.
Assyria, its true boundaries, i. 7;
its successive capitals, 7;
its size, 7;
consolidation of its supremacy, 41;
first A. empire, 41;
second A. empire, 41;
expeditions into Armenia, Cappadocia, and Syria, 41;
strictly a military monarchy, 96;
its régime, 103;
Assyrian monarchy, solidity of the succession, 103;
characteristics of the Assyrian race, 105;
cruelty of the Assyrian kings, 105–7;
luxury of do., 105–7;
constitution of the Assyrian nation, 111;
comparative insignificance of civilian element, 112.
Assyro-Chaldæan language, the, i. 53.
Astarte, i. 345.
Astragali, i. 206.
Astrology, i. 65;
the forerunner of real astronomy, 67.
Athenæum quoted, i. 317.
Aturia, a variant of Assyria, i. 6.
Auben (or Auben-Ra), ii. 120.
Augustus, ii. 382.

Baal worshipped in Judah and Israel as well as Tyre and Sidon,


i. 16.
Baalazar, ii. 336.
Babel, i. 14, 53.
Bab-i-Houmaioun, ii. 72.
Babil, i. 130, 154;
its identity discussed, 384; ii. 35.
Babooshes, i. 238.
Babylon, age of its premiership, i. 38;
more tenacious of life than Nineveh, 54;
etymology of the name, 86;
natural elements of its prosperity, 92;
superiority of its situation over that of Nineveh, 93;
an “eternal city,” ii. 53;
its defences, 53;
incomplete nature of the explorations that have been carried
out on its site, 55;
its size discussed, 56–59;
the stone bridge, 57;
height of the walls, 63.
Bactriana, metals brought from, i. 125.
Bagdad, i. 40, 54.
Bahr-ul-nejef, ii. 176.
Bakhenkhonsou, ii. 394.
Balawat, gates of, i. 194;
steles figured on, 196;
standards figured on, 195;

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