Background

I’ve gotten some really amazing and positive feedback on the monsters styling for this site. A lot of folks are unaware that the new GPT-IMAGE-1 model that is available (even to free users) is actually able to use your source material to generate a consistent style across multiple requests.

You may have discovered recently (if you participated in the Studio Ghibli ChatGPT trend, or if you turned yourself into an action figure) that you can upload a source image to ChatGPT and it will use that source material along with your prompt. In this article we’re going to explore the possibilities of extending this concept to create your own consistent brand for a website or social. This is a very similar process to how our initial stu.monster concept was built, but we’ll make a new style for this post and track from beginning to end. Let’s get started.

Concept

So… first come up with a style or underlying concept. Ideally this would be something creative maybe a style that you already have a connection with. You can get ChatGPT to work in any art style through prompting, so experiment to find what works for you. Choose something that will make your blog unique as a style or element such as: art deco, Piet Mondrian or even something like “playing cards”. For this article, I’ve chosen something out-of-the-blue: Scandinavian Folk Art https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dala_horse as the underlying style.

NOTE: For this post, I will use block quotes to show my prompt interactions with ChatGPT and include my original prompts verbatim. Try these out and riff on them to make them your own. In the chats below, I will be on the orange sherbet background, bot responses on blue.

Design an image of the characters for my blog project. The style and theming is going to be like dala horses and Scandinavian folk art. I want 3 main animal characters to use and they should be a dala horse a fox and something else. All in the same art style. It needs to be simplified enough to look good as icons.

Great let’s try this again. Horse, reindeer, fox and hare icons

80/20 Rule Maybe?

OK. Well…. This is NOT UNCOMMON, we’ve gotten most of what we want across the 2 requests, but not at the same time in the same image. You WILL need to occasionally go to your favorite image editing program (such as the always excellent, free Paint.NET) and tweak the outputs you received from the model.

I manually merged the 2 images together and used a clone stamp to remove the hare that was painted on the fox and replaced with some style elements from the other animals… and now we have a single image with our slate of characters. Oh i also removed the second tail from the reindeer because… it was weird.

Let’s build on that foundation image

Now that we have our “base” image, save this image somewhere, you will be using this same uploaded image in ChatGPT to begin lots of subsequent chats on the topic.

TIP:
I often find it better to upload your "base" source image at the beginning of a new chat session for this kind of work.  It seems to keep the source material fresh in the AI's "mind".  If you find that after 3 or 4 interactions with the bot, it is drifting away from the source material design... just start a new chat and upload your base image again.

The next interaction shows some of the back-and-forth that’s common when working with the current model. Keep in mind, I attached the base image above as part of this new chat.

we’re building a blog site called wild. it’s a technical themed blog but we want to keep with the existing scandinavian folk art style and use the characters and colors from the attached image. can you design a version of my characters that are working in an office around a laptop

That sounds like a fun and unique theme—combining Scandinavian folk art with a tech office vibe! I can create a version of your existing characters (horse, fox, deer, and rabbit) styled in the same Scandinavian folk art aesthetic, but shown working around a laptop in an office setting.
Before I start, could you confirm a few details to get it just right:
1. Setting preferences: Would you like a shared desk, a cozy co-working space, or a modern tech office look?
2. Props: Should they have coffee mugs, notebooks, headsets, or any other specific items?
3. Laptop style: Traditional laptop, something stylized, or even wooden/folk-inspired to match the aesthetic

Once I have that, I’ll generate the illustration for you.

cozy co-working space vibe, keeping the style by making laptops have wooden textures or carrying the color scheme to other parts of the room would be great

Now you’re off! Let your imagination run, ask for all the things you need for a website or blog… 404 pages, decorative line break images, small versions of the characters to use as icons. Maybe the animal faces only as an icon? This next example is a continuation of the previous chat about the office cozy co-working space

can you make a funny 404 image using these characters?

Of course, you now may want to incorporate other items or people. Here I started a new chat and gave the base characters image from earlier along with my headshot. Since it was a new chat, I did put in a sentence reminding the bot of what this concept is. My request was:

We’re building a blog called wild.. it’s tech content but Scandinavian folk art themed. Our primary characters are attached along with my headshot. Make a picture of me with the characters in the same style working on a white board in a cozy office. My clothing should be more outdoor than business

Wrap

There you have it. We created a slate of characters with a unique consistent style and then used prompting and regularly reuploading of our base image files to keep adding new material and concepts into the same universe. I did all this with the free ChatGPT so I was limited to a few image generations a day, but plan out what you need and make requests periodically and you can generate all this on the free tier as well.

Try it out. Let me know what you create.