Tiny Prediction: Instant, AI New Yorker-style Comic Strips by the end of the year
Nothing is more timeless than a comic strip from the New Yorker:
They are not just clever and witty with an iconic illustration style, but capture a particular moment in modern life and make a tasteful statement about it.
I have been testing DALL-E or ChatGPT for years now to see if these models could generate something at the calibre of a New Yorker strip - but they have not come close … yet.
To be clear, the criteria I’m looking for is something which conceptualizes a very funny joke and matches the art style well. Also, I am willing to give bonus points if the joke is something novel and under appreciated philosophically.
Today, after some minor prompting, ChatGPT came up with this:
There’s still a lot of work to be done … the font face, art style, and quality of the joke is just not where it should be. But I’m hoping by the end of the year, the models will cross some kind of threshold where this prompt will just start working.
Like everybody else, I am hoping the models will just get smarter and a lot more will be possible. I may ask for a new yorker style strip everyday just to elevate my daily routine and provide that familiar but refreshing take on modern life.
I chuckled at the strip. This is going to be good!
Actually, I was able to generate pretty similar style with the DALL-E using proper prompting.
Not exactly the New Yorker style (it wasn't my goal) but the same in spirit.
So I made an end-to-end joke and cartoon generation pipeline:
https://altsoph.substack.com/p/comic-cartoon-generation