Resource Post
Nov. 23rd, 2037 12:24 pm( 'Prompt me' posts )
( Random generators )
Various off-LJ/DW resources and adventures in JavaScript:
( Fanfic masterlist )( Random generators )
Another generator turns psychic
Mar. 5th, 2026 08:57 pmI've been experimenting with Google's latest AI image generator (Nano Banana 2) to generate Jamie's Angels "fanart". AI image generation has come on a lot since last year; NB2 is capable of some impressive feats, such as tracking the flow of events in an image and guessing what came before or might come next. It's also still capable of out-and-out stupidity. One minute it's generating an entire six-panel comic strip with all dialogue correct, the next it's drawing characters with three arms or swapping whole people, or bits of them, in and out between frames. I haven't been sharing the results online because there doesn't seem to be any point; anyone who does want AI-generated fanart can generate it themselves with equal ease.
What made me do a double-take this time was that in my prompt, I gave it, as usual, character forenames, descriptions and costumes; and from that, the generator was able to deduce that there was a Doctor Who connection and added an unprompted police box in the background.
It's also possible to feed Nano Banana 2 an image and have it simulate people commenting on it, just in case one's ego is fragile enough to be flattered by fake reviews of one's fake fanart. (I was impressed that it understood the dialogue enough to follow Zoë's "Barbara Celarent" jibe). What's amusing is that when you do it with an image that it's generated itself, the comments sometimes point out mistakes (such as Isobel's camera suddenly teleporting to Gia). Which is all very well, but if the generator's got enough smarts to spot that something's wrong, it would would have been better to use them when generating the image in the first place.
I had a wry flash of amusement that TechRadar's review of the "incredibly dull" Seven Dials adaptation begins "Even a TV genius like Chris Chibnall..."
Gosh, imagine how much worse things could have been if Chris Chibnall had been merely competent rather than yer actual TV genius.
(Having watched it, I am confirmed in my belief that Mr Chibnall has the stage direction [The heroine gazes mutely at the camera while the plot is read out to her at great length] bound to a single function key on his keyboard).
This isn't so much a complete fic, as the premise for one. And an excuse for me to team up another character played by Sheridan Smith with another character played by Jenna Coleman.
Characters: Joey Ross, Johanna Constantine
Fandoms: Jonathan Creek, The Sandman (Netflix), other
Word count: ~1800 words
( The Premise )
This had been on my to-read list for some time. When I read the Detection Club's parody Ask a Policeman I had some knowledge of three of the detectives being parodied — Lord Peter Wimsey, Mrs Bradley and Roger Sheringham, but the fourth, Sir John Saumarez, I'd never heard of before. At the time none of the books featuring him was readily available, but Enter Sir John has been reprinted recently so I thought I'd take a look. (The reprint is of the 1929 US edition, which apparently changes the victim's name compared to the UK version).
So, the plot: A travelling theatre company visits a provincial town. Screams are heard at a boarding house where two of the women are having dinner. When help arrives, one of them is dead, and the other one is promptly arrested, tried and convicted for the murder. Sir John, a noted actor-manager who knows Martella, the convicted actress, decides she is innocent and sets out to clear her name. Whether this inspired the premise of Dorothy L Sayers' Strong Poison or whether it was convergent evolution, I don't know.
Having read it, I think it's not entirely surprising that Sir John didn't have the lasting fame of the other three. He's an entertaining enough character, with the authors not taking him entirely seriously, but a lot of the surrounding cast aren't really fleshed out. And the plot is fairly slight; once Sir John has decided that Martella didn't do it, there aren't that many suspects for who did, so the second half of the book is fairly linear as he builds up his case, extracts a confession from the murderer, and gets Martella's conviction overturned. It's not to say there isn't the odd plot twist, but there's no point at which he has to throw out all his work and start again.
What does stick a little in the mind is the motive. ( spoiler )
And one curiosity. The reprint included a reproduction of the original frontispiece. What caught my attention was that the illustrator appears to have presciently modelled Sir John on Peter Capaldi.
Alphabetical fic meme
Oct. 27th, 2025 03:26 pmMemed from ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
thisbluespirit and pedanther:
thisbluespirit and pedanther:
Rules: How many letters of the alphabet have you used for starting a fic title? One fic per line, ‘A’ and 'The’ do not count for 'a’ and ’t’. Post your score out of 26 at the end, along with your total fic count.
- Ac Velut In Somnis (DW / Knightmare, 30179 words)
- Between the Old Year and the New (S&S / Lord Peter Wimsey, 4361 words)
- Child of the Gods (DW / Federation of the Hub, 3892 words)
- Death on the Marsh (DW / Doctor Syn, 19455 words)
- Extra-Curricular Activity (DW, 12014 words)
- False Arrest (DW, 943 words)
- Genius and Geniality (DW, 30233 words)
- How The Other Half Lives (DW, 3366 words)
- In the Bag (DW / Adam Adamant Lives!, 1843 words, major character death)
- Just Keep On Trying (DW / Portal, 3091 words)
- Klepsmnemon (DW, 36398 words)
- Legman (Red Dwarf / Miss Marple, 515 words)
- Mayhap You'll Never See Such Another (Professor X / Inspector Morose, 1239 words)
- Near Miss (DW / Blackadder, 100 words)
- Old Shame (DW, 1172 words)
- Party Piece (DW / Kaldor City, 1015 words)
- The Quest of the Chocolates (DW, 735 words)
- Red for Danger (AAL! / Green Knowe series, 594 words)
- Samantha's Turn (DW, 6355 words)
- Thy Ravish'd Hair (DW / The Goon Show, 3297 words)
- Unbearable (DW [This Time Round], 3696 words, author chose not to warn)
- Valen's Angels (B5, 864 words)
- With Hilarious Consequences (DW, 568 words)
- (For 'X' I'm afraid I've drawn a blank)
- You'll Have Had Your Alternate Reality (You'll Have Had Your Tea, 1000 words)
- Zombie (DW, 100 words)
Total score: 25/26, from 354 works on AO3.
I was pretty sure I wouldn't have any trouble with Z, and in the end I didn't even need to venture out of AO3 to exhume Zoë Heriot and the Elf-Knight to get there. If I ever do take up my keyboard again I'll have to consider what can be done with X, though.
In the last few years, generative AI has clearly developed many uses. Pictures of Paddington Bear bringing Sutekh's gift of death to all humankind? No sooner said than done. Footage of your favourite ship pair kissing, even when they never met in canon? There's a generator for that. Let alone the twerking...
One application that isn't so obvious and can sometimes lead to amusing not-quite-there misconceptions is to convert a picture into a romance novel summary. Feed whatever picture you like into the classifier at imagetoprompt.com, click on the thumbnail, and ask it "If this was the cover for a romance novel, what might the blurb say?" (For added verisimilitude, you can tell it the characters' names too).
( examples )Amazing what you can do with AI these days
Apr. 4th, 2025 03:32 pmIt's doubtless the height of egotism, but I've been experimenting with getting AI to make covers and/or illustrations for some of my fanfic. The tool of choice this time was Google ImageFX.
In general, it doesn't do too badly with two or three people in the picture, but it seemed to find the half-dozen required for a Jamie's Angels ensemble pretty taxing. And while it's pretty good with spelling, pretty good is not perfect.
( Under the cut for size )I sense the hand of the Master in this
Apr. 1st, 2025 09:21 pmWhen I was in Waitrose this evening the attendant manning the self-service checkouts was putting free bunches of daffodils in everyone's shopping. At least they were real daffodils rather than plastic ones.
(Also, an afterthought re AUs — it didn't occur to me until just now that 'Nordic Noir' was a perfectly valid type of AU, and one which Taskmaster has canonically visited.)
Fic: You Have Ten Alternatives
Mar. 31st, 2025 12:47 amA tumblr post by lurking_latinist suggested the concept of a "Taskmaster AU", and since I already had the Ten Alternate Universes meme lying around...
lurking_latinist suggested the concept of a "Taskmaster AU", and since I already had the Ten Alternate Universes meme lying around...
You Have Ten Alternatives (1000 words) by JohnAmendAll
Chapters: 10/10
Fandom: Taskmaster (UK TV) RPF, Doctor Who (2005), My Lady's Money - Wilkie Collins, James Bond (Movies 1962-2002), Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon | Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon (Anime & Manga), Babylon 5 (TV 1993), Sapphire & Steel (TV), Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Greg Davies, Alex Horne (British Comedy RPF), Amy Pond (Doctor Who), Mike Wozniak, Old Sharon, George Wickham, Susan Ivanova, Stephen Franklin, James Bond
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Anime, Alternate Universe - Mythology, Alternate Universe - Spies & Secret Agents, Alternate Universe - Pirates, Alternate Universe - Space, Alternate Universe - Children, Alternate Universe - Romance Novel, Alternate Universe - Detectives, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Alternate Universe - Regency, Drabble Collection
Summary:
Applying the "Ten Alternate Universes" meme to Taskmaster.
Actors I've seen elsewhere
Mar. 25th, 2025 08:36 pmI certainly wasn't aware that Hugh Burden played Lord Peter Wimsey on the radio, with Clifford Norgate as Parker.
AO3 stats meme
Feb. 23rd, 2025 10:38 pmYoinked from thisbluespirit:
( Answers below )
thisbluespirit:
Rules: give us the links to your fics with the most hits, second most kudos, third most comments, fourth most bookmarks, fifth most words, and fic with the fewest words.
( Answers below )
10 minutes of plot and 80 minutes of people kicking each other in front of flashing lights so you can't see who's kicking whom.
(OK, I didn't time it with a stopwatch but that's what it felt like).
I've not seen the line drawn there before
Aug. 25th, 2024 10:21 pmEver since the 2005 revival, and probably before, there's been a fairly standard template for an article about Doctor Who which goes: "Introducing the new companion, who's completely different from all the helpless screamers who came before her." Or, retrospectively, "X was a radical introduction as companion, so different from all the helpless screamers etc."
I think today's the first time I've seen the division between 'helpless screamer' and 'competent companion' placed as late as between Rose and Martha. I mean, say what you like about Rose (and I have) I'm finding it very difficult to picture her as 'hysterically screaming at every threat'.
(And another demerit to the article's author for capitalising the Doctor's "The" like it's a royal pronoun).
If you can get at the iPlayer, there's a little 15-minute thing: Peter Davison Remembers... Campion.
(They've got the actual episodes up on iPlayer at the moment, too).
I'll be in the Carr
Jan. 28th, 2024 09:07 pmFollowing up on my last post: Quite a few audio adaptations of John Dickson Carr's works seem to have made it to YouTube, and people have been collecting them into playlists. This one starts with Fire, Burn! with some guy called Richard Hurndall in the lead. (Richard Hurndall playing a time traveller? Nah, it'll never catch on...)
Drive-by rec
Jan. 7th, 2024 05:04 pmArchive.org has the BBC Radio series of Carr's Dr Gideon Fell mysteries, with Sir Donald Sinden in the title role. I remember listening to some of them in lunch breaks at work when they were originally broadcast, and enjoying them. So far this time round I've listened to He Who Whispers, which seems to be faithful to what I remember of the book.
This was a British Library crime reprint that I purchased on a recent visit. It's apparently "considered to be one of [the author's] finest works" according to the blurb on the back, and got a glowing review from Dorothy L. Sayers on initial publication.
My reaction, having read it, was that there's a reason Sayers, and Christie, and Freeman Wills Crofts were bestsellers, whereas Anthony Gilbert wasn't. ( Don't think there are any major spoilers, but just in case... )
AO3 Questions Meme
Jun. 17th, 2023 10:59 pmMemed from shivver:
( 1. How many works do you have on Ao3? )
shivver:
( 1. How many works do you have on Ao3? )
