Gharks, Grendels, Robots and Femtozoans

Tyna and a transcended Iidi of the Hierion Domain.

 Three months ago I began writing a new science fiction story called "D*". At that time, I mentioned the Eldil, strange, artificial life-forms that appear as characters in Out of the Silent Planet by Clive Staples Lewis. The Eldil are very difficult for humans to see; they apparently exist in a different physical domain than do we humans. In my imagination, the Eldil are similar to advanced aliens such as the Iidi, after they have abandoned their biological form and taken up residence in the Hierion Domain as artificial life-forms. Lewis also described other creatures such as the alien Pfifltriggi. I confused ImageFX with a complex text prompt: "

A pfifltrigg, by ImageFX

A stunningly detailed, full color, photorealistic rendering of a creature with a face that is hairless like a man’s. The creature’s face is long and pointed like a shrew’s, yellow and shabby-looking. The creature’s face is low in the forehead and heavy at the back and behind the ears. The creature is both insect-like and reptilian with a body like that of a frog. Part of creature’s fore-limbs are like an elbow that helps support the weight of the creature’s body. That part of the creature’s arms are broad and padded and clearly made to be walked on; but upwards from it at an angle of about forty-five degrees are branches of the forearms that are thin yet strong and end in enormous, sensitive, many-fingered hands. The creature can perform manual work with its body weight supported by the elbow. The creature is insect-like in that it can swivel its head almost all the way round like a mantis or a grasshopper. The creature appears to be part human dwarf and part like a frog". See the image to the left.

Pfifltrigg version #2, by ImageFX

I modified my text prompt to: "Photorealistic quadrupedal frog creature. The creature has four limbs and all four limbs touch the ground like a frog. Each forelimb has a lower branch ending in a padded elbow that rests on the ground. The upper branch of each forelimb ends in a  dexterous hand with long fingers. The creature supports its weight on the elbow pads and its hind legs, in a posture similar to a frog. The rear limbs are frog-like and end in webbed feet. The creature is posed in front of an ancient stone monolith with carved symbols. The lighting should clearly show the creature using its elbow pads to support its weight while its hands are holding tools used to carve stone. The creature has green skin and a pointed amphibian-like face with large ears". The pfifltrigg that is shown to the right is not bad, but I could never get ImageFX to generate a more quadrupedal pfifltrigg. 

An Iidi with purple skin (source).

 Femtozoans. I have long enjoyed populating my science fiction stories with a diverse collection of non-human biological creatures, human variants and artificial life forms. In my previous blog post, I mentioned zeptozoans, artificial life-forms that can arise within a person's zeptite endosymbiont. In older stories, I have included humanoids and human variants such as the Iidi, Grendels, the tryp'At, the Ek'col and the Asterothropes. Now, in "D*", there is a role for femtozoans.

Humanoid Diversity. I prefer humanoids over frog people. Previously, in stories such as "The Alastor Network" and "Meet the Phari", I depicted the Iidi as a humanoid alien species of the planet Dreavero, a world that I designated as being Alastor 1921 back in 2016. At the time when Ryl Shermatz ruled Alastor Cluster, there were still biological Iidi living in Wilson's Land on Dreavero, a sanctuary that a Connatic had long ago established for the alien Iidi to protect them against human encroachment. 

Figure 1. Some Layernites by ImageFX.

I imagined that the Iidi were so similar to humans that there had been a transfer of some Iidi genes into a few humans, which led to the Idite Dynasty. Thus, as a member of the Idite Dynasty, Ryl Shermatz carried some Iidi gene combinations, even if he did not have purple skin. 

In the final chapter of The Alastor Network, an Iidi appeared in a form that even Ryl Shermatz could see. I depicted Ryl Shermatz as having very limited telepathic abilities, but as having a mysterious ability to sense danger: if someone near him was a threat to his safety, Ryl knew it. Back in 2016, I never accounted for Ryl's ability to sense danger, but I have since developed the concept of the Sedron Time Stream. Maybe Ryl's "visions of the future" are all made possible when Ryl's femtozoan makes use of the Sedron Time Stream to access information about the future.

Figure 2. Layernites by ImageFX.

 When Ryl met that Iidi, the alien was using the physical form of a biological Iidi, but I imagine that this particular Iidi long ago transcended from its biological form and exists in the Hierion Domain and is composed of hierions and can take on any convenient physical form.

Jack Vance imagined a future where humans could adapt to the unique conditions of various exoplanets in the galaxy. Back in 2016, for the story The League of Yrinna, I included mention of Layernites of the planet Layerna, a world with much stronger gravity than Earth. The image in Figure 1 was generated by using this text prompt: "Photorealistic science fiction portrait of a diverse crew inside a spaceship observation deck with large windows showing stars and planets. The crew members are colonists from a high-gravity world and MUST be visibly shorter than average humans (around 4 feet tall maximum) with noticeably stocky, compact, and muscular builds. 

Input to Whisk.

Their bodies should be wide, with thick limbs, broad shoulders, and powerful torsos - proportioned like weightlifters but shorter. Show them wearing futuristic jumpsuits, each of a different color. Include people of various ethnicities, ages, and genders, all sharing the same distinctive short, powerful physique. Include furniture and control panels at a lower height to emphasize their small stature. View from an angle that clearly shows their height relative to the spacecraft interior. 35mm film". This text prompt was devised with help from Claude. My original request for, "Photorealistic science fiction scene depicting of a group of human humans who have evolved as a human variant on an exoplanet that has high gravity. These humanoids are short and have thick powerful bodies that are adapted to the strong gravity of their world," resulted in the image shown in Figure 2.

I used Figure 2 as a "subject" image for Whisk along with Figure 1 as a "scene" image and my usual "style" text prompt. With those inputs, Whisk generated the image shown below in Figure 3. I then used WOMBO Dream to make some modifications to Figure 3, resulting in the composite image shown in Figure 4. I changed the Whisk text prompt and asked that the Layernites be given hair (see Figure 5). I used WOMBO Dream to make some modifications to Figure 5, resulting in the composite image shown in Figure 6.

Figure 3. Two Layernites generated by Whisk.

Figure 4. These two Layernites were modified by WOMBO Dream.

Figure 5. The Layernites were given hair by Whisk.

Figure 6. Layernites that were generated by WOMBO Dream were pasted into the Whisk-generated storyboard.

Figure 7. Reference image for Leonardo.

To get the Layernites that are seen in Figure 6, I used a text prompt that referred to the human figures as "Neanderthals", which resulted in them being dressed in primitive grass skirts. Then the faces of the WOMBO Dream-generated "Neanderthals" that are seen in Figure 6 were generated separately and manually pasted in so as to cover up the rather ugly "Neanderthals" faces that were in the original images.

Figure 8. Leonardo's Neanderthal.

I had previously (see Zetozoans) had some success with Leonardo when generating "Neanderthals", so I again let Leonardo to the task of making Neanderthal-like humanoids. The image shown in Figure 7 was generated by Whisk and used as a reference image for the Leonardo Phoenix 1.0 text-to-image model. Using that reference image and the text prompt, "A stunningly detailed, full color, photorealistic rendering of a beautiful Neanderthal woman with very large brown eyes. Dressed in a cute fur miniskirt. The Neanderthal woman is very short and stout with thick arms and legs," Leonardo generated images such as the one shown in Figure 8.

Figure 9. Two Neanderthal-like Layernites that were generated by Whisk.

Figure 10. Layernites collaboratively generated by Whisk, Leonardo and Wombo Dream.

Figure 11. Mr. Wombo's bears.

I used WOMBO Dream to make some less hideous faces some Leonardo-generated "Neanderthals" and pasted the resulting "Layernites" into a Whisk-generated storyboard image (Figure 9). The resulting composite image is shown in Figure 10.

Figure 12. Layernites by WOMBO.

When provided with a Whisk-generated "Layernite" reference image from Figure 9, WOMBO Dream generated Layernites with animal faces and bodies such as those shown in Figure 11.

Rarely, "remembered" that these were supposed to be humanoids and gave the Layernites human faces. Figure 12 is a composite image where the Layernites have animal-like bodies and human faces. For this image, I also manually added a penis to one Layernite and pasted in two Leonardo-generated breasts for the other Layernite.

image source

In some of my science fiction stories, I have included Gharks (example), positronic robots and femtobot replicoids. Usually I allow the positronic robots and femtobot replicoids to make use of human forms that are visually indistinguishable from the human form. Gharks and Hoos were the invention of Jack Vance and I like to imagine that they were the artificial life remnants of humanoid aliens who long ago lived on the planet Marune. Only from the perspective of the Ekcolir Reality was it possible for a Vance analogue using the pen-name 'Jaqy Vance' (or Sam Jaqy) to realize that some of the Gharks who were sighted on Marune were actually interventionists who were guiding the evolution of telepathic humans in the Asimov Reality (see the image to the right).

SSS Grean

Grean the Kac'hin is the Interventionist agent who was designed and crafted by Manny the bumpha to lead the mission that captured Eternity from the positronic robots of Earth. In my imagination, the Kac'hin are a human variant that was designed to be resistant to the type of telepathy that the positronic robots had and could use to control the behavior of humans. In my imagination, the Kac'hin have distinctive physical features such as large eyes, pointed ears and teeth that have a different appearance than typical human teeth (see the image to the left).

Text prompt for Whisk: "A stunningly detailed, full color, photorealistic rendering of four young humanoids with very large eyes on a spaceship bridge overlooking Earth. A wide shot of a spaceship bridge, dimly lit with a large window showing a planet from space. In the background is a spaceship crew consisting of ten women in form-fitting jumpsuits of various muted earth tones (tan, red, olive green, dusty rose, darker olive green) and two seated figures (one woman with long dark hair and medium skin, one woman with long light blonde hair and light skin) in dark suits.  Four additional humanoid women stand in the foreground.  One humanoid woman has pointed ears, dark brown hair in a ponytail, light-peach skin, large green eyes, and wears a dark off-the-shoulder top and black choker. Another humanoid woman, also with pointed ears and large green eyes, has long dark brown hair in a ponytail, fair skin, and wears a black off-the-shoulder jumpsuit and choker. A third humanoid woman, with long light brown hair and large blue eyes, stands bare from the waist up, arms crossed, wearing black pants. The fourth humanoid woman has shoulder-length light blonde hair, light skin, wears a gold satin sleeveless jumpsuit, and has very large blue eyes and fangs. The color palette is dominated by earth tones with touches of teal and light blue. The faces and hair of the humanoid women are rendered with careful detail in a hyper-realistic fashion." With that text prompt and the "subject", "scene" and "style" images shown to the left, Whisk generated "storyboard" images such as the one shown below in Figures 13 and 14.

Figure 13. Five Whisk-generated Kac'hin.

Figure 14. Four Whisk-generated Kac'hin.

Figure 15. Four ImageFX-generated Kac'hin.

Figure 16. Four other ImageFX-generated Kac'hin.

Grean by Mr. Wombo.

The images shown above in Figures 15 and 16 were generated by ImageFX and gave very similar results to what was obtained with Whisk. 

Next, I used one of the Whisk-generated Kac'hin as a reference image for WOMBO Dream. The image that is shown to the right was generated by Mr. Wombo (text prompt: "A stunningly detailed, full color, photorealistic rendering of a very young Meg Ryan as a humanoid alien with large eyes, pointed ears and sharp white teeth, Meg Ryan has long blond hair, Meg Ryan is fifteen years old and beautiful, photorealistic detail in Meg Ryan’s face and hair, a dark star field in the background"). Mr. Wombo never generated any fangs, so I had to manually insert some fangs into this image.

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