SouthwestNOWCEDAR HILL | DESOTO | DUNCANVILLEMAGAZINE

AUGUST 2023

2023 Summer Savings
Shopping Guide
Also inside:
Scavenger Hunt
Crossword
Featured Business:
Mechanical Comfort Systems

Not YourGrandma’sPicture Book

AI puts a new spin
on an old art

In the Kitchen With
Jocelyn Medlock-Price

Keisha Edwards is a creative soul. Her husband,Aaron, is a high-tech wizard. Their professional worlds
don’t often intersect. “We’re both musicians and world
travelers,” Keisha explained. “But I’m a writer, speaker anddancer. He’s a software developer.” That might not soundlike fertile ground for collaborations, but enter AI, and that
picture changes.
“Keisha was always making up stories and poems and songs for our kids. I told her,‘You need to write these down for the kids.’”
Keisha smiled. “Writing a children’s book was a lifelong dream for me. I care about
inspiring young people and literacy and sparking imagination. I wrote this book all inrhyme. I’m really proud of that.” The book is all about the real, and fanciful, job choices
open to children. Scientist, astronaut, ballerina and doctor are joined by more fanciful
career options like princess, prince and superhero.
“The book is called Wild Dream Adventure and personalized with your child’s name inthe title.” So a finished book would be Mary’s Wild Dream Adventure or Paul’s Wild Dream
Adventure (or Rashonda’s or Oluwole’s or Svetlana’s or Mei Chien’s). “I’m a wordsmith.
Illustration is not in my wheelhouse. So we used new AI technology and Photoshop to design
the backgrounds for each of the possible careers. It allows whatever is in your mind’s eye to endup on the page. AI allows us to insert your child into the illustrations. It literally gives your childthe opportunity to imagine themselves in different careers and develop a sense of ambition.”
The custom images were where Aaron’s skill with AI came in. “I’m a software developer. I’ve
worked from home for the last 13 years, and more recently, I have started coding, building andwww.nowmagazines.com 8 SouthwestNOW August 2023

www.nowmagazines.com 9 SouthwestNOW
AugustWalker
2023— By Adamlaunching AI-centered products. Forthe book, we used AI to design thebackground illustrations. People think
AI does all of the work for you, but it’sreally just a tool more like Photoshop.
It takes guidance and a lot of work togenerate good images. Using text togenerate images is really impressive atfirst, but AI lacks creativity. It’s missing
the human element.” That’s the part
Aaron had to work hard to supply.
“When we generate the images ofyour child in the different careers, toinsert them in the pages, the quality
somewhat depends on the photos thecustomer supplies. They send us 20 to30 images of their child, and I use thoseto train the AI. It takes about an hour
to train the AI to recognize that child’sface. Then it takes about half an hour togenerate 200 images of the child.”“Then I choose the 30 best images,”
Keisha explained. “I have to be careful
not to choose weird ones, because AI
does strange things sometimes. Getting
good images for the dancer is very
difficult, because AI is not good withhands and legs.”“With the other careers, somecreative cropping can get rid of any
oddities, but you have to have a wholebody that turns out good for thedancer,” Aaron agreed. AI is currently
notorious for placing arms and legs in
impossible positions and for adding
or subtracting fingers and otherappendages. It’s powerful, but there
are a lot of simple things it still doesn’t
understand. So generating the images
is only a first step before weeding out
useless images and fixing the rest.
“This project was a great way to
combine our gifts,” Aaron confided. “I
www.nowmagazines.com 10 SouthwestNOW August 2023

dttawwwseycet
TtbTtaWmss
T
IipuiAatdid the technical work to write the code
to transform the child into images forthe book. She did the writing. People
are always asking if AI created thewhole thing. No. Keisha wrote it, and it
was a lot of work. We didn’t sleep forweeks! Actually, it’s still a lot of work,
since each book is custom made foreach child.”“We’ve been married for 21years, and this was our first time tocombine our skill sets like this,” Keishaemphasized. “Each book is unique tothe individual child. It’s really validating.
There is no more literal way for a childto see themselves in various careers,
because the images are literally them.
They can expand their ambition
to pursue a career. We didn’t haveanything like this when I was a child.
When I was a kid, I could never findmy name on knickknacks or souvenirs,
so my mom would special order
stationery and name plaques for me.
This is the ultimate in representation.
It’s not just a child who is like you. Itis you. The reaction videos that someparents and grandparents have sent
us of kids opening these books areincredible. And it’s cool that we’re using
AI. There’s been a lot of negative press
about AI, but we use it to make a childthe star of their own book.”
www.nowmagazines.com 11 SouthwestNOW August 2023