What Does This Image Tell You?

By mid-2023, text-to-image algorithms had generated over 15 billion images since 2022. In comparison, it took photographers 150 years, from the first photograph in 1826 to 1975, to reach the same milestone.

When your job involves being surrounded by photos, art, and all kinds of beautiful and interesting imagery, you begin to see and perceive these visuals in a unique way. Each image tells a story, and we all know the saying "a picture is worth a thousand words." But what if there’s more to it than that?

This is the story of how a single image can be deconstructed into smaller pieces and then stitched back together into something monumental. Stick with me here.

Last year, I took on a creative challenge, repurposing accidental scrap images from various MidJourney prompts into meaningful stories. I call these images "happy accidents." Often, you type a prompt to get specific visuals, but more often than not, you end up with "dead ends." Occasionally, MidJourney surprises you all of a sudden with an awesome image that makes you want to explore further, diving deep into an unexpected rabbit hole.

Many of these images had a cinematic quality, each narrating its own tale. Motivated by this potential, I started sharing them on Instagram as stories, accompanied by snippets of dialogue, anecdotes, or touches of humor or horror, crafting them as micro-stories with enough depth to spark imagination.

The image above is a perfect example of how a simple visual can spark a deep and intriguing narrative.

So, what is visible on this image?

• A young girl in a dark, wintry landscape.
• She is looking anxious, frightened, and in a state of shock.
• It’s cold outside.
• It appears she is on the run.
• Other human figures are visible in the background.
• She is standing or crossing the road at night.
• The mood of the image is tense and mysterious.
• It is a bright, moonlit night.

Seeing all of this in the image inspired me to create this micro-story, or something I would like to call a spark, or a seed for a future story.

“At that moment, Chloe realized why her parents and neighbors forbade their children to go out after dark before they came on the search party for Billy. She wanted, just this once, to take a look at the meteorite crash which fell the day earlier on the old farm behind their house. To her horror, it wasn't just a meteorite.”

Now we have a narrative component. It may be short, but it's rich enough to pull this concept together and form a sustainable path for the directions we want this story to take. From here, we can use this little piece of text, this spark, and explore different trajectories. We'll need to figure out the events that led up to this moment and what happens next. If you think this starting idea is strong enough to be a foundation, you'll still need to explain to your readers or players what happened before and how we arrived here. So, we'll have to dig deep while building the story.

With the details from the original image and the added spark (text), it's time to come up with a new set of questions to help us expand this narrative.

1. Why did Chloe go out even after her parents and other grown-ups decided to put a curfew for kids?
2. Is she going there alone, or is she planning to meet some friends down the road?
3. How and when did Billy disappear?
4. Is the "meteorite crash" behind the old farm connected to Billy's disappearance?
5. What secrets does the old farm hold?
6. The people in the distance behind Chloe could be a patrol of grown-ups searching for Billy. How does Chloe manage to avoid them?
7. Chloe discovers that the crash isn’t a meteorite as she first thought. What could it be?
8. What are Chloe’s next steps after discovering the truth about the meteorite?
9. Are we going to include supernatural elements in the story?
10. If yes, are we leaning towards aliens, ghosts, vampires, or some other mythical creatures?
11. Or are we going to choose a different direction without the supernatural, keeping it sinister with something or someone lurking in the shadows of this small town?
12. If there's a sinister figure hiding there (possibly in plain sight or not), are only children in danger, or could adults be abducted too?

With so many questions and all the listed facts, we’re now on a good path towards designing the narrative. We have the power to use this spark as a divergence point where the story can go in several different directions, depending on what we want from this narrative and how we can process it all without losing sight of the original setup.

To be continued.

#NarrativeDesign #TheFirstPart

Speaking of images and how they dictate narrative, check out the link below where I’ve used some cinematic images generated by MidJourney in a fun way for the #NetflixChallenge. Make sure to see the "Frostbound Dread".