Unleashing Creativity with AI Art: An Interview with John Meta from Red Squid

One of the reasons I started this newsletter was to feature and elevate voices of those who are building and creating amazing tools and art.

This week, I spoke to John. An active memebr of the #AiArt community, and specifically #aicinema. His curiosity and passion for stunning cinematic images brought to build a tool that could help others generate the frames they see in their minds.

He’s the one behind a tool some of you have seen me use — generating prompts that make our ideas cinematic.

For instance, for the image above, my initial prompt was:

After using Shotiz, it became:

Pretty neat, right?

Phil: Can you tell us a bit about yourself and your background?

John: Hi, my name is John Meta and I work on the Red Squid community. I have a background in vfx art and technical direction in the film industry, and I'm passionate about the creative process behind projects.

What brought you to the AI Community?

As I worked more in the pre-production phase of film projects, I became increasingly interested in the intersection between creativity and technology. This led me to the AI community, where I saw the potential for AI to reduce the time spent on technical aspects and free up more time for creative exploration.

What sparked the idea for Shotiz?

Shotiz started as a spreadsheet tool that we used at Red Squid for generating prompts. As the community grew and we received positive feedback, we realized the need for a simpler and faster tool that could include more people in the creative process. This led to the development of Shotiz, which allows users to quickly generate cinematic prompts.

How do you see Shotiz evolving in the future?

Moving forward, I see Shotiz evolving to offer more control over the generated prompts, with the ability to adjust parameters for more precise results. We also plan to introduce features that allow for consistency across multiple prompts, such as for an image sequence or movie.

Can you describe a prompt generated by Shotiz that blew you away?

I used it to generate prompts for cartoon movies. The results were beyond what I had imagined, and it showed me the power of specifying the technique used in the prompt to get even better results.

Finally, what advice do you have for someone getting into AI Art?

My advice for someone getting into AI Art would be to not let the lack of technical background hold you back. Embrace the technology and use it to unleash your creativity and make us dream!

I hope you enjoyed this interview with John Meta from Red Squid, and gained some insight into the potential of AI in the creative process. Stay tuned for more updates and insights in the upcoming newsletters!

See you next week,

Phil Desforges