013 - ImageAI? For a Finance and Accounting Professional? Are You Mad?
Yes. Also, we take a stroll through Microsoft Designer and get a quick intro to an Automation that will send out emails for us!
You'd think so. I mean, we have numbers; what more would anyone want from us?
Okay, that's not true - we also have financial statements, spreadsheets, and tax returns. So, that seems pretty adequate.
But, here's the wacky and weird thing - if we want to connect with folks, whether prospects, our clients, or just the general public... I don't even know if I can say it out loud...
They don't seem excited about financial statements, spreadsheets, or tax returns (cue gasps from the audience!).
Right? What sort of world do we live in?
Since we want to connect with folks because we have something to say, we should probably learn how to use ImageAI. It'll lure in the eyeballs, and THEN we can hit them with the ol' Excel spreadsheet!
Different ImageAI Platforms
While there are a zillion types of AI nowadays, I only think about two (for better or worse) in the ImageAI space. Why? Because these two work just fine for me. If I want to make a tap-dancing unicorn on top of a hot air balloon, I can crank that out quickly. And I know their particular quirks.
Right now, my ImageAI of choice is Midjourney and BingImage. And, for this article, we will be talking about BingImage because it would be cruel to try to explain what 'Discord' is to most folks. (It's just... its own thing).
As mentioned, each GenAI platform has a "conversation style." So, how I chat with ChatGPT is a little different than how I chat with BingChat. It's very similar, but I have vastly different expectations and tweaks. And how I chat with Midjourney is a little different than how I chat with BingImage. The prompt framework still has some shared elements.
BingImage and Prompting
Like we talked about last week, BingImage, on the Edge Browser, has moved out of BingChat into a new home at bing.com/image/create. You get 100 "boosts" at the beginning of the week, allowing you to keep refreshing the prompt until you get the image you want.
"What do you mean, refresh the image prompt?"
Well, here's the thing - we're asking the Picture Imagination Machine to invent something. Sometimes a lot of other folks have asked it that same question, so it will have a ready response. Sometimes, NOBODY has asked it about creating a "picture of a supermodel wearing the Russian crown jewels and eating a burrito in a dive bar," so it has to crunch through the idea a few times.
For example, I was trying to make an image for an upcoming class called 'The Birdzzz and the Beezzz - GenAI for your Tax and Accounting Staff,' and it started out with this:
and ended up like this:
And sometimes, depending on the platform, you'll just never get there, no matter how hard you try (this was the same prompt with Midjourney):
Still Not Convinced?
Okay, I understand - I'm not sure how many mechanical birds and bees pictures you're going to be sending to your clients. So, here are some practical applications for your practice.
1) Creating a logo
Prompt: minimalist logo, adorable robot, white with muted neon accent colors, stock image style, white background
2) Creating stock images
Prompt: office androids joking together, next to the water cooler, corporate setting, stock image style
3) Creating images for your website or newsletters
Prompt: Seattle City Skyline, Lime and Navy colors, steampunk art style
Prompt Formulas
I have a basic prompt formula (you might notice it above):
Object + Action + Style
Things I add in for flavor:
Color
Vibe
Background
Type (like a logo - and there are loads of different logos)
Things to Keep in Mind
BingImage still struggles with the fingers and faces of "real" people. It'll improve over time, but the stock images can be a bit off-putting.
You can only ask for a 1024 px by 1024 px image. This means that BingImage isn't the best tool for making banners.
You can save, download OR customize directly in Microsoft Designer (which conveniently leads to our next section):
And That Leads us to Microsoft Designer…
You're scrolling through LinkedIn, past all of those corporate versions of 'Live, Laugh, Love' when you see this...
Above the picture is the sentence, "I always thought being the boss meant that you had to know everything, but then I learned some powerful lessons."
What are you going to do??? You want to find out about the powerful lessons, right? And look at that picture! That picture says, "Powerful lessons, inside!"
So, you click and read the post.
Would you have stopped and read the post if it didn't have an engaging picture? Maybe? Possibly? (Probably not, if we're being honest).
Here is How I Created that Image
While I appreciate that you think I spent HOURS on that image, here's the reality...
Honestly, that was the laziest prompt that I've ever made. But Designer gave me a lot of options to choose from, even adding words that fit the theme.
Here's a Twitter post that I made - it took longer to figure out the Twitter post dimensions than to make the image.
It also made a couple of video options for me to choose from to give the post more pizazz (here's a picture of a robot doing jazz hands to show “pizazz”).
(this image style, by the way, is based on a prompt format template that took forever to figure out but is now part of KTA's brand vibe)
So, what do you need to know to get started?
I started making a whole series of screenshots, but once again, let's just run through a short video instead.
Easy, right?
Things to Keep in Mind
Microsoft Designer only works with personal Microsoft accounts right now. So, if you create an image in BingImage, make sure you're doing it under your personal account; otherwise, you have to download it (ask me how many times I've made this mistake)
While Microsoft Designer CAN generate images, it'll give you an error after a few refreshes. It also seems to have more limitations on the images it can create than BingImage.
While it's less robust than Canva at the moment, they are quickly adding improvements based on feedback.
What Are You Going to Make Next?
If you still need help with what you'd use Microsoft Designer for, look around the spaces where you see digital images - social media, websites, newsletters, emails...
...speaking of emails...
Let’s Automate Some Emails… Wait, Come Back Here!
I get it! I do! Who here doesn't enjoy spending their Friday sending out a large batch of emails, one-by-one? And I don't want to steal that joy. But I DO want to show you a different way...
The Simplest Power Automate Flow Ever
I'm busy, you're busy and you just read a really long blogletter about making pretty images, so let's just cut to the chase...
This flow will allow you to send a reminder email to whoever you set up on your Excel List. It's not fancy, but we're just starting out, right? We can make it fancy later.
Some things to keep in Mind
You need to have a table set up in excel to pull in the email addresses (using this flow)
Test it on yourself first
CoPilot for Power Automate can be a little finicky right now, but still worth learning. But, if it's too much of a headache, you can always go back to the old way of editing.
Some good news! My ‘30 Days of AI’ class is now a standalone class, so you no longer have to wait until the next cohort. You can access it at kta.ai. There are even options now to sign up your team members as well at a discounted price.
Thanks for hanging out with me on this adventure.
Happy Chatting!