Beaver

The Impending Darkness

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For someone who “didn’t mean anything but nonsense!” Mr. Carroll certainly captured an profound number of truths about life in The Hunting of the Snark. One of the most pervasive of these themes is the sense that we have all the time in the world—as many months, weeks, and days as we could possibly want. We have time for jokes, stories, dreams, lessons, tea, and knitting. Then, suddenly, nightfall has arrived, and all our time is spent.

The need to catch the Snark before nightfall of this very day drives our characters onward through the poem. And nothing creates quite so beautiful a deadline as the transformation of the sky at twilight.

We start to see the transformation in Fit the Fifth. The valley seems to bring on the darkness faster than the rest of the island. Butcher and Beaver witness a moon rise well before dusk—and find themselves on the verge of complete darkness before they band together and leave the valley.

The sky continues to shift during Barrister’s Dream, and our crew finds themselves at the start of Fit the Seventh at the time of day when all the blue yields to menacing yellows, oranges, and reds. The Banker obviously should have heeded the sky’s warning—but it does seem like nothing and no one could persuade him to be more cautious in his zeal.

Finally, Fit the Eighth happens in those final moments of light, when we all know that the sky will soon be dark, but we have no idea what it will do between now and then. Some evenings the sky decides to visit every single color on the wheel before relinquishing to the night. Some evenings we blink—and the stars are out. It’s a time of incredible possibility, wonder, and anticipation.

Building Beaver

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Going from AI Slop to a Lovable Character

The Beaver spans both character and creature in “The Hunting of the Snark.” It is the Bellman’s pet, the Butcher’s foil, and the Barrister’s antagonist. It knits. It galumphs. It counts (poorly). It even debates insurance policies.

It is also a delicious double entendre — perfect for the many of the themes I wanted in the book.

So as imagination dust swirled and coalesced, the main idea started to emerge:

  • The Beaver is the Bellman’s stooge/ servant
  • The Beaver is (obviously) anthropomorphic on walks on two legs.
  • However, the Beaver is still very much an animal

So first I decided that the Beaver needed clothes—but not too many. I started with a bow tie. Something about the excessive formality and professionalism on a furry buck-toothed creature called to me (also, my Black Lab looks quite handsome in a bow tie so I knew it could work). From there adding the Playboy Bunny Costume detached cuff links merged formality and innuendo perfectly. Throw in a monocle for comical studiousness, and we’re all set!

Off to AI (using Stable Diffusion with A1111) to generate some examples!

All of which are really bad: wonky proportions, grotesque hands, and utterly chaotic constructions.

But each one has elements that were workable: the upright posture, the proportions, the coloring on the bow tie and cuff links. So now I’ve got two options: a) continue refining prompts and models and in painting and masks until I get the perfect character built or b) work with a human artist.

Knowing that my end goal was to work with an artist to build a cohesive story, option B was a no-brainer; if I was focused on mastering AI artistry, I might have chosen option A. So ,after identifying the few salvageable elements, I condensed them into a clear brief for the artist:

  • Anthropomorphic beaver, should generally walk on hind legs
  • However, is regular Beaver size, should only come up to the other character’s shins
  • Wears a bow tie and cuff links

One of the early signs that I had found a good collaborative partner with my artist were the clear and concise notes we could give each other.

Artist: “Ditch the monocle, we’ll get better facial expressions without it.”

Me: “The hands and feet are too leathery and frightening, give it a softer look.”

And that’s all the “prompt engineering” we humans had to do.