Alright, let’s dive into this “joel valdez” thing. It all started when I stumbled upon his name while browsing some AI art tutorials. Seemed like he was doing some interesting stuff with prompt engineering, so I figured, why not give it a shot?
First thing I did was, of course, Google the guy. Got a bunch of links, mostly to his social media and some articles about his workflow. I spent a good hour or two just soaking it all in, trying to get a feel for his style. His stuff is pretty abstract and dreamlike, which is not exactly my forte, but hey, that’s why we’re experimenting, right?
Next, I decided to try and replicate one of his more simple-looking pieces. I picked one that had a lot of blues and purples and what looked like some kind of underwater scene. I fired up my Stable Diffusion setup – took a bit to remember all the commands, hadn’t used it in a week or two.
Now, the real fun began: Prompt engineering. I took the keywords I gathered from the image and his descriptions (where available) and started crafting my own prompt. Something like: “deep sea, bioluminescent, abstract, flowing, blue and purple, Joel Valdez style”. Hit “Generate” and waited.
The first result was… well, it was something. Not exactly what I was going for. Looked more like a melted blueberry smoothie than a deep-sea dreamscape. So, I started tweaking the prompt. Added some more specific keywords like “coral reef” and “glowing particles”. Reduced the influence of “abstract” a little, as it was clearly overpowering everything else.
After about ten more generations, I was getting closer. I realized that the “Joel Valdez style” part was too vague. I needed to break down what specifically made his style unique. So I went back to his images, looked at them again with a more critical eye. Noticed the way he used light, the texture, the color palettes.
I tried incorporating some of those observations into the prompt. Things like “soft lighting”, “painterly texture”, “muted colors”. Also played around with the negative prompts – what I didn’t want in the image. Stuff like “sharp focus”, “realistic”, “photo”.
After a good few hours of back-and-forth, generating images, analyzing them, tweaking the prompts, and repeating, I finally landed on something I was relatively happy with. It wasn’t a perfect replica of Joel Valdez’s work, but it had a similar vibe. More importantly, I learned a ton about prompt engineering in the process.
Here’s the final prompt I ended up with, for those who are curious:
- Positive Prompt: “deep sea, coral reef, bioluminescent, flowing, blue and purple, soft lighting, painterly texture, muted colors, ethereal, dreamlike, inspired by Joel Valdez”
- Negative Prompt: “sharp focus, realistic, photo, harsh lighting, oversaturated”
The main takeaway? Experimentation is key. Don’t be afraid to try different things, even if they seem silly. And always be analyzing your results. What worked? What didn’t? How can you improve your next attempt? It’s a constant process of learning and refinement. Plus, don’t expect to nail the “style” of someone else right away, it takes time and practice.
So, yeah, that was my little “joel valdez” adventure. Fun stuff. Might try replicating another artist’s style next week. Any suggestions?
