It all started with me volunteering to arrange a virtual baby shower for a colleague. She had a cute theme and naturally, I went to AI to generate a custom background for Zoom. That sparked an idea - why not expand the cute graphic into a children’s picture book? Here is a breakdown of what I did, in case you were curious:
My original prompt to ChatGPT:
Can you make a virtual background for the theme elephant, lilac, stars, clouds, moons for a virtual baby shower?
ChatGPT’s response:
Yes, I can create a virtual background with the theme: elephants, lilac, stars, clouds, and moons—perfect for a baby shower. Before I generate it, could you let me know:
Do you want it to be more realistic or whimsical/cartoon-style?
Should it include any text (e.g., "Welcome Baby!" or a name)?
Would you like it to be landscape (widescreen) for Zoom/virtual background use?
Once I have those details, I’ll generate it for you!
My clarifications:
I want it to be whimsical and ethereal. No text please. And yes it should be landscape for Zoom.
It generated the image that is the header for this post.
Next, I asked it to create the book, here is the prompt:
Can you write a food science themed children's book that uses the above image (especially the elephant? Keep it 10 pages long, for ages 2-3 yrs and generate the corresponding images for the story.
This was ChatGPT’s response:
Here’s a 10-page story for toddlers (ages 2–3) featuring the whimsical elephant from your image, with a gentle introduction to food science through fun, age-appropriate language and visuals. Each page will have a short sentence and a custom-generated image to match.
Title: Ellie’s Moonlight Picnic
By [Your Name]
(Age: 2–3, 10 pages)Page 1:
Ellie the Elephant flew through the lilac sky.
(Image: Ellie floating on a cloud with stars and a crescent moon behind her.)Page 2:
She was looking for a yummy snack.
(Image: Ellie sniffing the air with a cute, curious expression.)Page 3:
"I want something cold!" said Ellie.
(Image: Ellie imagining a bowl of colorful fruit popsicles.)Page 4:
She made ice with her chilly trunk!
(Image: Ellie using her trunk to make a sparkly block of ice on a cloud.)Page 5:
"Now something sweet," she smiled.
(Image: Ellie holding a floating spoon and looking at a pot of honey.)Page 6:
She mixed stars and berries—swirl, swirl!
(Image: Ellie stirring a bowl with starlight and purple berries sparkling inside.)Page 7:
“Let’s freeze it!” said Ellie. She made berry ice cream!
(Image: Ellie placing the mixture into a cloud freezer with moons on it.)Page 8:
She shared it with her friends—yum!
(Image: Baby animals (like a bunny, giraffe, and panda) enjoying scoops on clouds.)Page 9:
The stars twinkled, and Ellie giggled.
(Image: Ellie lying on her back with a big smile under the moonlight.)Page 10:
“Food is fun,” said Ellie. “Science is too!”
_(Image: Ellie with a small beaker, moon-shaped spoon, and her ice cream, surrounded by stars.)Now this is where we run into trouble. ChatGPT struggled to create all the images. Also, I was using the free version, so I was hitting the data limits. I had to urge the AI in the right direction with these prompts:
Please make the image for Page 3 for the children's book. I liked the format (page split) you used for Page 1. Can you use the same format?
Please make Page 4 for the Children's book in the same format you just used for Page 3.
Please make Page 4 - She made ice with her chilly trunk! (Image: Ellie using her trunk to make a sparkly block of ice on a cloud.) - for the Children's book in the same format you just used for Page 3.
Please make Page 5 -"Now something sweet," she smiled. (Image: Ellie holding a floating spoon and looking at a pot of honey.) - for the Children's book in the same format you just used for Page 3.
Please make Page 6 - She mixed stars and berries—swirl, swirl! (Image: Ellie stirring a bowl with starlight and purple berries sparkling inside.) - for the Children's book in the same format you just used for Page 4.
Please make Page 7 - “Let’s freeze it!” said Ellie. She made berry ice cream! (Image: Ellie placing the mixture into a cloud freezer with moons on it.) - for the Children's book
Please make Page 8 - She shared it with her friends—yum! (Image: Baby animals (like a bunny, giraffe, and panda) enjoying scoops on clouds.) - for the Children's book.
Please make Page 9 - The stars twinkled, and Ellie giggled. (Image: Ellie lying on her back with a big smile under the moonlight.) - for the Children's book.
Please make Page 10 - “Food is fun,” said Ellie. “Science is too!” (Image: Ellie with a small beaker, moon-shaped spoon, and her ice cream, surrounded by stars.) - for the Children's book in the same format you used for Page 3.
I split the prompts over several days, as I could only generate a few pages a day. This is where things got interesting…
I let Chat GPT know Ellie was missing her trunk. The AI fixed it, but struggled with the punctuation, so I decided to used good old fashioned app “Paint” to fix the punctuation and we were good to go. I let the color difference slide.
I tried to brainstorm with ChatGPT what to do next, but didn’t really get anywhere. A friend suggested the I look into websites that arrange zines when I talked to her about my quandary and I sort of just shelved her (amazing) recommendation until today.
I finally looked into it, and ended up finding:
https://png2pdf.com/ - As the name suggests, this converts png files to a pdf.
https://nashhigh.itch.io/zinearranger - A zine arranger that provides folding instructions
https://heyzine.com/ - A free online flipbook maker
I had to resize all the images by cropping them manually in Designer, but overall, I think it was still worth it to get this mini project completed.
You can find the final flipbook version on heyzine - Ellie’s Food Adventure by S. Thote
And, if you were wondering, yes, I had to also figure out how to take a video of my screen. Its the Windows key + G to open the Game bar, then struggle to find the record option - which is a small circle. Fun.