"With a little bit of courage and a whole lot of imagination, anything is possible." - Timidus the Mouse
Everyone has always told me I should write a kid's book. So I decided to try to learn if I could do a kid's movie using an AI.
I learned I can - it's the story of Timidus, the Mouse.
How did I do it? I took a blog post I wrote sometime back, used an AI to turn it into a kid's story, and then turned it into an animated short, using an AI. I added a voiceover by Snoop Dog, using an AI tool, and added a somewhat hip-hoppy music track created by an AI.
My little movie is but 45 seconds long. I could make it longer and do the entire story, but I won't pursue it further than I did because I learned what I needed to know. I'll move on with my journey of continuous exploration.
What did I learn through the process? A lot of new skills - and, as Timidus discovered in the story as written by an AI, with a little bit of courage and a whole lot of imagination, anything is possible. Here's the video - ALL of this was done with various AI tools, except for the brief final assembly I undertook using my video editing software.
Here's the story of how I went into this unique project.
First, I needed some content for my kid's story, so I picked this blog post from my Daily Inspiration series some months back. "A bold future abhors a timid mind!" This post had to do with car companies, the future, and massive market transformations such as they are witnessing with the move to electric vehicle technology.
https://jimcarroll.com/2023/07/daily-inspiration-industry-transformation-a-bold-future-abhors-a-timid-mind/
I thought that might provide the basis for my story, so looked around for an AI that could do something creative with it. I stumbled across TextCortex - it's an AI that offers all kinds of different tools, including one that will turn any material into something creative. I fed it the blog post --and it came back with the story of Timidus the Mouse. Whoah! I'm blown away. You can find the entire little story at the very end of this post.
The story begins like this:
Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there lived a timid little mouse named Timidus. Timidus was always afraid to take risks and try new things. He spent his days nibbling on cheese and hiding in his little mouse hole, never daring to venture out into the big wide world.
I decided I needed to know who this Timidus fellow was, so I went over to MidJourney to create him. After playing around a bit, I found a few options.
I chose the fourth one and ended up with a high resolution of whom I will call Timidus. He's a cute little guy, isn't he?
The next character in the story emerges in the next paragraph:
One day, a wise old owl named Big Thinker came to visit Timidus. Big Thinker was known throughout the land for his big ideas and bold approach to life. He saw something special in Timidus and knew that he could help him unlock his true potential.
An owl named Big Thinker, the denizen of knowledge and wisdom? I had to discover him too, and went through the same process - and found the one I liked!
Okay, at this point, I've got the main characters for my story. Time to animate. The tool-du-jour is Runway, and so I went over there and fed it to both the Timidus and Big Thinker images. It's a pretty simple process - give it an image and ask it to animate it. On a free plan, you can get a 4-second clip, and expand it to 8 seconds - enough for my little movie.
I ended up with a few usable video clips and downloaded those. What about the land, far far away? Back I go to Midjourney, find something useful, and then drag it into Runway.AI to animate it.
Cool! I had the makings of an animated movie. But now I needed someone to narrate the story. I thought for a bit...
And spent a bit of time on LinkedIn, actually, while I went away from the project for a short time. And that's when I had the idea - why not have Snoop Dog do the narration? If you are using LinkedIn, you will be aware that Snoop Dogg is all over the business social network as of late. He joined a few months ago and is sharing wonderful stories about creativity, innovation, big bold ideas, and more. I decided I must have Snoop narrate the story!
How could I do this? Well, with a bit of searching, it turns out that he has lent his voice to a service called Speechify, which will use the base of his voice to narrate anything.
I pasted in the story of Timidus, clicked generate, and had a voice track. It's not perfect, but it will do.
Music! I now needed music as a backing track! I have access to the Google Test Kitchen, where I can try out various new AI services they are prototyping, including a Text-to-Music generator. I asked for a music clip of a 'slow hip hop beat, rhythm only, in the style of traditional hip hop', and got back a passable track. The Dogg would probably be horrified at it though. Maybe if he reads this one day, he can contribute to a real beat!
Finally, I needed a title screen. For that, I went over to Ideogram - it's an AI that will let you generate text-based images. I couldn't recreate the style of my land far, far away, but managed to get something workable.
Finally, I took all of these clips, the voiceover, and the music track, assembled them into a short 41-second video, and my project was complete.
And there you have the story of how Timidus began to think big, start small, and scale fast - and became a leader amongst his fellow mice. In the end, I like to think that he became a futurist, able to inspire others around him.
Timidus The Mouse
Timidus The Mouse
Based on a Blog Post by Jim Carroll
Rewritten by An AI
Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there lived a timid little mouse named Timidus. Timidus was always afraid to take risks and try new things. He spent his days nibbling on cheese and hiding in his little mouse hole, never daring to venture out into the big wide world.
One day, a wise old owl named Big Thinker came to visit Timidus. Big Thinker was known throughout the land for his big ideas and bold approach to life. He saw something special in Timidus and knew that he could help him unlock his true potential.
"Think big, Timidus!" Big Thinker exclaimed. "The world is changing fast, and you need to keep up if you want to succeed."
Timidus was skeptical at first, but as he listened to Big Thinker's tales of 24-hour farming, battery-based cars and trucks, and decentralized energy, he began to feel a spark of excitement deep within him.
"Start small, Timidus," Big Thinker continued. "Take small steps every day towards your big goals, and soon you'll be scaling new heights you never thought possible!"
With Big Thinker's encouragement, Timidus began to explore the world outside of his mouse hole. He scurried through fields of wheat and corn, climbed trees to reach the juiciest fruits, and even made friends with a pack of adventurous squirrels who showed him the thrill of daring leaps and bounds.
As Timidus grew bolder, he discovered a new passion for innovation and invention. He tinkered with wires and circuits, creating his own little gadgets and gizmos that amazed his fellow mice and even caught the attention of the wise old owl himself.
"Be bold, Timidus!" Big Thinker cheered. "You have a brilliant mind and a heart full of courage. Anything is possible if you dare to dream big and never give up!"
And so, Timidus continued to think big, start small, and scale fast. He became a leader among his fellow mice, inspiring them to embrace change and take risks in pursuit of their dreams. His inventions revolutionized the way they lived and worked, and his bold spirit inspired them to reach for the stars.
In the end, Timidus became known throughout the land as the greatest mouse inventor and adventurer of all time. And though he never forgot his humble beginnings, he knew that with a little bit of courage and a whole lot of imagination, anything was possible.
...This short story is based on the content in this blog post.
https://jimcarroll.com/2023/07/daily-inspiration-industry-transformation-a-bold-future-abhors-a-timid-mind/
Futurist Jim Carroll is a big believer that wasted time in the exploration of frivolous ideas is the root of much future success.