An air of tension, thick and palpable, fills the hushed room, and your heart thumps out a frenetic beat. You stand at the precipice of the unknown, never before granted access to the below-ground bunker, a place shrouded in secrecy and whispers of danger. Today, the whispers are charged with understandable excitement.
Every eye in the bunker is on you. Watching. Waiting.
You take your place at the control podium and press the button. From a hidden compartment in the cement floor, everything you’ve worked for and sacrificed for slowly rises. Silence falls over the high-ranking observers as they take in the sleek, mysterious object of unparalleled power that could change the course of wars. Either that or you just unveiled our latest prompt: Secret Weapon Reveal.
What is SLDS?: SLDS is a weekly prompt challenge that encourages artists of all levels, including non-artists, to create an image with a spy and romance theme. You can use various tools such as Photoshop, ArtRage, Procreate, DALL-E, MidJourney, Microsoft Edge’s CoPilot, or any other software that you prefer to create your artwork.
? How To Join In ?
- Create and Share: Craft artwork inspired by the weekly prompt using any digital tool that inspires you.
- Share Your Creation: Post your artwork on your blog and link to this post, or share it on Instagram using the hashtag #SLDSart and tag me @susbraithwaite. Make sure to do so before next Friday!
- Pingback Issues: Pingbacks aren’t working 50% of the time, so leave your link in the comments so we all can visit your post. ?
- Engage and Inspire: Join our community of artists and spies. Your work might be featured in our intelligence brief (blog post).
This Week’s Challenge: Secret Weapon Reveal
For our first prompt after my holiday (thank you all for your kind anniversary wishes—you all rock! ?), we delve into the wide world of weaponry. From microscopic nanotechnology to aircraft carriers the size of a small village, the possibilities are tantalising. Throw in the owner of said secret weapon—good guy or bad?—and you’ve got yourself an intriguing, if deadly, setup!
Create With Me
When it comes to secret weapons, the bad guys always have the edge. They have a knack for creating something despicable—or twisting a tool for good into one capable of mass destruction. My resident bad guys, The Consortium, in my upcoming Deniable Unit series, could teach a masterclass!
I’m going to steal from one of my works-in-progress (Waves of Deception). My bad guy, Victor Dubois, hijacks a nanotech serum intended to help injured soldiers. Being a bad guy, Victor wants this tech for himself and The Consortium, planning to put it to use in the field, making their agents almost superhuman.
Let’s Get Revealing!
With it being a serum, it’s pretty tiny, so I’m going to have to be careful that the secret weapon being revealed isn’t so minuscule that it can’t be seen. Hmm. Let’s give it a shot!
PROMPT: Please create a wide-format image of a man holding up a vial before a trio of besuited men—the vial almost seems to glow. We’re located in a dockyard warehouse.
Okay, it’s not what I’m looking for. The location is pretty cool—the details of ships and boxes in the background, the shadows lending to a sense of danger. But the vial is massive. Let’s add the word tiny to the prompt.
PROMPT: Please create a wide-format image of a man holding up a tiny vial before a trio of besuited men—the vial almost seems to glow. We’re located in a dockyard warehouse.
I like it, but it doesn’t feel very revealy. This could go so many different ways. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that we don’t get a magician’s flourish for the reveal! ?
PROMPT: The man is revealing the vial. It’s a secret weapon.
Hmm. I don’t see much of a difference here. Maybe a change of location will give us some variation.
Change of Location
PROMPT: Let’s change the location to a board room.
Right. Okay, then. I don’t hate it—it makes me smile and giggle just a wee bittie. He might have taken way too much of the serum ?. Maybe one last try…
Secret Weapon Reveal in an Ops Room
PROMPT: Let’s change the location to an ops room. Can you show him pulling the colourful garment around him?
I love this one. No, it’s not perfect, but it gives a sense of menace. Everything is in proportion, and it just generally feels right. I’m being really vague here, but the feeling is that it could be a still from a movie. Yes! That’s it! It’s a spy movie freeze-frame.
Over to You
Now, it’s your turn to reveal the extraordinary. Dive into the suspenseful world of espionage and show us your vision of a secret weapon reveal. I can’t wait to see what you create!
Till next time, stay awesome,
Susan x
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