So, I Did A Thing

Melissa Widmaier

January 26

I'm not one to toot the horn of the AI movement, but I do believe that new technology is worth exploring. It's all in how you use it. The thought of using AI to write blogs (or even draft my stories!) makes me ill, though. I see so many adds in my author groups and e-mail lists encouraging me to try out a new AI thing to improve my sales. Notice, they don't really say it will improve your writing.

I have tried out the Bing AI picture maker to see if it could recreate my characters for an Instagram post or two. It was okay... A bit buggy and odd. Honestly, the best thing was when I asked it for an image of a sheep dog. I spent far too long laughing at the results.

Still, it got the job done. Were I to sell images of my characters, print them out and hold them in my hand, I think I would stick with the true artists for help there.

Another area I've been exploring is audiobooks. I would like to eventually put my books in audiobook format. I think it's a great way to connect with a story. Unfortunately, true audiobook creation is out of my budget and over my time constraints.

I tried reading an excerpt myself to post to YouTube, but that turned into a disaster. My reading was fine, but the audio was corrupted by some odd hissing noise. (Honestly, I wonder if it was my Wind spirit trying to mess with me.) Anyway, that had to be scrapped. But, I'm nothing if not determined. Desperate for another option, I saw that Microsoft's Clipchamp program did text-to-speech for video.

I fell down a rabbit hole so deep not even Lewis Carroll could write me out!

While the audio isn't perfect and it hiccups a bit, I am proud to say I was able to make a chapter excerpt with different character voices and a narrator! For a free service (that took me weeks to make, ahem), it's not too bad.

Was it a fun thing to play with?

Sure.

Will I do it again?

HECK NO! My time is too valuable.

I see the allure of using AI for basic things like this. It's a fresh take on some old techniques and that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Still, I'll probably just buy a better mic and regale you all with an excerpt from the next book once it's ready.

If you would like to listen to "The Wind at Oak Hollow" Chapter 6, feel free to click on the link below or watch it on YouTube. If anything, the character voices are pretty entertaining. (Hereu's voice is spot on!)