Writer Terry Groves had a problem. He needed a cover image for his book. His inspiration was the 1918 calendar print “The Sky Pilot” by Musselman, based on pilot Harriet Quimby.
Little trivia: in 1911, Harriet became the first licensed female airplane pilot in America. In 1912, she crossed the English Channel, a rare thing back then.
Terry had inspiration but could not use it. Searching stock images came up empty; he even tried a few AI imaging efforts that were a disaster.
I have created several award-winning book covers for Terry, so he asked for help.
I tried some Ai imaging to create the image. They were better but still not “it”
Then I remembered an image of a woman posing with a Steam Engine. It had the look.
Terry loved it, but there was nothing aviation about the shot. This photo below was not the pose but gives you a sense of the steam engine.
This was our starting image from that train shoot.
I decided to “dress” her with the help of some Firefly AI.
The pilot’s cap was first. Some of the early attempts were hilarious. We finally got the vintage look and a good fit.
The jacket was also comical at times. Hours can be swallowed up so fast with this. After you put in the prompt, the art comes back pretty quick. You could not ask the AI to fine-tune an image it gave. Each new version was a fresh design. You would tweak the prompt to get closer.
Luck, I think, has more to do with it.
When it came together, it looked great.
Then Terry reminded me he needed a colour image for the cover.
I hand-coloured the black and white. It looked a bit too modern, though. A retro tweak gave us the right look. The final touch was to age the image.
I do love this kind of creative work. It is very satisfying, especially when I get an image perfect my client loves.
As clients become aware of this next level of creativity, we are seeing more requests. Henriette had us do some really wild things with her Ferrari, but that will be another story.
Let me know how you feel about this image. I would love to hear from you.