Last year I discovered that my son would like to read the Chronicles of Narnia with me, but he also wanted a picture on every page. To that end, I purchased digital editions of the books with the color illustrations by Pauline Baynes and searched the internet for professional and fan art in order to build word documents with the text and at least one picture per page. About 2/3s of the books' contents have existing illustrations, however a good third of the books are not illustrated.
Since there's not enough hours in the day, I turned to AI (Google Imagen, Deep Dream Generator, Dall-E 3) to generate the images.
I found it fascinating to see which parts of the books are less illustrated (The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe usually has 2-3 images available for every page of the books, while there are significant sections of The Last Battle and The Silver Chair where its difficult to find illustrations for entire chapters.)
Hopefully someone out there will be inspired to create some real art based on this 🙂
This is Digory and Polly entering Uncle Andrew's forbidden study
ch01TheWrongDoor_pg015_01TheWrongDoor02DigoryAndPollyB.jpg
EDIT: Link to (almost) all of the images is at:
https://crosswordspersonalnotes.home.blog/narnia-ai-images-of-parts-of-the-books-that-are-less-often-illustrated/
This topic was modified 3 weeks ago 2 times by DavidD
Topic starter
Posted : April 2, 2025 2:24 pm
DaughterOfTheStar liked
@davidd interesting. What instructions did you give the AI for the tray of rings? (the only thing I can see that is not correct)
There, shining in the sunrise, larger than they had seen him before, shaking his mane (for it had apparently grown again) stood Aslan himself.
"...when a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor's stead, the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backwards."
Posted : April 2, 2025 4:34 pm
@coracle I don't still have the prompt. I believe I asked it for gold and emerald rings. I've kept most of my prompts though.
Digory waiting for Jadis and Uncle Andrew to come back
Digory before Aslan (looking at the Lion's paws)
Talking animals coming to Uncle Andrew
Digory and Polly attempting to get Jadis back to her world
Uncle Andrew faints
Topic starter
Posted : April 2, 2025 6:32 pm
Impending Doom and fantasia liked
These are very well done considering they are AI generated and AI can be questionable when it comes to images.
'It is not easy to throw off in half an hour an enchantment which has made one a slave for ten years' - The Silver Chair
Posted : April 2, 2025 7:22 pm
Hi all,
These are some (AI) illustrations that I generated for my son to accompany reading the seven Narnian Chronicals.
A link to pretty much all the illustrations is available here:
https://crosswordspersonalnotes.home.blog/narnia-ai-images-of-parts-of-the-books-that-are-less-often-illustrated/
Topic starter
Posted : April 3, 2025 9:50 pm
@davidd do you mind my asking how old your son is? Is there a reason he needs more pictures? (If it's too personal, you could reply on Private Message)
Thank you.
There, shining in the sunrise, larger than they had seen him before, shaking his mane (for it had apparently grown again) stood Aslan himself.
"...when a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor's stead, the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backwards."
Posted : April 4, 2025 4:22 am
@coracle I managed to locate part of the prompt (imagen only shows so many characters):
"
Interior scene set in a cozy, dimly lit attic room that is furnished like a sitting room. The side walls are lined with shelves full of books. A blonde girl with long hair and hair ribbon and wearing a blue dress and a boy in brown norfolk jacket are standing in front of a wooden door in the back wall and behind a table with a wooden tray covered in gold rings and emerald rings. The table also has books, ink bottles, sealing wax, and a microscope. A...
"
Topic starter
Posted : April 5, 2025 12:18 pm
coracle liked
They are very nice images and quite accurate to the books. I think they deserve a book of their own, but it should be a separate collection from Pauline Baynes’ illustrations, which always should be included along with the stories. Every edition of Narnia should feature Pauline Baynes’ work. The artificial intelligence images can help to interpret the books, but no one should replace the art of Pauline Baynes. Her work is inseparable from the Chronicles.
Posted : April 6, 2025 10:38 am
DavidD liked
These are fun to look through and I especially loved the different styles of art. Thank you for posting these.
Avatar Credit to Narnia Aesthetic on Tumblr.
Posted : April 10, 2025 10:46 am
DavidD liked
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