BREAK TIME IS UP, FAKE TIME IS NOW...

 

    ...and unlike John Cena, you can see me, and I never give up. Instead of just kicking back and relaxing on my break, I studied up on Photoshop features/techniques and what else can be done with Nano. And boy howdy did I discover some things. I've been missing out on something that has been in the Camera Raw filter that has become a game changer: Adaptive Presets. Essentially, AI masks the different parts of the image, and you are able to edit those individually without having to mask it yourself. You can also control the intensity through a slider, so you can add a background blur, grain, sharpening, and color grading, select how much you want of each, and then confirm it under a single smart filter. It has so many options, and does all the things I need to do for my edits. It's fucking fantastic; however, there is a caveat: it is a strain on your graphics card while it is open. In fact, it completely destroyed the backlight on my TV, and I had to get my new one early. I wasn't supposed to get it until Christmas, but I had to tell them that I needed it now. Thankfully, everything seems to be working now.

    I also did some further testing with Nano. The best thing I discovered about it is its upscaling capability. It is by far the best upscaling I have ever seen. When you ask it to upscale with the right prompt, it will create the detail needed to make it in a high resolution without changing the subject at all. It is straight up magic and not something we can do with manual edits. There's only one problem with it. While I can use it to create the best quality headshots, I obviously can't use it on the base images. If I was able to, the quality of these fakes would be out of this world. Every detail would be enhanced, realistic, and in a true high resolution. If only we didn't have such strict guidelines with it. My only hope is that one day, we can run Nano locally with some of the restrictions lifted. For now, I have resorted to using the native Topaz Gigapixel upscaler. That has mixed results unfortunately, and wastes credits on top of that. It's a damn shame, and something I hop gets better in the future.

    There is another downside that is out of my control. Despite my efforts to make these as high quality as possible, the images still come out compressed with some light artifacting. I can't explain why, I did everything to avoid that and still it happened. It pisses me off, because they looked so good as I was working on them, and you're not able to see that. It's probably my hardware, it really isn't designed for photo editing. Even still, I would say these are my highest quality work. If you're wondering why I chose Sofia and Barbara, it was a simple matter of just having them on my mind. Sofia has entered into my personal list of S tier celebrities. I'm legit crushing on her at the moment, and I don't know why. It's really fucking weird to me, but it is what it is. As for Barbara, well... I feel like I don't really need to provide an explanation. I mean, just look at her for Odin's sake. If there is a God, he was certainly cooking with her. Sprouse most certainly has a sweet life.

    So speaking of cooking, I got something interesting in the oven. Watching Cena's retirement match made me want to finally make those fakes of Anna Jay and Fallon Henley. However, I decided that I'm going to make a composite fake for the both of them, and I'm going to do something a little more original. I guess you can say that I'm starting a rival promotion, I've drafted the both of them, and they'll be competing for the Intergender Tag Team Championships. This match is going to be "intense" for the both of them. Before you get too excited, this fake is in its infancy, and it is going to take a ton of work and generative credits to get it right. So don't expect it anytime soon. 

    For now, I'm excited to be back into the giant swing of things. So until next time, enjoy these fakes, and as always, stay safe out there.

    Also, shoutout to Raztave who has been uploading my recent stuff over on CFake. I appreciate it since I've given up doing that myself. If you see this, thanks and cheers.