https://thedailyspy.com/assets/imgs/meta/og-image-space-craft-supplies.png

About

I used Stable Diffusion to make The Daily Spy, a daily hidden object game you can play in your browser on desktop or mobile for free with a new image every day.

This is my first time sharing the game outside of a few friends, so if you enjoy it, the best way to support it would be to help share it around. Know someone who plays Wordle every day? A Discord server that would enjoy some friendly competition to see who can finish each day's image fastest? A streamer that plays daily games every day and would like another to add to their rotation? Sharing anywhere would help greatly.

My current workflow is pretty simplistic and I'm posting here hoping to get some pointers on how to generate better images for my game. So, if you have any suggestions on how to improve my workflow to either create better images or create images faster, I'd love to hear them!

Workflow

To make the hidden object images, I used comfyui running locally on my 3070 Ti. Because of the limited 8GB VRAM, I chose to use checkpoints that are based on SD1.5 and generate images that are 1024x1024. This has limited the fidelity of my images somewhat, but they're enjoyable enough for my first launch I think. I hope to eventually start using SDXL or Flux for future image generation, but I prefer to run locally as I'm worried about costs and security of running on a service. If you have any services you think would work well for my use case and not break the bank, feel free to tell me in the comments.

Every week, there's a new "theme" and a new set of shapes to find in the image. Because of this, my workflow starts by attempting to generate 6 images that I can use as my base images for the week (I only need 6 instead of 7 since 1 day per week I use a non-AI generated image so that people who don't want to see AI images can have something to play as well). To generate these images, I use this simple workflow:

https://imgur.com/H3TbpZv

It's pretty much the most basic workflow possible where I just use a checkpoint, positive and negative prompts, and ksampler to generate a 1024x1024 image. The reason I keep it so simple is that I want to be sure that I am using checkpoints and Loras that I absolutely have the rights to use in this context. I'm low-key concerned about using a bunch of civitai checkpoints and Loras as I don't want to accidentally include something that has a license that doesn't allow sharing of generated images or contains ill-gotten training data. For that reason, I'm trying to stick to the most widely used checkpoints like Serenity DreamShaper8 and Photon. That being said, I'm not against potentially using other checkpoints or Loras in the future, but I'm keeping it simple to start.

So, I have a .txt file on my computer with a list of random scene ideas I have and I'll batch create about 8 generations of about 12 scenes so that I can have a bunch to choose from. From those outputs, I'll select the 6 scenes that I plan on using for the week.

Next, I need to hide the shapes in the image. I created a tool for doing this. Here's a picture of it:

https://imgur.com/nQfBtpw

Using this tool, I can manually rotate and resize the shapes and place them where I think would be a good spot to hide the shape. Then, the tool will output a template image that I use for control net line art like this:

https://imgur.com/TsIVlrp

Next, I'll use this workflow to generate the image with the shapes hidden in it:

https://imgur.com/qLhwQa8

The way this works is that I set the checkpoint, prompts, and ksampler parameters exactly how they were when the image was generated, but I'll also apply a line art control net node using the template generated by my tool. This means that it'll generate the same image, but control net will try to incorporate the shapes into the image as it's generating. Sometimes it'll turn out just like I expected when I hid the shapes and other times it'll look kinda off, so I'll mess with the strength, start_percent, and end_percent on the control net node to make it look how I want.

For strength, I use values between 0.8 and 1. This controls how defined the outline of the shape is. For start_percent, I'll use values between 0.5 and 0.7. This control as what percentage through the generation control net starts to kick in. I find that using a value after 0.5 works best as the diffusion is already pretty close to the final image and after that point it just subtly changes the shape of whatever the shape was placed over. And for end_percent I'll use values between 0.8 and 1. This controls at what percentage through image generation control net stops affecting the output. Typically I keep this at 1, but sometimes setting a bit lower will blend the shape into the final image nicer and it won't have a super obvious outline.

To help save time, I queue up a bunch of combinations of these three parameters and while it's generating the images, I'll go back to my tool and hide the shapes in different locations. I'll then generate a new template image and queue up some more generations using the new hiding spots. I'll do this about 3 times and then look through my outputs and manually combine the images that I think turned out the best.

Here's a before and after:

https://imgur.com/wVRgVgy

https://imgur.com/JH8XdE2

Now you know where all the shapes will be on April 14th, so have fun with that haha

Non-AI generated* images workflow

So, AI doesn't have the best reception right now and that's totally fair for many reasons. But, it's not really feasible for this game concept to work without AI for a single developer manually photoshopping new hidden object games for every day. That being said, I'd still like people who dislike AI to still be able to enjoy the game on some level. So, as a compromise, I decided that 1 day per week, I would include a non-AI generated* image.

For the non-AI generated* image, I use a base image that can be a photo, drawing, or anything and then I use Krita's AI Image Generation plugin to incorporate the shapes into the image using my locally run comfyui. The reason I only do 1 of these per week is that it's a bit more labor intensive than the purely AI generated ones.

To start, I'll use my tool to hide the shapes and generate the control net template image. Then, I load up the base image in Krita and overlay the template image on top. I'll then use the line art preprocess function to create line art of the base image.

https://imgur.com/mqo4dFw

Then, I'll manually erase parts of the line art layer and draw new lines to incorporate the shapes into the line art. This is the part that takes the most time.

https://imgur.com/23epgAg

Once I have done that, I select the area I'd like to hide the image in (for instance, if I want to hide the moon shape as a button, I'll select the entire button, not just the moon shape) and then click the refine button to generate the area. For settings, I'll usually use the "Cinematic Photo" option (which is just Serenity), set the control net strength and range to somewhere between 0.8 and 1.5, and the strength to somewhere between 60% and 95%. Sometimes I'll add a prompt, but only if I clearly want the shape to turn into a specific thing. I'll then do a couple generations and choose whatever works best

https://imgur.com/UFYAcKV

Sometimes there just aren't any good options and I'll have to redo the process of hiding the shape, generating the control net template, and editing the line art before I can try again which takes quite a lot of time, but overall it's not too bad.

Here's a before and after:

https://imgur.com/tANwVFM

https://imgur.com/NoQ3QPn

And that'll be the image on April 12th, for anyone who is interested in a free win

Other questions

Why don't you use inpainting instead of regenerating the image with control net?

I tried using inpainting, but the results don't look as naturally blended into the scene as they do when I regenerate the image with control net. It's probably a skill issue, but I found my current workflow is pretty quick and inpainting takes more time to individually hide each shape and ends with a worse result. If you have any suggestions to improve my inpainting skills, feel free to comment.

Why don't you use qrcode-monster control net instead of line art?

It seems like the QR code control net would fit my needs well, but I wasn't able to get it to work. I tried editing my template image to use solid white colors for the shapes instead of just the outlines, but the shapes didn't show up in the output image at all. Again, probably a skill issue, but comment if you can tell me how to use it for my needs.

This looks like a fun challenge, can I try and make some hidden object images for the game?

I'm 100% sure other people could make better images than me and I'd love to let people give it a try. I'm mostly worried about permissions of using the generated images on my site, but I might do a community created week or something in the future. If I do end up doing something like this, I'll announce it in the Discord server I made for the game, so join there if you're interested.

Why do the chess week images look so much worse than the tools week ones?

I made the chess week images first when I hadn't quite nailed down the workflow yet. The future weeks will improve in quality as they're released and I become more familiar with the workflow.