1st Blog Post: A Pseudo-Introduction to paulie!

There are certain basic facts that you learn as you get older. One of those, to me at least, is the need and ability to roll with the flow. Once upon a time I worried and stressed about so many things that I had little to no control over. When a meticulous plan failed to come to fruition in the way I had envisioned. We all have phrases or old axioms to cover it: You Can't Always Get What You Want. God Answers Prayers, It's Just That Sometimes The Answer Is "No" Do The Best You Can With What You've Got One of my dreams as a younger man was to be a writer. Novels were my initial dream, but I lack the dedication to complete a story that long, or so it seems. Once I know how the story ends, it's hard for me to fill in the middle part LOL Then a buddy suggest I try the comic book market. Many of my stories, of which he had read several as more-than-a-friend but less-than-a-mentor. And he knew I was a long-time fan of comics, in fact; it was the reason we had initially met, as a mutual friend owned a used book store. Fast forward a few decades. Yes, I had some stories published. And tiring of being relegated to the lower echelon of independent publishers, I began publishing my own. But it gave me greater control over my characters. If I had been gifted with the talent to draw, I'd have probably been unstoppable. But sadly, I have trouble drawing a recognizable stick figure! And I got tired of dealing with artists who sought to impose their vision of my story over the directions I gave in my scripts. Then, late last year I dabbled on a couple of AI sites. Found one that had some comic book style settings and figured I might give comics a try again. I had some stories that I had never gotten to tell still rattling around in my head. At that early stage of my AI experience, I was unable to get the comics thing to do what I want, but I was able create decent pictures based on my words. And I got hooked! Before long it became a matter of mathematics: "If a picture paints a thousand words" and I can paint a picture using ten or twenty words, then the picture is a huge profit over my words! And I feel certain like I got involved in AI at the right time. While a lot of people like creative looks and styles, even as a comic book publisher, I liked my stories to look as real as possible. So most of my art pursues the photo-real look. Occasionally I will dabble with a paint or a sketch style, but not often and not for long. But as I was saying, right place/right time. The improvements we've seen in AI in 2025 has been nothing short of remarkable to me. And I'm hoping 2026 continues that trend. I suspect it will. It seems more and more like there is a serious and quick "trickle-down effect" with the steps in quality. A year ago, getting a creation to have consistently realistic hands and feet was a damn-near impossibility. But as soon as one model crossed that canyon then it seemed a train of models followed. Video saw the same leap in quality. It's nothing short of remarkable and I'm thrilled to be here at this time! Not sure why I wrote all of this or if it will ever get read. In that regard, it reflects most of my writing for most of my life. But it's here, and I hope you get something out of it, even if it's just a laugh! Happy 2026 everybody!