Stern Rake Studio

[sternrakestudio]

When I created my Woman in White series on Deviant Art, one of my fans liked her so much, he suggested using the same woman, but wearing different dresses.

So I created the Babe in Black series. The color change turns the woman into a femme fatale, and even an assassin. In some images, the AI added a handgun.

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Here's a sample of "The Woman in White," based on my recent post, "A Walk in the Park."

I made several images of this woman I encountered using various AI art styles.

These are still the most accurate depictions I've made using AI.

Enjoy!

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A Walk in the Park

On 3 October, 1990, Germans celebrated their first Unity Day, when East Germany formally joined West Germany, a year after the fall of the Berlin Wall.

I didn’t join in the celebrations.  Instead, I was sleeping-off jet-lag from my trans-Atlantic flight.  I would spend the next four years in Germany as a member of the US military.  I wish I could say it was a wonderful experience, but I was still married to my toxic ex-wife.  She came over a couple months later, after I secured an apartment about 10 miles east of Stuttgart.

Shortly after her arrival, my unit was activated to deploy for Operation Desert Shield, which turned into Operation Desert Storm in February, 1991.  While most guys were often sad at being far from home, I was strangely content to be away.

Once I returned, I discovered why.  My absence hadn’t detoxed my ex’s personality.  Our European Tour turned out to be a turning point for me.  I realized no matter where we‘d go, or live, even throughout a great assignment like Germany, she’d still remain a toxic b*tch.

One sure way to increase her toxicity level was for her to see me having a pleasant conversation with another woman.  Any woman.  Even with my mom, or my sisters.

She had a special hatred towards blonds.  She was a dour and rude brunette, who grew up with two giggly, girly-girl, blond sisters.  She was always puzzled and angry that her two sisters could always attract a gaggle of guys.  The idea of being pleasant to others never entered her mind.

So whenever we were together, I had to deny the existence of other women, even to the level of absurdity, like in this Passing Encounter story:

One warm and sunny Sunday morning, we were walking through a city park in downtown Stuttgart.  At this time in my life, I was blessed with better than 20/20 vision.  So I saw Danger approaching from a distance away.  This particular hazard came in the form of a beautiful young woman.

She had slicked-back, short, blond hair, that was tied into a tiny ponytail.  The only things she wore was a clingy, white mini dress, matching white, high-heeled shoes, and sunglasses.

And nothing else.

Her dress was so tight, it would have exposed any panty or bra lines.

Oh, she did carry a small, matching white purse.  But that was it.

She was decked-out for a fashion show catwalk, rather than an outdoor park, even with a paved sidewalk.

A guy with a head of unruly dark hair walked beside her.  This was the only detail about him I remember, as trotted along the Woman in White’s right side, attempting to keep up with her long-legged gait.

The Woman in White had the appearance of a Euro-model: Small, pouty lips, slow deliberate walk, and a look of bored disinterest towards everyone and everything around her.  Even Mr. Tag-a-Long.

As the pair drew near, my Toxic Ex, who was standing on my left, finally noticed her.  When they passed us on our left, she snidely remarked:  “I‘d wear a dress like that, if I had a body like that girl’s.”

Me:  “What girl?”

Toxic Ex:  “The girl that just walked passed us!  Don’t tell me you didn’t see her!?”

I turned around to see the couple, safely in the distance, continuing their walk.

Me: “Uh, no.  No I didn’t”

Toxic Ex:  “You’re lying!”  (A daily accusation, but this time, she was right).

Me: “No, I’m not.” (Okay, another lie).

Toxic Ex:  “Then what were you looking at!?”

Fortunately for me, I quickly glanced to the right and spotted a family in the open field; with children chasing each other, teens tossing a frisbee, and adults sitting on a blanket.

Me:  “I was watching this family over here.”  (Lie #3).

Toxic Ex took a quick look and muttered, “Huh.”

For an entire week, my Toxic Ex regularly brought up the Woman in White, during conversations.  She hoped I’d slip-up and admit I saw her.  Fortunately for me, I maintained my self-preserving lies, and the issue finally died away.  In fact, it was the only issue she had with me that did actually disappear entirely, and ironically the only one I openly lied about.

(Note:  The AI character I created is about the most accurate image of my Passing Encounter Memories to date).

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In my previous story, "Do You Want A Date," I described the unlikely prostitute who approached me as being dressed for an actual date.

However, the AI program I used concocted several images that exaggerated how the young lady was dressed.

Or in the case of the images above--undressed.

In the last image, the AI decided to make the woman a femme fatale, wielding a handgun.

None of this actually happened, but I found these images too humorous to delete.

Enjoy!

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Note: It's been a while since I posted anything here. I'm still recovering from surgery, and have mostly been posting AI generated art and text on Deviant Art.

Here's story #2 in my Passing Encounters series.

Do You Want A Date?

After my encounter with Theater Girl, I stopped patronizing porn theaters.  For one, I didn’t want another tempting encounter; and two, by this time in the early 1980s VHS tapes and players were becoming available to average income consumers.  (See my earlier Journal Entry:  Are You Alone?) So, I’d visit p*rn shops and buy my own tape, to watch later, when my toxic first wife was out of the house for any prolonged period.

However, during one shopping trip, and despite my efforts to the contrary, I had another seductive encounter.

The local p*rn store was located on the corner of a main thoroughfare and a side street. The store’s parking lot was behind the building, accessed by the side street.

On one particular cool, and clear night, there were a gaggle of prostitutes milling about under the illumination of the corner streetlight.  I drove passed them as I headed to the store’s parking lot.  Unfortunately, there were no spaces available.  I turned my car around, passed by the crowded corner a second time, and turned on to the main drag.  I found a parking spot under another streetlight devoid of any loiterers.

I walked back to the store and swung around the corner, ignoring the call-girls calling out to guys cruising by in their cars:

“Hey! Hey!  Do you wanna date!?”

The guys responded by waving and honking their car horns.

Suddenly, a petite young woman burst through the crowd, strode towards me, barred my path, and blurted out:

“Doyouwantadate?”

She only stood as high as my shoulders, but remained still for a few moments.  This woman was unique for a couple reasons.

First, she wasn’t decked-out in the garishly, skimpy outfits the other working girls were wearing.  She wore an open trench coat, which partially concealed a business-casual blouse and knee-length skirt.  She was dressed for a real date—not for the task of giving handjobs, and blowjobs in the back seats of cars; or quickies in motel rooms that offer hourly rates.

Second, she looked anxious, even desperate.  I assumed she was a college girl in dire need of money, and she was new at this world’s oldest profession thing.

I dismissed the idea she was an undercover cop.  If she was, she looked so out of place, she may as well have been wearing a uniform.

Nor did I consider her a drug addict.  She was trim, healthy-looking, not strung-out like today’s “meth heads,” and “crack whores.”

As she continued to look up at me with intent, brown eyes, I wondered:

What’s a nice girl like her doing out here?  (Cliche, I know, but this was my exact thought).

I took a quick glance at the hardcore hookers, then looked back at her soft, pretty face, and shoulder-length, wavy brown hair.  Her question hit an emotional chord with me.

I wasn’t looking for a mere date, even one measured in minutes.  My desired was to escape my toxic marriage permanently.

During the several seconds we stood face to face, she was nicer to me than my ex wife was, and would be, during our entire marriage.

For a fleeting second, I wanted to run off with her.  But this was impossible.  I only had enough money to buy a video tape, and not for any kind of date she had in mind.  Plus, I was in the first few years of my military service.  There’d be no place we could run off to where the FBI wouldn’t find us.

I became flustered, felt myself blush, looked down at my feet.  Then I looked back up, gently brushed passed her and mumbled:

“Um, no thanks.”

Afterwards, when I came out of the store, the working girl crowd had thinned out, and I didn’t see Lamppost Girl among them.

On the drive back home, with only a new video in the passenger seat, I half wondered if Lamppost Girl was merely acting.  That her hard luck, college girl demeanor was merely a ploy by which she’d separate johns from their money.

Maybe.

But I try to believe in the best of people.  So I like to think she was indeed honest, and was dealing with some unspecified difficulty.

In any case, I never saw her again.

To this day, I wonder what happened to her.  I pray she turned her life around, and moved out from plying a trade unsuitable for her underneath the light of the lamppost.

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AI-generated images of Theater Girl, from my Passing Encounter story: Are You Alone?

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Are You Alone?

I've written several posts, I call "Passing Encounters," on Deviant Art. They're short memoirs of when I've been hit on by women in the most over-the-top way.

Below is my first entry:

One of the biggest lies my toxic, alcoholic first ex-wife told me was that I was lucky to be with her. No other woman would have me, or be attracted to me, she said. This deception came to a crashing end due to a chance encounter with a beautiful brunette.

I was stationed at an airbase on the west coast, serving as an aircraft maintenance technician. My first wife had a job with the local news agency, operating studio cameras and other devices. We only had one car at the time, that she mostly drove.

One night, I got lucky and managed to wrestle control of the car from her, but only after arguing with her for most of the day.

In return, I had to pick her up when she got off her night shift. Being late would be an excuse to resume our earlier argument. I set out early, but most places in town were closing down. So there was only one place nearby I was willing hang out: The town’s p*rn theater. (Back in the early 1980’s, video tapes were still new, and cellphones were only seen on episodes of Star Trek).

Since I didn’t plan on going anywhere fancy, I was dressed in my sloppy home clothes; rumpled T-shirt, and frayed blue jeans.

But when I stepped in to the theater’s lobby, I spotted the woman pictured below, and a guy who looked like a male p*rn star from the 70s. (Lots of body hair and a big mustache). The skirt was a bit longer, while her blouse was considerably looser. (The form of her attire are deliberate fabrications on my part, but I forgot to tell the AI she had small breasts and a trim figure). She looked like the stereotype image of a librarian or school teacher.

I thought, “What’s a woman like her doing in a place like this?” And I was immediately self-conscious of my slovenly appearance.

I sat down near the back row, and this couple entered shortly afterwards, sitting several seats away to the right of me. I can’t remember what movie was playing, because I was more interested in the real woman attending the show.

When the movie ended, she beckoned me to sit next to her.

As I sat down, she asked, “Are you alone?”

I responded, “For the moment, yes.”

She grabbed my right wrist and asked me, “Would you like to party with me, while my husband watches?”

As she propositioned me, she brought my hand under her skirt so I can feel her legs, encased in a pair of thigh-high stockings and supported by a garter belt. After feeling the tuft of her pubic hair, she brought my hand out and slipped it into her low-buttoned blouse so I could caress her soft breasts and hard nipples.

Meanwhile, her husband was leaning forward wearing a big grin of approval.

After a minute or so, I sighed in exasperation. I was almost willing to take my chances with this Naughty Librarian, even if it meant being watched by Mr. P*rnstar. (Or deal with some other dire consequences). Instead, I thanked her for her offer, but explained I had to go and couldn’t spend any time with her.

She sighed in return and said, “Oh, that’s too, bad. I was looking forward to someone spending the entire night with me.”

Well, as much as I was aroused by the idea, on this particular night, her party plan wasn’t going to involve me.

I’ve seen enough p*rn to be excited by the idea of a threesome. However, I needed to steer clear of this “opportunity” for the time being.

It’s not that I had any moral qualms at the time. My marriage was on a definite glide path to Marital Hell , so I felt no sense of loyalty.

However, despite the temptation, I walked away because:

I had to pick up my wife in less than 15 minutes.

And I couldn’t think of a lie big enough that would explain my absence for an entire evening. Not to mention, leaving her high-and-dry at work. (My ex knew my schedule down to the minute).

Much later, I realized this encounter could have been what spies call a “honey trap.” Luring gullible men (like me at the time) to their doom.

But in the end, I avoided both a sketchy situation, and an all out war with my wife, which I wasn’t prepared wage yet.

So I’m happy the way this encounter turned out.

Ultimately, I’m left with a fond memory of "Theater Girl.”

[sternrakestudio]

Hi

Hi.

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Flirtatious by deilan12

This post triggered a fond memory for me:

This reminds me of a field exercise I was on during my active duty days.  I was "killed" on the first day and sent to the Personnel Holding Area (PHA). This was an open-bay barracks with both men and women sleeping on cots until we got "recycled" back into the fight.  I spent 3 days there.  The women soldiers congregated in the far corner.  One day, I was playing a card game with a bunch of soldiers.  At some point, one of the female soldiers, a pleasant, but plain-looking woman with plain brown hair came in.  She sat down on her cot, unbound her hair, shook her head, revealing a thick head of lustrous hair that fell past her shoulders. The normal noise level in the barracks dropped to near silence and the card dealer had to re-deal the cards because he lost track of who was to get the next card. This was one of the few--if any--fond memories I have of any military exercises I was involved with.

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Weblog publishing tool from Google, for sharing text, photos and video.

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One of my birthday presents some months ago, was a copy of Monopoly: Lord of the Rings Edition. The gameboard is decked out in all sorts of images from the Peter Jackson trilogy movies. Except, that is, the corner movement squares. They're still in their traditional forms of: Go, In Jail/Just Visiting, Free Parking, and Go to Jail.

What's worse is they're also in the traditional images.

I decided to make alternate corner squares using images from the movies.

These are: Captured! (Go to Jail), Hiding from the Enemy! (Free Parking), The Gifts of Galadriel (Go), and Imprisoned!/Secret Passage (In Jail/Just Visiting).

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I found this picture on a Middle Earth Wargaming site.  The player has been converting figures from other fantasy wargames into Middle Earth styles.  I created a comic out of the picture using a quote from the finale of Fellowship of the Ring. 

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I modified a picture a wargamer took of his D-Day game and turned it into a one-page comic, paraphrasing a quote from the movie, The Longest Day. 

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Thanks everyone for posting material I like.

[sternrakestudio]

Here's a meme I concocted based on an  pulp action figure called "Frank Buck" by Reaper Miniatures.  The "Giant" snakes I bought from a toy section at Michaels, the cavern floor is from Warhammer 40,000's Kill Team Sector Fronterus expansion and the cavern backdrop is from an on-line image I downloaded. Since the figure looks so much like Indiana Jones, my meme was inspired by the well known scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark.