Gilded Tide: a Steam capsule set from a 1704 gold screen
Ogata Kōrin’s Rough Waves became key art for a game that does not exist yet, and then a set of eight Steam capsules.
- AskedTurn this key art into the full Steam capsule set. Extend the screen for the wide ones and keep the logo readable.
- What the AI didGenerative Expand painted new wave panels to the left and right, widening the nearly square screen to 3:2.
- Your callsToning the new panels down to the 300-year-old gold, drawing hinges at the joins, and making a logo-free copy and a big-logo copy for the hero and the small capsule.
- Cost77 credits (4.6¢)
- TimeAbout 26 minutes including dead ends; about 4 minutes of actual tool time.
- SourcePublic domain, released under CC0 1.0 by The Met’s Open Access program
The editor was signed out for this run, so the expand was sent to Bike4Mind directly, with the same request PaintBox’s generative fill makes. The result was placed back into the PaintBox document under the original, which stays untouched on top.
The recipe
Every step ran in the production editor unless it says otherwise. Menu paths are as the editor names them.
- Open the scanFile > Open…Open The Met’s 3811 x 3398 scan.
- Trim the frameImage > Canvas SizeTrim the black lacquer frame, 120 px a side, centre anchor.
- ResampleImage > Image SizeResample to 2560 tall, 2895 x 2560.
- Widen the screen with AIAIImage > Generative Expand…; the model call itself sent to Bike4Mind directlyExpand to 3840 x 2560, centre anchor, asking for more of Kōrin’s waves rolling into flat aged gold leaf, matching the palette and brushwork, with no frame, text or people.
- Keep the original on topFile > Import Image…, Free Transform, Send to BackPlace the AI image as a smart object under the original and scale it to fill. Only the new margins show.
- Match the old goldAdjustment Layer > Hue/Saturation, clipping maskThe new panels came out about 19% brighter and more saturated. A Hue/Saturation layer clipped to them: hue +4, saturation -28, lightness -14.
- Draw the hingesNew layer, Transform Selection, Edit > Fill…Two 6 px rules in #262a1f, sampled from the real centre hinge, so the widened art reads as a four-panel screen.
- Title lockupText tool, Layer > Layer Style…"GILDED TIDE" in Serif 500 at 200 px, ivory, inside every capsule’s safe zone, with a drop shadow and a dark outer glow. The subtitle takes the same style by copy and paste.
- Export the setFile > Export For > Steam CapsulesOne preset renders all eight capsules; review the contact sheet.
- A logo-free heroVariants > Create Virtual CopySteam wants the library hero to be just the artwork, so a virtual copy hides both title layers. The hero and page background come from it.
- A readable small capsuleVirtual Copy, Free TransformAt 231 x 87 the title was about 90 px wide. A second copy hides the subtitle and scales the title up to nearly fill it.
- Export the key artFile > Export > PNGBack on the original, export the 3840 x 2560 master.
Credit ledger
One credit is $0.0006. Hand tools run in the browser and cost nothing.
| Action | Model | Credits | USD |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open, trim, resample | none, in the browser | 0 | $0.000 |
| Generative Expand (refused, not charged; fixed since, the default is now gpt-image-2) | gpt-image-1 | 0 | $0.000 |
| Generative Expand, 1536 x 1024 (the balance change across the request, an upper bound) | gpt-image-1.5 | 77 | $0.046 |
| Place, match, hinges, type, virtual copies, exports | none, in the browser | 0 | $0.000 |
| Total | 77 | $0.046 (4.6¢) | |
Source and license
- Rough Waves, two-panel folding screen, ca. 1704–09, Ogata Kōrin; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Fletcher Fund, 1926 (26.117)
- License: Public domain, released under CC0 1.0 by The Met’s Open Access program
- Credit line: Ogata Kōrin, Rough Waves. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, CC0.
What came out
- Key art PNG, 3840 x 2560
- Steam capsules: header 460x215, small 231x87, main 616x353, vertical 374x448, library 600x900, library hero 3840x1240, library header 920x430, page background 1438x810
Rough edges we hit
Written down, not smoothed over.
- The default model at the time, gpt-image-1, was refused by Bike4Mind, so another model had to be picked by hand. Fixed and deployed since: the default is now gpt-image-2.
- Signed out, Generative Expand queued a candidate that could only fail, with no sign-in prompt.
- The Steam preset then wrote the older, half-size store capsule sizes and had no library logo PNG; it now writes the current Steamworks sizes and a library logo.
- Crop is a non-destructive view crop; Canvas Size is the real trim.
- Only four generic type families, so no real logotype.
Run on 2026-11-06. More recipes · Open the editor · How AI works