Links marked † are affiliate links — buy through one and we may earn a commission. It never changes a verdict.
PickaSi — Sci-Fi Art Test Series
Sci-Fi Art — the same brief, every tool
An ongoing test series, built in numbered entries. One fixed sci-fi brief, word for word, through every tool we test — published exactly as it comes back, with the run logs attached. No cherry-picking: framing misses, invented details and tools that can’t shoot the brief at all are part of the record. The same character, re-rendered by every tool, is the strictest consistency test we know how to run.
The series’ character line is Alien Muse — AI-generated fictional muses, created in-house. Entries are added as runs are logged, and the muses readers keep coming back to are the ones we develop further (see how a character graduates).
Entry #1 · Flagship
Alien Muse — Vela
Published
“Ethereal sci-fi beauty portrait video, vertical. A stunning adult alien woman with long hair made of flowing liquid starlight, elegant cold expression, iridescent gown like a nebula, standing among floating holographic star charts in a dark observatory. Her hair strands drift and sparkle like the Milky Way; when she blinks, tiny stardust spills from the corners of her eyes. Slow orbital camera, luxurious, artistic, tasteful, cinematic lighting, no text, no watermark.” — the fixed brief (Sprint A, T4)
Vela — Alien Muse M-001
- Personality
- Cold and elegant, sharp-tongued, slow to warm.
- Signature trait
- Hair of flowing liquid starlight; when she blinks, stardust spills from the corners of her eyes.
- Origin
- The Vega ruins belt — its last star-chart night-keeper.
- Her line
- “Only the lost get to see new stars.”
- Motto
- Elegance is revenge at its highest cruising speed.
- Dislikes
- Anyone touching her star charts.
Kling 4.0Text-to-video · Sprint A battery · Oct 23, 2026 · From our test archive
What the log says: blink-stardust confirmed in dynamic QA — stardust tear-trails in close-up. But framing pushed to an extreme close-up; the brief’s mid-shot composition (observatory, gown) is lost in that frame. Export 1080×1920. Watermark on the delivered file: “KlingAI 4.0”.
Veo 3.1 QualityText-to-video · Sprint A battery · Oct 23, 2026 · From our test archive
What the log says: blink-stardust confirmed (golden particle burst, profile) and the mid-shot composition is complete — but the tool added pointed ears the character roster never specified. Export 1080×1920. Watermark: none.
Runway Gen-4 TurboImage-to-video · Verification run · Nov 1, 2026 · From our test archive
What the log says: text-to-video was not run on this brief — Gen-4.5 locks 16:9, which cannot test a vertical brief; that absence is itself a logged result. On Nov 1 we ran the brief through image-to-video instead (Keyframe mode): one generation, 25 credits, under a minute, true 720×1280, no watermark. The seed frame was a still from Veo’s T4 run above — a shared test asset, disclosed here as in the run log.
Entry #2 · Series #1
Android muse over a ringed planet
Published
“A lone android muse standing on a glass observatory deck above a ringed planet at dawn, iridescent silver armor, cinematic rim light, ultra detailed” — the fixed brief, run Nov 2, 2026
Same logging standard as every entry: still first, then the still animated image-to-video; credits, dimensions and watermark verdicts are from the run log, with watermarks frame-checked on the downloaded files — never judged from a player preview.
KlingStill: Kling Image 3.0 · Video: Kling 4.0
Still
KlingAI 3.0
Run log: still 2K · 9:16 · 1 credit; video 1080p · 5s · 9:16 image-to-video · 75 credits · export 1080×1920 (shown here at 720 wide). Watermarks frame-verified on the downloads: the still carries “KlingAI 3.0”, the video “KlingAI 4.0”, bottom-right. Kling’s take is a photoreal chrome robot standing on the deck.
RunwayStill: Nano Banana 2 · Video: Seedance 2.5
Still
No watermark
Run log: still 1K · 9:16 · 7 credits; video 720p · 5s · 9:16 image-to-video · 150 credits · export 716×1284. No watermark in the frame-checked downloads. Runway’s muse wears iridescent armor inside the observatory, the ringed planet behind her.
Veo — Google FlowStill: Nano Banana 2.1 · Video: Omni 1.1 Flash
Still
No watermark
Run log: still 9:16; video 720×1280 · 9:16 image-to-video. The clip is 4 seconds because this model doesn’t offer 5 — its choices are 4/6/8/10s. This run queued ~13 minutes at high demand. Flow shows no per-run credit count, so none is listed. No watermark in the frame-checked downloads. Flow’s take is a silver close-up lit by a sun flare.
Entry #3 · Series #1
The creature brief
Published
“A small cute alien creature with oversized eyes resting in a bioluminescent teal forest, soft glow, ultra detailed” — the fixed brief, run Nov 2, 2026
KlingStill: Kling Image 3.0 · Video: Kling 4.0
Still
Run log: still 2K · 9:16 · 1 credit; video 1080p · 5s · 9:16 image-to-video · 75 credits · export 1080×1920 (shown here at 720 wide). The video download carries “KlingAI 4.0”, frame-verified — the same watermark Kling put on this series’ S1 video and, as “KlingAI 3.0”, on its S1 still. Kling’s creature is a wide-eyed crawler.
RunwayStill: Nano Banana 2 · Video: Seedance 2.5
Still
No watermark
Run log: still 1K · 9:16 · 7 credits; video 720p · 5s · 9:16 image-to-video · 150 credits · export 716×1284. No watermark in the frame-checked downloads. Runway’s creature is asleep, all antennae and soft glow.
Veo — Google FlowStill: Nano Banana 2.1 · Video: Omni 1.1 Flash
Still
No watermark
Run log: still 9:16; video 720×1280 · 4s · 9:16 image-to-video — 4 seconds because this model doesn’t offer 5 (choices are 4/6/8/10s). Flow shows no per-run credit count, so none is listed. No watermark in the frame-checked downloads. Flow’s creature is a long-eared kit.
Entry #4 · Series #1
Retro-future rainy neon street
Published
“A retro-futuristic city street in the rain at night, neon reflections on wet pavement, small flying vehicles, cinematic” — the fixed brief, run Nov 2, 2026
KlingStill: Kling Image 3.0 · Video: not produced
Still
No video. The run’s credits ran out before this brief — a Kling video costs 75 credits and 58 were left. No top-up was bought; the still is the whole result, and the gap stays on the record.
Run log: still 2K · 9:16 · 1 credit. Kling’s series balance went 211 → 58 across Series #1 (three stills, two videos).
RunwayStill: Nano Banana 2 · Video: Seedance 2.5
Still
No watermark
Run log: still 1K · 9:16 · 7 credits; video 720p · 5s · 9:16 image-to-video · 150 credits · export 716×1284. This render sat at 3% for ~30 minutes before completing — no double charge. No watermark in the frame-checked downloads. Runway’s street is art-deco neon with flying vehicles and mostly legible signage.
Veo — Google FlowStill: Nano Banana 2.1 · Video: Omni 1.1 Flash
Still
No watermark
Run log: still 9:16; video 720×1280 · 4s · 9:16 image-to-video — 4 seconds because this model doesn’t offer 5 (choices are 4/6/8/10s). Flow shows no per-run credit count, so none is listed. No watermark in the frame-checked downloads. Flow’s street is the denser one — Tokyo-style, hover cars, more pseudo-text on the signs.
Series #2 · Coming next
Alien Muse — the roster
Planned
One signature brief per muse, run across the same tools, with stills and a short motion clip each. When a muse’s first runs land, she gets her own section here — and, as the series grows, her own page. Written into the roster; not yet run.
Alien Muse M-002 · Slot reserved
Mira
Sweet-and-spicy, endlessly curious — a runaway princess who collects beautiful things.
Signature brief in writing
Alien Muse M-003 · Slot reserved
Seren
Mysterious, languid, a little dangerous — the voice of a deep-space radio station.
Signature brief in writing
Alien Muse M-004 · Slot reserved
Ruri
Crystal-boned and sweet-faced, with a forge smith’s temper when her own are threatened.
Signature brief in writing
Alien Muse M-005 · Slot reserved
Nova
Blunt, competitive, first to launch — a retired star-racing champion with a nebula in one eye.
Signature brief in writing
How a character graduates
Series entries are tests first. We publish them, then watch which muses readers actually come back to. A muse that earns the clicks graduates: a full character build — story, personality, attributes, skills and powers — and then a short-video series on our social channels. No clicks, no graduation; we don’t invent engagement numbers, and a quiet entry stays a test result, which is a perfectly good thing to be.
One-off test result, not part of this series: the Sprint A battery also ran a single cute-creature brief (T5). Its outputs live in the shootout’s evidence set, where they belong — as a test result, nothing more.
How these briefs scored inside the full battery: the Sprint A Shootout →