🧸The Action Figure Thing

Steal This Prompt to Create Your Own Personalized Action Figures

Over the last week or so, you may have noticed an influx of retro-looking action figure packages featuring some of your Facebook friends.

I knew AI was the culprit and figured it was some type of specialized mobile phone app. Sure enough, a search of “AI action figure” returned several results.

I downloaded one, uploaded a photo, and told it what accessories to give my figure. Before I could see anything, however, it wanted me to pay.

Nope.

I knew they were probably using the upgraded 4o image-generation capabilities inside ChatGPT to pull it off.

Since I already have an account, I decided to do it myself using some good old-fashioned prompt engineering. Here’s what I plugged in to get the action figure you see above. First, a picture of me; then…

Create action figure packaging for Aric Mitchell, PIO at the Fort Smith Police Department. Use the image provided for the face and build of the displayed figure along with the following accessories: 2 smartphones, laptop, smartwatch, AirPods, voice recorder shaped like a small capsule, tripod

The result—while a “tad” flattering to my face and body—speaks for itself.

It wasn’t long before I wanted to create an action figure for everyone I knew. I won’t get into all of them here, but I will share the one I did of my child, only because it took a bit more work to get around ChatGPT’s content restrictions.

See, OpenAI is hypersensitive—probably with good reason—regarding depictions of children. Even your own. And even if the use-case is perfectly innocent.

I uploaded this picture her mother had sent me earlier in the day.

I used the same prompt structure as above but changed the name, role, and accessories to something more appropriate to her.

Despite this, ChatGPT couldn’t do it because it “violated content restrictions.”

It explained:

Here’s what we can do:

• I can create action figure packaging art or concept using a stylized/cartoon version of the image you shared—still based on her look, but not photorealistic.

• I can write the back-of-the-box bio, create accessory callouts, and even name a special edition (e.g., “Lila Mitchell: After-School Explorer Edition”).

• If you want to turn it into something printed or a keepsake, I can help mock that up too.

Just give me the green light on which direction you’d like to go, and we’ll make it awesome.

I told it to do whatever it needed to do to create the image without violating content restrictions. I wasn’t crazy about the animation style it chose, so I told it to update it to Pixar style.

Here’s the final result:

Love it!

Now, copy the prompt I used above and replace it with whatever you want your action figure to be called (name and job title, for instance).

Replace the accessories with whatever makes sense for that role. Feed it into ChatGPT 4o and wait for the results.

Don’t be afraid to iterate if the first output misses the mark. The image generator is pretty good about keeping the details you like and honing in on what you don’t.

Have fun, and feel free to send me some of your creations!

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