Using AI to Generate an Ancestor's Photo

I now know what ai thinks my great great grandmother Creighton looked like

Awhile back I asked all of you about the possibility of using AI to generate a photo of my great-great grandmother’s photo. I first tried with Claude, but that ai program doesn’t do photos. I went back to ChatGPT, and I am excited to show you what has developed (outdated photography pun intended)!

Catharine Claminia (Simeral) Creighton died young. She was 47 years, 7 months and 14 days when she passed Friday, November 23, 1893, in the cabin. Her cause of death was consumption, which we know today as tuberculosis. Her youngest child was 18 at the time. Her oldest daughter had just married less than a month before on October 25.

I was able to find pictures of two of her sisters on Ancestry.com. Since I don’t have permission to share those from the owners, I won’t share them here, unfortunately. Both photos were of her sisters when they were much older than 47.

I also uploaded a picture of one of her daughters, Anna Dean Creighton Wilson, that I own.

Anna Dean Creighton Wilson

I told ChatGPT that I wanted the photo to create a picture that would be a candid shot, sepia toned, and what she would have possibly looked like in her forties.

It took forever. In fact, I thought ChatGPT had quit working. It was just spinning. I am using the free version, so perhaps that is why. I finally gave up. A couple days later I went back to ChatGPT to give it one last try, and to my amazement, this is what was looking back at me:

ai generated

I asked Chat if a picture of her granddaughter at about that age, through her son, would help. Chat thought so, so I uploaded this photo of my grandmother, Catharine’s granddaughter:

ChatGPT then revised Catharine’s picture to this:

ai generated

Because I was having fun with the process at this point, I then uploaded my mom’s picture in her late twenties. She would be Catherine’s great-granddaughter:

You can tell I didn’t worry about glare on the photos I uploaded. I just snapped pictures of other photos with my phone. ChatGPT came back with a revision of Catharine:

ai generated

Now came the real test. I asked ChatGTP to make a photo of me. This is when the ai started hedging:

ChatGPT’s answer.

I told it to go ahead and make a speculative portrait of me. This is what it created:

ai-generated

It got the brown wavy hair correct. That’s about it, I think.

My Grandma, Mom, and I have very strong similarities in appearance, but I suspect those strong traits I see were from Grandma’s maternal line instead of her paternal Simeral/Creighton line.

I do have a cousin who descends from the Simeral/Creighton line, and she will probably read this. I also have a few cousins that descend from Catharine’s sisters who will read this. It’s be interesting to see what else all of us cousins could create. (Hint hint!)

It’s a fun tool to play with to help me imagine what my ancestors would have looked like. Maybe a new game for all of you who go to family reunions!

I’d love to hear from all of you what you think of Catharine’s ai-generated portraits. Do you see a resemblance?

Thanks for joining me at The Creighton Cabin this week!