Text-to-image generative models have recently exploded in popularity and accessibility. Yet so far, use of these models in creative tasks that bridge the 2D digital world and the creation of physical artefacts has been understudied. We conduct a pilot study to investigate if and how text-to-image models can be used to assist in upstream tasks within the creative process, such as ideation and visualization, prior to a sculpture-making activity. Thirty participants selected sculpture-making materials and generated three images using the Stable Diffusion text-to-image generator, each with text prompts of their choice, with the aim of informing and then creating a physical sculpture. The majority of participants (23/30) reported that the generated images informed their sculptures, and 28/30 reported interest in using text-to-image models to help them in a creative task in the future. We identify several prompt engineering strategies and find that a participant's prompting strategy relates to their stage in the creative process. We discuss how our findings can inform support for users at different stages of the design process and for using text-to-image models for physical artefact design.

翻译：文本到图像生成模型近期在普及性和可访问性上呈爆发式增长。然而，目前关于这类模型在连接二维数字世界与实体工艺品创作过程中的创造性应用仍缺乏研究。我们开展了一项先导研究，探究文本到图像模型能否以及如何辅助雕塑制作前的创意阶段（如构思与可视化）。三十名参与者选择雕塑材料后，使用Stable Diffusion文本到图像生成器根据自选提示词生成三幅图像，旨在为后续实体雕塑创作提供参考。多数参与者（23/30）表示生成的图像启发了他们的雕塑创作，28/30的参与者表示未来有兴趣使用文本到图像模型辅助创意任务。我们识别出若干提示工程策略，并发现参与者的提示策略与其所处创意阶段存在关联。本文讨论了这些发现如何为设计流程不同阶段的用户提供支持，以及如何将文本到图像模型应用于实体工艺品设计。