Temperature instead of prompt craft
One dial covers the distance between a literal reading and a loose one, without teaching anybody a syntax.
AI SaaS case study
ASYCD
An image generator with a memory. Every prompt and every result stays on the account, so a piece of work can be picked up again weeks later instead of started over.
- IndustryGenerative art and design tools
- UsersArtists, designers and hobbyists
- DeliveredSeptember 2024
- ServicesProduct Design, Development, AI
Overview
ASYCD generates images from a theme and a temperature — the theme is what you want, the temperature is how far it is allowed to wander from it. Two fields, deliberately, on a platform aimed at people exploring an idea rather than specifying one.
The part that makes it a product rather than a demo is the history. Prompts and the images they produced are kept against the account, so a direction from last week can be found, reused and pushed further.
Generation is metered in credits, which is what makes an image generator with real GPU costs behind it something that can be sold rather than merely launched.
- AI SaaS
- Image Generation
- Credit Billing
- Prompt History
- Accounts
- Responsive Design
Project video
Type a theme. See where it goes.
Generating from a theme, and the history the account keeps of it.
Key capabilities
A theme and a temperature
Two fields instead of a prompt-engineering tutorial. The temperature is the dial that decides how literal the result is.
The account remembers
Prompts and the images they produced are kept, so an idea from a fortnight ago can be reopened rather than reconstructed.
Credits, one image at a time
Generation draws on a credit balance shown in the header, and runs one image per request so the cost of a click is never ambiguous.
Signed in or just looking
The gallery and the form are visible before an account exists. Signing up is what buys credits, not what unlocks the page.
Making an image is rarely one attempt. It is a direction, then a variation, then a variation on that — and most tools treat each request as unrelated to the last, so the thread of what was being explored lives in the user's memory and in a folder of downloads named by timestamp. Come back a week later and the work is not resumable; it is repeatable at best, if you can remember what you typed. Meanwhile every one of those attempts costs real GPU time, which the interface has to account for without turning the experience into a meter.
The thread of an idea is lost
Without a history, refining last week's direction means remembering the prompt that produced it.
Generation is not instant
A request takes real time on real hardware, and a screen that does not say so reads as broken.
Prompting is a skill nobody asked to learn
A blank text field rewards people who already know the vocabulary and quietly loses everybody else.
The form is two inputs because the audience is exploring, and a temperature dial expresses "how far from what I said" better than any adjective a beginner would think to type. Behind it, the account keeps every prompt and every image, which turns a series of one-off requests into a body of work. Credits sit in the header rather than behind a billing page, so the cost is present without being the subject, and generation is deliberately one image per request — a clear price per click beats a grid of four where three are discarded.
History as the product
Prompts and results are kept against the account, so the platform accumulates value the longer somebody uses it.
One image, one price
A single generation per request keeps the credit arithmetic obvious and stops a batch being spent on results nobody wanted.
The whole product, before signing up
A theme, a temperature, a button. The featured work sits above it so a visitor sees what the platform produces before being asked for an account — signing in buys credits rather than access.
The result, with the prompt still in the field
The theme that produced the image stays where it was typed, so the next attempt is an edit rather than a retype. The credit balance in the header ticks down by one — visible, and never the loudest thing on screen.
Everything made, still on the account
Account details above, and below them the history — each prompt with the image it produced, in order. This is what a session of exploring looks like a week later, which is the difference between a tool and a place to work. Personal details are blurred here; they are not on the real screen.
Charging for something that costs real GPU time
Solution: Image generation has a floor cost per request that a flat subscription either subsidises or gouges. Credits deduct per generation against a visible balance, which prices the compute honestly and lets somebody spend a little without committing to a plan.
A history that is worth keeping
Solution: Storing prompts is easy; making them useful is not. Prompt and result are kept together against the account and shown in order, so the history reads as a sequence of decisions rather than a folder of files with no context.
Waiting, without looking broken
Solution: Generation is slow enough that a static screen reads as a failure. The viewer holds the frame and shows that work is happening in place, so the wait is legible as progress rather than as nothing.
Questions
It sets how closely the result sticks to the theme. Low is a literal reading; higher lets the model wander further from what was typed. It is one dial standing in for a lot of prompt vocabulary.
So the price of a click is unambiguous. A batch of four spends four credits to produce three results nobody asked for, which is worse value on a credit system than it is on a subscription.
Prompts and the images they produced, in order. That is what lets somebody return to a direction they were exploring rather than trying to remember the words that got them there.
No. The featured work and the generator itself are visible signed out. An account is what holds credits and history.
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