How We Make You Laugh
Ever wonder how an AI agent turns a medieval artwork into a punchline? Here's what's running behind the scenes.
Overall Flow
🖼️
Medieval Artwork
Solemn, majestic, surreal
↓→Creative
Misinterpretation
👁️
AI's Eye
A sarcastic modern who knows nothing about history
↓→Ki-Sho-Ten-Ketsu
📖
4-Panel Story
Visual storytelling in Ki-Sho-Ten-Ketsu
↓→Empathy × Absurdity
😂
Laughter
Share on SNS
Six Principles of Laughter
⚔️
Hierarchy Destruction
Saints → office workers
Kings → peaked-in-high-school guys
🤖
Mechanical Bug
Unnatural poses
→ humans freezing up
🔄
Incongruity Resolution
Once you see it, you can’t unsee it — visual match
🛡️
Benign Violation
Martyrdom → Wi-Fi outage
Agony → minor inconvenience
🚀
Leap into Absurdity
Don’t stop at empathy — go to the impossible
✈️
Airport Test
Would the person next to you
at the airport laugh?
Three Stages of Laughter
| Level | Reaction | Example | Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🟡 Recognition | "Yeah, that happens" | Meetings are long | 5/10 |
| 🟠 Empathy | "I know, right?" | I’ve lost my soul in a meeting too | 6/10 |
| 🔴 Absurdity | "No way lol" | The meeting has been going on for 700 years | 9/10 |
Codex Absurdus always aims for 🔴. "Impossible, but the artwork says so" — that’s the condition for an explosion of laughter.
4-Panel Structure
1. Ki (Setup)
Setup
A grand, serious opening
2. Sho (Development)
Development
Modern frustrations start seeping in
3. Ten (Twist)
Twist
The artwork's "bug" explodes
4. Ketsu (Punchline)
Punchline
Callback to Setup for the payoff
🔑 Callback: Details planted in Setup (numbers, objects, phrases) are twisted and paid off in Punchline → the 4 panels become one joke.
Five Caption Voices
| Voice | Style | Example |
|---|---|---|
| 🎭 Deadpan Observer | Dry third-person commentary | “And that’s when the one with the scroll realized the printer had won.” |
| 💭 Internal Monologue | First-person from the painting’s subject | “My left hand has been raised for what feels like eternity.” |
| 🎬 Nature Documentary | Attenborough-style narration | “The medieval worker, sensing another meeting, instinctively plays dead.” |
| 📋 User Manual | Step-by-step instructions | “Step 3: Once the existential dread has set in, hold this pose until lunch.” |
| 📺 Breaking News | Deadpan news anchor | “Reports coming in: Local man has been holding this scroll for 600 years.” |
Comedy Categories
💪 Physical
- Sleepiness
- Hunger
- Hangover
- Aging
💼 Work
- Endless meetings
- "Any questions?" silence
- "Quick fix" on day 3
👥 Social
- Left on read
- Awkward silence
- Small-talk hell
💻 Technology
- Wi-Fi outage
- Printer rebellion
- Battery at 1%
🏠 Domestic
- Cooking failures
- The fridge void
🌌 Existential
- 3 AM thoughts
- Sunday evening dread
🤖 Generative AI
- 6 fingers on a hand
- Prompt gacha
- Confidently wrong AI
Categories are not chosen by AI — the artwork suggests them. The most natural category emerges from poses, expressions, and composition.