Some people merely wash the dishes. Other people WASH THE DISHES.

PASSION controls how much expressive intensity and embodied commitment a subject brings to whatever the hell they're doing. Negative weights move toward restrained, detached, matter-of-fact behaviour. Positive weights make the subject increasingly invested in the moment.

Yes, it works for the obvious stuff: kissing, embracing, dancing, arguing, singing and dramatic performances. But those are easy. We made painters paint, musicians perform, people assemble furniture and one poor bastard wash dishes until we were satisfied that the slider wasn't simply learning romance or people yelling at each other.

We even tested it on horses.

Somehow, there is such a thing as a more passionate horse.

The interesting part is that PASSION generally tries to preserve the prompted activity while changing how strongly the subject commits to it. A dancer can go from marking the choreography to throwing herself into the performance. A painter can go from calmly doing the work to apparently believing that civilization depends upon this landscape. A furniture assembler can go from Step 7 to THIS NIGHTSTAND WILL BE BUILT.

It isn't perfectly surgical. As Passion rises, SDXL may recruit stronger body language, expression, gesture, dramatic lighting, loosened hair, clothing/presentation and sometimes a more dramatic environment to sell the idea. That's part of what the model thinks “passionate” looks like.

Suggested range: -2 to +3

-1 — Calm. Restrained. Doing the thing because the thing needs doing.

-2 — Dispassionate. The meeting could have been an email.

0 — Brother Checkpoint, unsupervised.

+1 — Clearly engaged. Somebody has begun to give a shit.

+2 — Passionate. Body language, expression and commitment are now firmly involved.

+3 — I HAVE FEELINGS ABOUT THIS FURNITURE.

-3 — The monastery archives begin opening. Older/anachronistic associations may creep in.

+4 — Everybody has been told this is their final performance before the king. Dramatic drift starts becoming part of the entertainment.

The negative and positive sides aren't visually symmetrical, and they don't need to be. Dispassion is often quieter than Passion. Around -1, that's actually one of the slider's nicest tricks: the composition can stay recognizably similar while the subject simply stops caring quite so fucking much.

Recommended: start around ±1, then turn the knob until somebody takes dishwashing personally.