As an AI enthusiast, I’ve been experimenting a lot lately with Stable Diffusion, which is one of the most advanced AI image generators available today. In this article, I want to share some of my favorite prompt engineering techniques to help others get the most out of this incredible tool.
Crafting Quality Prompts
The key to generating great images with Stable Diffusion lies in crafting prompts that clearly communicate what you want to illustrate. A prompt is the text input that guides the AI on what type of image to generate. Here are some best practices I’ve learned:
Specify Style and Composition
Be as explicit as possible about the desired art style, color palette, framing, etc.
A scenic landscape painting in the style of Bob Ross, very detailed oil on canvasUse Descriptive Adjectives
Leverage adjectives to set a mood and inject personality.
A cute, fluffy samoyed puppy sitting in a field of flowers, radiating joyGive Context Through Relationships
Show interactions and relationships between elements in a scene to make an image more engaging.
A mother fox curled up in a den with her sleeping baby fox kitsAdvanced Prompt Engineering
As you become more adept at Stable Diffusion, you can start fine-tuning prompts to improve image quality, guide consistency, and incorporate creative concepts.
Quality and Realism
Add modifiers to increase photorealism and reduce AI flaws.
An oil painting by a renowned artist of a majestic snow leopard in the Himalayas, National Geographic award-winning photographConsistent Elements
Lock some elements to maintain coherence across image generations.
(snowy owl):0.8 --ar 9:9 (very detailed eyes, extremely focused:1.2)Creative Concepts
Introduce fictional themes or mash up disparate ideas into one visual.
Astronaut riding a Pegasus in space, digital artPrompt Structure Tips
Here are some structural recommendations when constructing prompts:
Order of Operations
- Style/medium
- Main subject
- Descriptors
- Relationships
- Context
- Quality adjustments
Length
I find prompts between 50-100 words produce the best results. Extremely long prompts often lead to confusion.
Punctuation
Use commas between descriptive phrases and periods at the end of main concept statements. Exclamation points can be fun too!