Creating images with AI — Resources

The most essential rules for building a prompt for a quality image, on a single page: structure, style, lighting, ratio and models. Save it or print it.

One-page cheat-sheet

AI image — prompt rules

1Prompt structure

  • Subject — the main object (who/what)
  • Style — photorealistic, drawing, 3D...
  • Composition — angle, shot
  • Lighting + quality — at the end

2Style keywords

  • photorealistic, watercolor, oil paint
  • 3D render, anime, pixel-art
  • An artist/style name adds precision
  • Choose one main style

3Lighting and camera

  • golden hour, soft light, neon
  • bokeh — blurred background
  • wide-angle, close-up, aerial
  • 35mm, portrait lens

4Aspect ratios

  • 1:1 — square (avatar, post)
  • 16:9 — wide (banner, background)
  • 9:16 — vertical (stories, phone)
  • 4:5 — Instagram post

5Negative prompt

  • State what should not be there
  • For example: blurry, extra fingers, text
  • Reduces low-quality results
  • A separate field in many models

6Quality-boosting words

  • highly detailed, sharp focus
  • 8k, high resolution
  • professional photography
  • Don't overuse — in moderation

7Popular models

  • Midjourney — artistic, high quality
  • DALL·E — faithful to the prompt
  • Stable Diffusion — open, flexible
  • Leonardo / Firefly — free options

8Typical mistakes

  • A too long, contradictory prompt
  • Hands/fingers, text — may come out wrong
  • Too many subjects at once — confusion
  • Re-edit the result (iteration)