Crafting Better Midjourney Prompts: A Beginner's Guide

Are you new to Midjourney and finding it hard to get the exact images you want? This guide is for anyone who wants their prompts to be more predictable. You want Midjourney to actually create what you describe. Let's explore how to improve your prompt creation right from the start.

Why Your Prompts Might Not Work How You Expect

By default, Midjourney can be quite basic. If you don't give it clear directions, it often creates standard, almost stereotypical versions of people, objects, and settings. If you want your art to stand out and reflect your unique vision, you need to guide the AI more intentionally. This guide shows you how to make your prompts more intentional.

Prompts sometimes don't produce the results you expect for several reasons. Understanding these helps you write better prompts.

Midjourney Fills in Blanks

If you don't specifically mention something in your prompt, Midjourney will make its own guesses. These guesses tend to be the typical, common version of whatever you asked for. If that's what you need, this can be helpful. But if you want something unique, you must be specific.

Make Sure to Describe the Whole Picture

Many people focus only on the main subject. But it's important to describe three key areas of the image:

• The main subject or focal point.

• The context or background for the subject.

• The feeling or style you want the image to have.

Missing one of these can lead to unexpected results.

Midjourney Has Processing Limits

Think of each prompt as a task Midjourney's computers need to process. If your prompt is too complex or requires too much work, the AI might run out of time before completing all the details. This can result in parts of your description being ignored or combined in strange ways. There are ways to simplify prompts to help the AI, which we'll touch on later.

Avoid Confusing Instructions

Some words or phrases can confuse Midjourney's standard prompting mode. These include:

• Direct commands or instructions ("make the elephant smaller than the strawberry"). These are better suited for Midjourney's specific conversational mode, not basic prompting.

• Technical jargon or camera terms (like "16k" or "f/2.8"). These often don't translate well to visual instructions for the AI and are unreliable.

• Prompts written in a very literary style, perhaps generated by an untrained AI. These often use many words that don't relate directly to how the image should look, wasting processing effort and leading to unpredictable results.

Instead, focus on clear, picture-focused descriptions. Think about describing what someone would see, not giving commands or using unrelated technical terms.

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How Midjourney Understands Your Prompts

Midjourney uses a process called diffusion to turn your text into images. It learned how words match visual patterns by looking at millions of images with descriptions. This included things like photo captions and tags.

When you give it a prompt, Midjourney starts with a base of random visual noise, sometimes called a "seed." It then repeatedly refines this noise, making tiny adjustments based on the rules it learned from the training data and your prompt. This refinement process is called denoising. You actually see a simplified version of this when Midjourney shows the progress bar animating your image.

Imagine a sculptor starting with a block of marble (the seed). Your prompt is like the chisel, guiding the sculptor to chip away at the noise and reveal the image hidden within.

While seeds are the starting point, they aren't very useful for getting consistent results over time. Because Midjourney uses different computers for each image job, the "seed" value for the random noise changes. This means trying to use a seed number from a previous image won't guarantee you start from the same visual noise base later. Seeds are best used for comparing different prompts or settings within a single session (using the --seed parameter), not for long-term style consistency.

Making Your Prompts Adherent

Prompt adherence simply means writing prompts that get Midjourney to create the image you intended. It's about being clear and specific so the AI doesn't have to guess. This is different from just exploring and seeing what random results Midjourney creates, which is also fun!

To make your prompts more adherent, remember to:

• Describe your main subject in detail.

• Describe the surroundings or background.

• Specify the aesthetic style you want.

• Use clear, visual language. Avoid confusing commands or jargon.

• Keep your prompts focused and avoid unnecessary words.

Improving your prompting can take practice. Tools designed for Midjourney users can help streamline the process and give you more control over your results. Consider exploring options like the TitanXT Midjourney Automation Suite to make prompt creation more efficient. Check out TitanXT and see how it can help you!

Conclusion

Getting started with Midjourney means learning how to communicate your ideas effectively to the AI. By understanding why prompts sometimes don't work as expected – due to assumptions, incomplete descriptions, processing limits, or confusing language – you can start writing prompts that are more adherent and produce the specific images you envision.

Focus on clear, visual descriptions detailing the subject, background, and style. As you get more comfortable, you'll find it easier to shape that initial random noise into the artwork you want.

For help with managing your prompts and generating consistent results, explore tools like the TitanXT Midjourney Automation Suite. It can assist you in creating, organizing, and fine-tuning your interactions with Midjourney, helping you get the best possible output. Discover the benefits of automation for your Midjourney projects!