How to Generate Beautiful Images with AI

Published on April 9, 2026

You've tried an AI image generator — GPT-Image, Nano Banana, Flux or Stable Diffusion — and the results disappointed you? Blurry images, weird compositions, generic style… Most of the time, the problem isn't the tool: it's the prompt. A prompt is the text description you give the AI to create your image. And contrary to what many people think, it's not just a simple sentence — it's a structured visual instruction.

The good news: writing a great image prompt is a learnable skill. You don't need to be an artist or an engineer. With a few concrete techniques, you'll go from unpredictable results to images that truly match your vision.

In this guide, you'll learn how to structure a prompt, choose the right artistic style, control composition, manage rendering quality, and iterate effectively. Each section includes comparative examples you can copy and adapt immediately.

At a glance — the 7 pillars of a great image prompt

#	Pillar	What it changes
1	Prompt structure	The essential foundation for any controlled result
2	Artistic style	Defines the visual identity of your image
3	Quality and rendering	Takes you from draft to professional image
4	Composition	Frame, angle, depth — like a real photographer
5	Text in images	Avoid common mistakes
6	Iteration	How to refine until you get the perfect result
7	Advanced tips	Shortcuts to save time

Prompt Structure

Why structure changes everything

An image generation model doesn't "think" — it translates words into pixels based on billions of learned associations. If your prompt is vague, it fills in the gaps randomly. Random can be interesting for free artistic exploration. But if you have a precise vision in mind, every piece of information you leave out is a chance of ending up with something unexpected.

The golden rule: everything that isn't written is invented by the model.

An effective, complete prompt rests on six components. They chain together naturally, like describing a scene to a film director:

Component	Definition	Example
Main subject	The core concept of the image	a futuristic city, portrait of a woman
Details / Action	Pose, expression, clothing, movement	wearing a red coat, looking away, running through rain
Context / Environment	Location, era, weather, atmosphere	in a Japanese garden at dusk, cyberpunk street at night
Artistic style	Photo, illustration, 3D, painting…	flat design illustration, oil painting, anime style
Quality / Rendering	Level of detail, lighting, resolution	ultra realistic, 8k, cinematic lighting
Composition	Angle, framing, depth of field	close-up portrait, rule of thirds, shallow depth of field

Example of a prompt built with this structure:

❌ a woman in a city

✅ Portrait of a young woman with short dark hair, wearing a vintage leather jacket, standing on a rainy Tokyo street at night, surrounded by neon reflections. Cinematic photography style, 35mm film grain, dramatic lighting, shallow depth of field, ultra realistic, 8k.

❌ a woman in a city

✅ Portrait of a young woman with short dark hair, wearing a vintage leather jacket, standing on a rainy Tokyo street at night, surrounded by neon reflections. Cinematic photography style, 35mm film grain, dramatic lighting, shallow depth of field, ultra realistic, 8k

The difference in results between these two prompts is spectacular — even though the basic information is the same.

Order of elements

Always start with the main subject. Elements at the beginning of a prompt carry more weight in most models. Put what matters most first.

Artistic Style

Style is the visual identity of your image

Two images with the same subject but different styles have nothing in common. An AI can generate "a cat" as a watercolor illustration, a hyperrealistic photo, a 3D Pixar render, or a manga drawing — and each result will be radically different. Specifying the style is therefore just as important as describing the subject.

There are four main ways to define an artistic style:

1. By referencing an artist or artistic movement

This method is often the most effective because models have been trained on enormous corpuses of artwork.

Style requested	Effect
in the style of Picasso	Cubism, geometric decomposition of shapes
in the style of Studio Ghibli	Soft Japanese animation, lush nature
in the style of Banksy	Street art, stencil, social commentary
art nouveau style	Vegetal ornaments, curved lines, pastel palette
bauhaus style	Pure geometry, primary colors, minimalism

Picasso

Studio Ghibli

Banksy

Art nouveau

Bauhaus

2. By genre or medium

oil painting, watercolor, pencil sketch, digital art, flat design illustration, 3D render, pixel art, photography

3. By combination

3D render in the style of Pixar, illustration in the style of Studio Ghibli, photo in the style of Wes Anderson

4. By photo or cinematic equipment

For images with a photographic style, you can reference real equipment:

• shot on Kodak Portra 400 — warm colors, film grain
• shot on iPhone 15 — modern natural rendering
• 80s vintage photo — nostalgia, faded colors
• Polaroid style — instant photography, white borders

The style shortcut: give a reference image

The most powerful method is often to give an existing image as a style reference. On Haloon, you can upload an image and ask: "Generate [subject] in the same graphic style as this image." The AI extracts the visual characteristics and reproduces them. No need to be an expert in artistic vocabulary.

Here, we generated the first image with Generate a front facing young woman shot on Kodak Portra 400 and then used a prompt + the base image to generate the variations. For example, for the iPhone version, update this picture as it has been shot by an iPhone 15.

Kodak Portra 400

iPhone 15

Polaroid

Vintage

Quality and Rendering

Going from average to professional results

The quality of a generated image depends on several parameters you can explicitly control in your prompt. Here are the most important levers:

Image type:

Clearly define what you want: photograph, product mockup, logo, icon, sticker, illustration for a book, hero image for a website. This precision avoids model ambiguity.

Technical quality:

These terms "boost" the general quality rendered by most models:

• ultra realistic — high-quality photorealistic rendering
• 8k resolution or high resolution — maximum level of detail
• sharp focus — perfect sharpness
• highly detailed — rich textures and details

Lighting:

Lighting may be the most transformative parameter. The same scene with two different lightings can go from ordinary to cinematic.

Lighting	Effect
golden hour lighting	Warm golden light, sunset atmosphere
cinematic lighting	Dramatic contrast, film-like atmosphere
soft studio lighting	Professional portrait, soft and flattering
dramatic side lighting	Strong shadows, visual tension
neon lighting	Cyberpunk atmosphere, saturated colors
natural daylight	Neutral, natural and realistic light

Format and ratio:

Always specify the ratio based on your use case:

• 16:9 — landscape, wallpaper, banner
• 1:1 — square, social media post
• 9:16 — vertical, stories, mobile
• 4:3 — traditional, presentation

Composition

Frame like a photographer or filmmaker

Composition is how elements are organized within the frame. It determines what the viewer sees first, the overall atmosphere, and the sense of depth. AI models respond very well to technical photography and cinema terms.

Camera angles:

Term	Effect
close-up / extreme close-up	Focus on details, expression, texture
medium shot	Balance between subject and environment
wide shot	Context setting, panorama
top-down / bird's eye view	Aerial view, planning perspective
low angle	Dominance, power, heroism
eye level	Natural, accessible

Lenses and optics:

Lens	Visual effect
50mm lens	Most natural, closest to the human eye
85mm portrait lens	Soft, bokeh, ideal for portraits
macro lens	Extreme detail, miniature world
fisheye lens	Dramatic distortion, ultra wide angle
telephoto 200mm	Depth compression, distant subjects

Framing and depth of field:

• rule of thirds — this rule allows for a dynamic, balanced composition
• centered composition — symmetry, frontal impact
• shallow depth of field — blurred background, sharp subject
• deep depth of field — everything sharp from foreground to background
• bokeh background — background lights transformed into soft glowing circles

Combine multiple terms

85mm portrait lens, shallow depth of field, bokeh background, rule of thirds — this combination alone turns any portrait into a professional photograph.

The Text Problem

The exception that proves the rule

Adding text to an AI-generated image is still one of the most difficult tasks today. Even the best models — GPT-Image, Nano Banana, Flux — can produce distorted letters, misspelled words, or inconsistent fonts.

Tips to maximize your chances:

When you need text in an image, be as precise as possible:

The word "HALOON" in bold white sans-serif font, centered at the top of the image, clean and sharp

Specify:

• The exact text (in quotes)
• The font if important (sans-serif, serif, handwritten)
• The relative size (large, small, headline)
• The color (white, #FF5500, black)
• The position (centered at the top, bottom left corner)

Current model limitations

Even with all these specifications, text may still be imperfect. This is a known limitation of current image generation models.

The professional solution: generate without text, add it afterwards

The most reliable method remains generating your image without text, then adding it in an external tool :

• Canva — the most accessible
• Figma — ideal for designers
• Photoshop / GIMP — full control

This approach guarantees perfect text and lets you adjust it easily without regenerating the entire image.

Iteration for Pro Results

Nobody gets it right the first time

The idea that you'll type a prompt and get exactly what you want on the first try is a myth. Professionals who use generative AI daily — designers, illustrators, content creators — all follow the same process:

1. Base prompt: set the main subject and style, without overloading
2. Evaluate: identify what works and what needs to change
3. Targeted adjustment: change one element at a time
4. Iterate: repeat until you reach the desired result

The targeted adjustment rule

Only change one element at a time when iterating. If you modify the style, composition AND lighting simultaneously, you won't know what produced the improvement — and you risk losing what was working.

How to refine an existing image:

When you edit a prompt to refine an image, the magic formula is:

State what you're keeping AND what you're changing.

Situation	❌ Vague adjustment	✅ Precise adjustment
Change character	make it a girl	Keep the same scene and style, replace the male character with a young woman in her 20s, same clothing and pose
Change weather	change the sky	Keep the composition and style, change the sky from clear blue to dramatic stormy clouds with lightning
Adjust atmosphere	make it more dramatic	Keep the subject and composition, change the lighting to cinematic dramatic side lighting with stronger shadows

Tips to Move Fast

Shortcuts used by advanced users

Tip 1 — Ask an LLM to write your prompt

This is the most powerful technique for beginners. Simply describe your image idea in plain language to ChatGPT or Claude, and ask it to write an optimized prompt for your image generator:

"Here's my image idea: [simple description]. Write me an optimized prompt for Nano Banana, including artistic style, quality, composition and lighting."

Tip 2 — Reverse engineer an existing image

Got an image you love and want to reproduce its style? Upload it to a multimodal LLM (Claude, GPT-4o) and ask:

"Describe the graphic style of this image in technical terms usable as a prompt for an image generator."

You'll get a precise description of the style — color palette, artistic references, lighting treatment — that you can reuse directly.

Tip 3 — Optimize your prompt effortlessly

If you have a prompt that gives an acceptable result but not yet excellent:

"Rewrite this prompt to make it more cinematic and detailed, while keeping the same subject: [your current prompt]"

Tip 4 — The universal template

Keep this template handy and fill in the blanks:

[SUBJECT], [SUBJECT DETAILS], [CONTEXT/LOCATION], [TIME/WEATHER],
[ARTISTIC STYLE], [LIGHTING], [LENS/ANGLE], [QUALITY],
[RATIO if needed]

Filled example:

Portrait of an elderly craftsman, focused expression, hands working with wood, small artisan workshop, warm afternoon light through a window, cinematic photography style, golden hour lighting, 85mm portrait lens, shallow depth of field, ultra realistic, 8k

Use Haloon to access all models

On Haloon, you get access to all the best image generation models from a single interface — GPT-Image, Flux, and more. You can compare results on the same prompt in a few clicks, and find the model that best matches your visual style.

Going Further

Advanced parameters that make a difference

Negative prompts

On some models (Stable Diffusion, some Flux versions), you can specify what you do not want in the image:

Negative prompt: blurry, low quality, distorted, watermark, text, cropped, extra limbs, bad anatomy

Check compatibility

Negative prompts are not supported by all models. GPT-Image, for example, doesn't support them natively. Always check the documentation of the model you're using.

Optimal prompt length

Length	Words	Recommended use
Short	10-30 words	Quick exploration of a concept or style
Medium	30-80 words	Ideal for most projects
Long	80+ words	Complex scenes with precise constraints

Beyond 100 words, you risk internal contradictions or the model "forgetting" elements. Density matters more than length.

Model-specific parameters

Some models accept technical parameters outside of the text prompt:

• Flux: support for hexadecimal color codes (#FF5500) for precise color control
• Midjourney: --ar (ratio), --stylize, --chaos parameters
• Stable Diffusion: guidance scale, steps, seed for reproducibility

Summary

Generating beautiful images with AI is not a matter of luck — it's a skill that can be learned and practiced.

Pillar	The golden rule
Structure	Everything not written is invented by the model
Style	Reference artists, movements, or materials
Quality	Lighting transforms an ordinary image into a pro one
Composition	Use photo/cinema vocabulary
Text	Add it afterwards in Canva or Figma
Iteration	One element at a time, state what stays and what changes
Tips	Ask an LLM to write or optimize your prompts

The best way to improve: practice. Take a simple subject, apply one technique at a time, and observe how each addition transforms the result.

Try it now

Test these techniques on Haloon.ai — access to GPT-Image, Flux and other image generation models from a single interface, without juggling multiple subscriptions.