Good image prompts read like a brief to a photographer or illustrator. This guide covers how to write one, when to pay for High quality, and how to iterate quickly.
Anatomy of a prompt#
Cover four things, roughly in this order:
| Part | Example |
|---|---|
| Subject | A lighthouse on a basalt cliff |
| Setting & time | at dusk, with a storm clearing over the sea |
| Style & medium | long-exposure photograph |
| Light & color | low warm sun, teal and amber palette |
A lighthouse on a basalt cliff at dusk, a storm clearing over the sea,
long-exposure photograph, low warm sun, teal and amber palettePrompts can be up to 2,000 characters, but more isn't always better: put the important details first, and drop words that don't change the picture.
Flash or High#
| Flash | High | |
|---|---|---|
| Resolution | 1024 px | 2048 px |
| Cost | 20 credits | 60 credits |
| Use for | Exploring ideas, thumbnails, drafts | Final assets, print, fine detail and text |
Explore with Flash, then re-run the winning prompt on High.
Iterating#
Change one thing at a time — style, then composition, then lighting — so you can tell what made the difference. Keep a note of prompts that worked; there's no seed for images, so the same prompt can come out differently each time.
Aspect ratio#
Pick the aspect ratio before you refine the prompt. Changing the ratio later changes the composition too.
- Square — avatars, social posts, product shots.
- Landscape (16:9) — headers, slides, wallpapers.
- Portrait (9:16) — phone wallpapers, stories, posters.
Over the API#
Generate with Create an image. The response includes a signed URL that expires after an hour — download the image if you need to keep it, or call List images later for a fresh URL.