Midjourney Prompts: How to use References Styles 1 to 10
How to use Midjourney’s Style Reference Seed
How to use Midjourney’s Style Reference Seed
Everything changes in the landscape of image generation with artificial intelligence. Midjourney’s style reference feature is a transformative tool for creators seeking to fine-tune the aesthetic appeal of their visual outputs.
How to use Reference Styles
Midjourney has updated its --sref parameter. Originally released to enable users to influence the style of generated art by using the URL of an image as a style reference.
Then, Midjourney released the --sref random . It selects a random style from Midjourney’s extensive repertoire. In your completed job, the “random” value will be replaced with a style reference seed number: for example, if you prompt --sref random , it becomes --sref 762351716 in the result. Then, if you like the style, you can use that style reference seed in future prompts to generate images in the same style.
These Reference Styles are very powerful.
I have been using, testing and writing a lot about using styles in your prompts. I experimented with tokens like cyberpunk , abstract , surreal and futuristic . However, for Midjourney and other generative tools, they are too wide. You’ll need to define a lot of details to your prompt to keep your images consistent.
You could write: [your prompt] Strong use of pink tones, a tendency to anime art, highly detailed, maximalist, exaggerated, a mixture of art and photo, street style graffiti, trendy, colorful characters, symbols, patterns, and shapes
Now, you just write: [your prompt] --sref 1
These Reference Styles will deliver similar aesthetics most of the time!
We just need to find one we like.
This is why we have guides! Today, I will be sharing with you the results from --sref 1 to --sref 10.
Let’s dive in!
Note: I used generic prompts to let each style fill in the unknown information. This way, we will learn more about it.
sref 1: Pinky Street Anime
Characteristics: Strong use of pink tones, a tendency to anime art, highly detailed, maximalist, exaggerated, a mixture of art and photo, street style graffiti, trendy, colorful characters, symbols, patterns, and shapes.
Cute animals by default. Add more “Cute” tokens would work well.
This style has a tendency to Pink AND Girls.
Mixing art effects with photography looks amazing.
sref 2: Sepia Retro Futurism
Characteristics: Strong use of black, a tendency to vintage illustration, Art Noir, retro-futurism, sepia textures, 20th-century illustration, and a mixture of art and photo.
This style would be great for Noir art: Mystery, Horror, Suspense art.
Very dramatic portraits.
sref 3: Blue 3D Glass
Characteristics: 3D animated film, tendency to blue tones, Futuristic transparent glass, digital art with a high level of detail, 3D, CGI, digital art, 2049 movie style, surrealistic atmosphere, light blue tones, blue sky, ocean backgrounds.
Masked animals by default! This style surely loves glass masks.
Very nice reflective surfaces.
Even nature is reflective in this style.
Portraits look 3D-ish. For more natural faces, try — style raw
Speed effects and reflective surfaces in machines work well in this style.
sref 4: Postapocalyptic Yellow
Characteristics: Postapocalyptic, Vintage objects, modern attire, Dark sky, smoke, ruins, tendency to vibrant orange and yellow colors for contrast against grey background, hyperrealistic style, cinematic lighting, somber atmosphere, tendency to photography.
This is a style for a dystopic future. Add zombies or your favorite flavor.
sref 5: Grey Cartoon Sketch
Characteristics: Grey color palette, cartoon sketch, concept art, ink brush strokes, low detail, hand-drawn illustration, concept sheet, a tendency to illustration.
Very narrow. Use it to generate a sketchy and/or hand-drawn style.
This style tends to illustration. Use — style raw if you want photos.tends
Again, this is a style that doesn’t want to generate photos…
…so it’s natural it can generate good Niji stuff.
sref 6: Pastel Retro Future
Characteristics: Minimalist retrofuturistic, a tendency to blue and pink tones, space-age fashion, retro aesthetic, muted pastel colors, vintage illustration.
Robotic animals by default. Very dynamic too.
Strong DeLorean style for its machines.
A technological tree appears when prompting for Nature.
sref 7: Purple Video Game Splash
Characteristics: Hearthstone style, League of Legends splash art, purple and gold accents, magical fantasy setting, splash art, vibrant colors, digital illustration.
This style is good for magical creatures.
Purple vibes all over.
sref 8: Abstract Haute Couture
Characteristics: High fashion photography, avant-garde model, haute couture, tendency to orange and brown tones, flying fabrics and broken pieces of structure, surreal and dramatic landscapes, blending of high-fashion photography with abstract art, dystopian wastelands.
Abstract fashion animals.
Awesome speed effects!
sref 9: Graffiti Plastic Candy
Characteristics: Vibrant colors, bright tones, cute playful characters in the style of Vinyl toys, candy, cartoon characters, whimsical, unreal engine rendering style, bright pink plastic, maximalist, street art.
Wow! Colored plastic, very dynamic.
Animals are made of plastic with this style, like vinyl toys.
sref 10: Legoland
Characteristics: Lego building blocks, shallow depth of fields, dreamy, pastel artworks, soft lighting, vibrant color palettes.
Everything is made of Lego.
Interesting use of photography. Still turning persons into toys.
What ideas do you have for these styles? How would you use them?
Keep in mind Midjourney already knows how to use these styles, and as we have seen, it would make it easier for you to keep an aesthetic in multiple images. Hope this helps!
Thanks for reading!
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