Choose Who Is Sharp
One prompt, two frames, two different stories. Focus is a choice the prompt has to make. Midjourney.
The prompts
Copy them, run them, change whatever you want. No signup.
photorealistic cinematic film still, a quiet family drama in a dim 1970s farmhouse kitchen, the camera set low at a child's eye height. A boy of about eight with tousled brown hair and a faded striped t-shirt stands large in the left foreground, seen from behind at the shoulder, watching. At the far end of the room an open screen door; his father stands small in the far doorway, a man in his forties in a canvas work jacket carrying a worn brown suitcase, stepping out into bright summer daylight. Daylight pours through the door and falls in a long bright wedge across the worn pine floorboards toward the boy; the rest of the kitchen, the wooden cabinets, an old enamel stove and a rounded refrigerator, sinks into deep cool shadow. Warm late-afternoon sun in the doorway against cool blue-green shadow inside, high contrast, dust hanging in the shaft of light. The bright doorway is the brightest thing in the frame; the father is a dark shape against it. Shot on a 32mm lens at f/4, deep focus holding both the boy and his father sharp, Kodak Vision3 500T color, deep but detailed shadows, fine film grain, cinematography in the style of Robbie Ryan. The image fills the entire frame edge to edge, no borders or bars. --ar 16:9 --raw --stylize 150 --v 8.2 --relax --no painting, illustration, sketch, drawing, letterbox, black bars, borders, matte, split screen, diptych, collage, grid, text
photorealistic cinematic film still, a quiet family drama in a dim 1970s farmhouse kitchen, the camera set low at a child's eye height. A boy of about eight with tousled brown hair and a faded striped t-shirt stands large in the left foreground, seen from behind at the shoulder, watching. At the far end of the room an open screen door; his father stands small in the far doorway, a man in his forties in a canvas work jacket carrying a worn brown suitcase, stepping out into bright summer daylight. Daylight pours through the door and falls in a long bright wedge across the worn pine floorboards toward the boy; the rest of the kitchen, the wooden cabinets, an old enamel stove and a rounded refrigerator, sinks into deep cool shadow. Warm late-afternoon sun in the doorway against cool blue-green shadow inside, high contrast, dust hanging in the shaft of light. The bright doorway is the brightest thing in the frame; the father is a dark shape against it. Shot on a 32mm lens at f/4, deep focus holding both the boy and his father sharp, Kodak Vision3 500T color, deep but detailed shadows, fine film grain, cinematography in the style of Robbie Ryan. The image fills the entire frame edge to edge, no borders or bars. --ar 16:9 --raw --stylize 150 --v 8.2 --relax --no painting, illustration, sketch, drawing, letterbox, black bars, borders, matte, split screen, diptych, collage, grid, text
Why it works
These two frames came from the same prompt in the same run. The only difference is who is sharp, and it changes the story.
Make the father sharp. We see what the boy sees. His father is the one thing he is looking at.
Make the boy sharp. Now his father is a blur. It feels like he is already gone.
A drawing can’t show focus. Our storyboard showed where everyone stands. It could not show who is sharp, so the prompt has to say it.
Before you run it
Name one person. This prompt says deep focus holding both the boy and his father sharp. Midjourney did not follow it. In each frame it picked one person and blurred the other.
To pick the father, try replacing that phrase with shallow focus on the father in the doorway, the boy soft in the foreground. To pick the boy, try shallow focus on the boy, his father a soft blur in the doorway. We have not run these two lines yet, so check all four renders.
Decide before you prompt. Ask which person the scene is about. Make that person sharp.