Write What the Camera Can See
How to prompt a feeling the camera can see. Four stills, four prompts, Midjourney.
The prompts
Copy them, run them, change whatever you want. No signup.
photorealistic cinematic film still, contemporary city drama. Medium close-up, a happy woman on the front steps of an old brick apartment building on a quiet city street. She is in her late twenties, with short curly black hair and brown skin, wearing a faded denim jacket over a white T-shirt. Late afternoon, warm low sun from camera left, the street out of focus behind her. Camera at eye level, shot on a 50mm lens at f/2.8, shallow depth of field, naturalist available light, restrained contrast, Kodak Vision3 250D color, fine film grain. The image fills the entire frame edge to edge, no borders or bars. --ar 9:16 --raw --stylize 100 --v 8.2 --relax --no painting, illustration, letterbox, black bars, borders, matte, split screen, diptych, triptych, collage, grid, text
photorealistic cinematic film still, contemporary city drama. Medium close-up, a woman holding a brand-new door key up to the light on the front steps of an old brick apartment building on a quiet city street. She is in her late twenties, with short curly black hair and brown skin, wearing a faded denim jacket over a white T-shirt. Late afternoon, warm low sun from camera left, the street out of focus behind her. Camera at eye level, shot on a 50mm lens at f/2.8, shallow depth of field, naturalist available light, restrained contrast, Kodak Vision3 250D color, fine film grain. The image fills the entire frame edge to edge, no borders or bars. --ar 9:16 --raw --stylize 100 --v 8.2 --relax --no painting, illustration, letterbox, black bars, borders, matte, split screen, diptych, triptych, collage, grid, text
photorealistic cinematic film still, contemporary domestic drama. Medium shot, a proud father in a small suburban kitchen. He is in his early forties, with a short graying beard, wearing a red flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up. Evening, warm light from a lamp over the stove, the window behind him dark blue. Camera at eye level, shot on a 50mm lens at f/2.8, shallow depth of field, naturalist available light, restrained contrast, Kodak Vision3 250D color, fine film grain. The image fills the entire frame edge to edge, no borders or bars. --ar 9:16 --raw --stylize 100 --v 8.2 --relax --no painting, illustration, letterbox, black bars, borders, matte, split screen, diptych, triptych, collage, grid, text
photorealistic cinematic film still, contemporary domestic drama. Medium shot, a father taping a child's first-place ribbon to the refrigerator door in a small suburban kitchen. He is in his early forties, with a short graying beard, wearing a red flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up. Evening, warm light from a lamp over the stove, the window behind him dark blue. Camera at eye level, shot on a 50mm lens at f/2.8, shallow depth of field, naturalist available light, restrained contrast, Kodak Vision3 250D color, fine film grain. The image fills the entire frame edge to edge, no borders or bars. --ar 9:16 --raw --stylize 100 --v 8.2 --relax --no painting, illustration, letterbox, black bars, borders, matte, split screen, diptych, triptych, collage, grid, text
Why it works
These are two pairs of prompts. In each pair, one prompt names a feeling and the other replaces only that with something the camera can film. Everything else in the pair is the same, word for word.
The prompt says “a happy woman.” a happy woman gives Midjourney a feeling and nothing to point the camera at. You get a smile, and nothing in the frame says why.
Give her something to hold. a woman holding a brand-new door key up to the light puts the reason in her hand. The key tells you she just got a place of her own.
The prompt says “a proud father.” a proud father gets you a man smiling in a kitchen. Nothing says what he is proud of.
Give him something to do. a father taping a child's first-place ribbon to the refrigerator door shows what he is proud of and that it belongs to his child.
Write what the camera can see. A feeling word gives you a face. A key or a ribbon gives you the reason for it.
Before you run it
Ask what you could photograph. If the word is a feeling, ask what the person would be holding or doing when they feel it, and write that instead.
Make the object big enough to read. A key is small, so the woman’s prompt asks for a medium close-up. If the object is lost in the frame, move the camera closer.
Use the same settings. All four were made with --raw --stylize 100 --v 8.2.
To make it yours, keep the object and change the rest. Swap the person and the place for your own, and keep one thing in the frame that shows why they feel it.