Lighting is the key to creating stunning, photorealistic artwork that stands out. Using the right Midjourney lighting prompts, you can easily elevate your AI art.
For example, you might want to create the golden glow of a sunset, the dramatic shadows of a film noir scene, or the soft, dreamy atmosphere of a misty morning; all this is possible with the lighting prompts styles we will discuss in this guide.
In this guide, we’ll share the best Midjourney lighting prompts and show you how to use them with examples.
Remember, we’ll use the latest V6 Midjourney version for this guide. If you have not yet updated your Midjourney, you can easily do so by going to Midjourney Settings and changing your Current Suffix to –v6.
Midjourney lighting prompts – Useful to generate your Ai art
Here are the lighting style prompts that we are going to talk about in this post:
- Soft Lighting
- Hard Lighting
- Back Lighting
- Golden Hour
- Midday Sun
- Overcast Lighting
- Artificial Lighting
- Seasonal Lighting
- Shadowed
- Sunflare
- Rim Lighting
- Cross Lighting
- High Key Lighting
- Low Key Lighting
- Broad Lighting
- Short Lighting
- Flash-Lamp & Flashtube
- Incandescent Lamp
- Crackle Tube
- Halogen Lamp
- Strobe Light
- Flickering Lighting
- Motivated Lighting
Soft Lighting
Soft, diffuse lighting can create a more natural, atmospheric look and feel to the generated images. It helps to minimize harsh shadows and highlights, resulting in a more even and pleasing luminance.
It’s a great lighting style if you want your AI images to have more pleasing lighting that’s not harsh on the eyes (for example, hard shadows).
Hard Lighting
Hard lighting, characterized by stark contrasts between bright highlights and deep shadows, can add drama, intensity, and a sense of three-dimensionality to the generated images. It’s a great lighting style to create more striking, cinematic, or mystical aesthetic images.
Back Lighting
By placing the light source behind the subject, backlighting can create a beautiful rim of illumination around the edges, separating the subject from the background and adding depth and dimensionality to the image.
It’s a great lighting style to achieve a dramatic, ethereal, or ethereal look in your Midjourney AI artwork.
Golden Hour
The golden hues and long shadows of golden hour lighting can create a dreamy, ethereal quality. This warm, soft lighting occurs during the first and last hours of the day. It’s a great lighting style to capture a serene, atmospheric, and aesthetically pleasing mood.
Golden Hour is one of the best Midjourney lighting prompts for creating images with depth.
Midday Sun
Midday Sun is a harsh, direct light from the high sun creates strong shadows and highlights. It works well for subjects that need a bold, high-contrast look, like buildings or action scenes. Midday sunlighting is good for clarity and vibrancy in AI portraits or images.
Overcast Lighting
The light becomes soft and even when the sky is covered in clouds, which we call Overcast lighting. This can create a calm, moody, and atmospheric look in the images. Overcast lighting reduces harsh shadows and highlights, giving a more subtle and diffused illumination. It’s a great lighting style to make your AI image feel cozy, tranquil, or mysterious.
Artificial Lighting
Lighting that is created by human-made sources, like lamps or spotlights, can add a lot of control and creativity to the images. Artificial lighting allows you to create specific moods, highlight certain elements, and even defy natural lighting conditions.
Seasonal Lighting
Lighting changes with the seasons, and so can the mood of your images. Whether it’s the soft, diffused light of winter or the bright, harsh light of summer, incorporating seasonal lighting into your AI artwork can evoke specific times of the year and deepen the atmosphere.
Shadowed
If you want to add mystery and depth, shadowed lighting is the way to go. It creates deep shadows with just a hint of light peeking through, adding drama and a sense of intrigue to your images.
Shadowed lighting can create a sense of mystery, drama, and depth in the artwork. Shadowed lighting makes some areas of deep shadow in the image, often with just a small amount of light peeking through.
Sunflare
Sunflare adds a touch of magic to your images, creating a bright, glowing effect that feels warm and inviting. It’s perfect for adding a special touch to your photos, making them feel vibrant and full of life.
It’s a cool lighting style to use if you want your pictures to look extra special.
Rim Lighting
Rim lighting outlines your subject with a halo of light, highlighting their edges and adding depth. It’s a fantastic way to make your subject stand out, giving your images a warm or cool glow that draws the viewer’s eye.
Cross Lighting
Cross lighting, where light shines from behind the subject, emphasizes the edges and adds depth, making your subject pop. It’s perfect for creating a striking and dramatic look in your images.
High Key Lighting
High Key Lighting is when a scene is brightly and evenly lit, minimizing shadows. High key lighting is all about brightness. It floods the scene with light, minimizing shadows and creating a cheerful, uplifting atmosphere. It’s ideal for capturing clean, bright, and happy images.
Prompt: a photo portrait of a woman, high key lighting, dslr –aspect 1:1
Low Key Lighting
Low key lighting is the opposite—mostly dark with selective bright spots. It adds mystery and drama by highlighting contrasts between light and shadow, perfect for creating intense, moody images.
Broad Lighting
Broad lighting spreads light evenly across the scene, creating a natural, calm, and balanced look. It’s great for making your images look soft and inviting, perfect for portraits or serene landscapes. Broad lighting can make Midjourney AI images look natural, calm, and balanced.
Short Lighting
Short lighting places the main light source on the side of the subject, creating dramatic shadows on one side. It’s the go-to for a moody, cinematic feel, making your subject look sculpted and intense.
Flash-Lamp & Flashtube
Flash-lamp and flashtube lighting are all about capturing action. Flash-lamps give you a sudden burst of light, perfect for freezing a moment in time. Flashtubes, often used in cameras, produce quick, bright flashes ideal for studio lighting.
a photo portrait of a boy, flashtube lighting, dslr –aspect 1:1 –stylize 8 –v 6.0
Incandescent Lamp Lighting
Incandescent lamps work by heating a metal filament inside the lamp until it glows and emits light.
The light from incandescent lamps has a warm, yellowish color tone. This can create a cozy, inviting feel in Midjourney AI images. The lighting also tends to be a bit softer and more diffused compared to some other lighting sources.
Crackle Tube
Crackle tube lighting creates a dynamic, flickering effect that looks like crackling electricity or flames. It’s perfect for adding energy and chaos to your images, making them visually exciting and intense.
When lit up, the crackle tube gives off an irregular, flickering light that can look like crackling electricity or flames. This creates a very dynamic and eye-catching lighting effect. Use this lighting only if you want a sense of energy, and chaos in your images.
Halogen Lamp
Halogen lamps produce a bright, crisp white light, often described as “cool” or “daylight” in tone. This type of lighting creates strong contrasts and is great for images that need a sharp, clear look.
Strobe Light
Strobe lights produce quick, bright flashes, creating a stroboscopic effect that can make your images look like they’re frozen in time or in motion. It’s a fun way to capture fast-paced action or give your images a surreal, dynamic feel.
Prompt: a photo portrait of a boy, portrait lit using strobe lighting, –aspect 1:1 –stylize 7 –v 6.0
Flickering Lighting
Flickering lighting adds an unsteady, wavering brightness to your images, creating a moody or even eerie atmosphere. It’s perfect for adding a touch of the supernatural or unsettling to your work.
Motivated Lighting
Motivated lighting mimics the natural light sources in a scene, like lamps or windows, making your images look more realistic and believable. It’s all about making the light feel like it belongs in the scene, adding to the overall atmosphere.
Moon Light
Moonlight adds a soft, cool glow to your images, perfect for creating a peaceful, romantic, or slightly eerie feel. The gentle illumination and long shadows can transform your scene into something dreamlike and mysterious.
Diffused Lighting
Diffused lighting spreads light evenly across the scene, softening shadows and reducing harsh highlights. This creates a smooth, flattering light that’s often used in fashion photography and portraits. It’s ideal if you want your images to have a gentle, even illumination that brings out the best in your subjects.
Urban night
Urban night lights bring the vibrant energy of cityscapes into your images. Think of street lamps casting a warm glow, neon signs adding a splash of color, and headlights cutting through the darkness. This lighting style is perfect for creating an immersive, contemporary feel that captures the essence of a bustling city at night.
This can include things like:
- Street lamps – These are the tall, bright lights that line the roads and sidewalks. They help light up the streets and make it safer to walk around at night.
- Neon signs – Many businesses in urban areas have neon signs that create a colorful, eye-catching glow at night. This adds a vibrant, lively feel to the city.
- Building lights – The windows and exterior of buildings are often lit up at night, creating a glowing effect across the cityscape.
- Vehicle headlights – The headlights of cars, buses, and other vehicles moving through the city add their own pockets of illumination.
Bokeh Light Effects
Bokeh lighting is like adding a sprinkle of magic to your images. This effect creates soft, blurry circles of light in the background, giving your images a dreamy, artistic quality. Bokeh is perfect for portraits where you want the focus to be on the subject, with a beautiful, atmospheric background that enhances the overall mood.
Bokeh is great if you want your Midjourney AI images to have a more artistic, ethereal feel. The soft, glowing highlights can make a scene more magical or romantic.
And That’s a Wrap!
Mastering different techniques in Midjourney Lighting prompts is like having a toolbox filled with options to bring your creative vision to life. Whether you’re going for a soft, romantic feel or a bold, dramatic impact, the right lighting can make all the difference.
Don’t be afraid to experiment with different lighting styles and combinations—you might just stumble upon the perfect look for your next AI masterpiece.
If you’re eager to keep exploring and learning, be sure to check out more of our articles below. There’s always something new to discover when it comes to creating stunning AI-generated images!
Happy creating!
