How I nailed the art of a Midjourney avatar making that might slightly look like me.
My first week on the job hunt after significant cutbacks. Let's have a decent avatar, I said to myself; let's do it in style. No more black-and-white artsy portraits; let's flex the muscles of the Midjourney profile image. I'm not innocent in my tries; I aspire high, aim at a style that is not conventional, and I'd like to whisper and see what comes out.
The road was bumpy, and it took a while to realize how to nudge it my way. After hours and hours of waiting for the images to appear - which is magic, there and then, I have something to share. The basics of uploading an image and creating a replica are covered in How to Upload and Edit Your Image with Midjourney using AI?; it yields generic and sometimes scary images at best. Very quickly, you ask yourself, how can I make it resemble me?
blob:https://discord.com/imagelink cute, 3d girl, simple realistic
blob:https://discord.com/imagelink sophisticated, 3d, manga
In Turn Yourself into a 3D Character with Midjourney V5! you get the following prompt components such as:
After your photo link, type "a poster in the style of... "
At the end of the prompt, type --ar 3:2 for the aspect ratio
At the end of the prompt, type --iw 0.5 - where iw is image weight between 0 to 2, this determines how close the Midjourney Avatar will resemble your original photo.
So I tried. Some were scary or too young, some were too old, some too cute, and none were close enough to represent me:
blob:https://discord.com/imagelink 3d cartoon in the style of pixar of an attractive woman 30 years old --v 5 --iw 0.6
blob:https://discord.com/imagelink 3d cartoon in the style of pixar of an attractive woman 30 years old, blond, smiling, good vibes--v 5 --iw 0.6
blob:https://discord.com/imagelink 3d cartoon in a circle, in the style of pixar of an fairly attractive woman 30 years old, dark blond, wavy hair, till the shoulders, smiling, wearing glasses, blue eyes, wearing a shirt, office, good vibes--v 5 --iw 0.65
Still too cute, tried adding five years of experience and 'smart':
blob:https://discord.com/imagelink
3d cartoon in a circle, in the style of pixar of an attractive woman 35 years old, blond, wavy hair, till the shoulders, smiling, wearing glasses, blue eyes, wearing a shirt, good vibes, smart --v 5 --iw 0.65
And how would a smart Venus look line?
blob:https://discord.com/imagelink 3d cartoon in a circle, in the style of pixar of an attractive woman 35 years old, blond, wavy hair, till the shoulders, smiling, wearing glasses, blue eyes, wearing a shirt, good vibes, smart --v 5 --iw 0.65
I tried to look beyond Pixar to Netflix titles such as 'Hilda.'
blob:https://discord.com/imagelink
3d cartoon in a circle, in the style of netflix hilda of an attractive woman 35 years old, blond, wavy hair, till the shoulders, smiling, wearing glasses, blue eyes, wearing a shirt, good vibes, smart --v 5 --iw 2
I was beginning to think about variations and styles and needed a method to avoid starting all over again on each phase. The Create Cartoons with Midjourney: Turn Your Photos into Fun Cartoons! tutorial has the answers:
Type/prefer remix and press enter, allowing you to modify the prompt whenever you want to generate variations.
I also found lists of styles and pre-made prompts to boost the process:
Things were starting to look closer to home.
blob:https://discord.com/imagelink simple realistic cartoon in a circle of an attractive woman, 35 years old, dark blond, soft curly hair, laughing, glasses, blue eyes, wearing a buttoned shirt, good vibes, very happy, whimsical, in the style of dark matter art, coastal landscapes, subtle, earthy tones, webcam, simplified and stylized portraits, light amber and amber, zeiss milvus 25mm f/1.4 ze. --v 5 --iw 1.7
or worse
blob:https://discord.com/imagelink as cartoon style
To sum it up
To move from a generic style to a specified persona:
Dig deep into styles and conventions and provide as many details as possible.
If you want your protagonist to wear glasses or any other gadget, append it to the beginning.
Use the /Discover and upload an image to see what Midjourney has to say about prompts, and use it to tweak your own. (a tip I got from the great boost meetup)
Investigate biases. How does smart look, or slightly older, or suspicious... See the end results
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