How to Create Illustrations using AI Art Generators: Illustration Prompts

The user base for AI art generators has been increasing day by day. People are very curious to play with these text-to-image models.

The AI art generators, such as DALL.E 2, Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, etc. are capable of generating artwork, photography-styled images, architectural designs, and illustrations.

In this article, you will learn how to give prompts to get different types of illustrations. 

What is the Best AI Art Generator to Create Illustrations?

First of all, you might have a question “will AI art generators create illustrations?”. Yes, they are. DALL.E 2, Midjourney, and Stable Diffusion have the capability to create illustrations since they are already trained with millions of labeled images.

Among many AI art generators out there, Stable Diffusion (SD) is rapidly growing and one of the best AI art generators. It’s because Stable Diffusion is a real open source project and the innovations like Deforum, SD Videos, etc. keep building upon it!

Almost every couple of days AI research enthusiasts keep on building different models upon Stable Diffusion. Hence, you can create high-quality animations and illustrations on SD with great detailing.

However, DALL.E 2 and Midjourney also release new versions gradually.

Prompts to Create Illustration Arts

A good prompt must contain a noun, adjective, style, quality, artist name, computer graphics, art medium, and art platform names. At least, the prompt must contain a noun, adjective, style, and quality modifiers.

An example of a good prompt is “Kobe Bryant shooting free throws, digital art, modern art, trending on artstation, 4K”. This prompt contains a noun, a style, the art medium, and quality modifiers.

In the case of illustration arts, along with the above-mentioned modifiers, you must include keywords mentioned in the below classification as well. For example, keywords, such as charcoal illustration, ballpoint pen art, etc.

We can classify illustrations into a few groups based on their medium and purpose of it. The classification of illustration is as follows:

Illustration X Print Medium

  • Charcoal illustration
Create Illustrations using AI Art Generators: Illustration Prompts
charcoal drawing of what an AI thinks an AI looks like; Source
  • Ballpoint pen illustration
Illustration Prompts
intricate eyes fractal pattern spiral, blue ballpoint pen; source
  • Woodcut illustration
Create Illustrations using AI Art Generators: Illustration Prompts
the underwater world created from corals made out of wood engraving; source
  • Watercolor illustration
Create Illustrations using AI Art Generators: Illustration Prompts
A watercolor painting of a dog and a cat kissing; source
  • Pencil Illustration
Create Illustrations using AI Art Generators: Illustration Prompts
anole eating a fidget spinner, pencil drawing; source
  • Acrylic Illustration
AI Illustration Prompts
An abstract acrylic infinity pour painting, shot on canon camera, shot on 16mm film, hyper-realistic, photo, on canvas; source
  • Etching
AI Illustration Prompts
Depressive mood, dark fairytale, black wizard-boy with a giant cat sitting on top of his head, Etching, detailed beautiful Illustration by Alexandra Waliszewska | 997; source
  • Airbrush
AI Illustration Prompts
Gloomy airbrush cartoon of a dog with a long beard; source
  • Oil painting
AI Illustration Prompts
An Impressionist oil painting of loneliness; Source
  • Ukiyo-e
AI Illustration Prompts
An owl drinking tea with the queen smiling, ukiyo-e; Source

Illustration X Digital Medium

  • ACII art
AI Illustration Prompts
a picture of a terminal where the user has drawn Mona Lisa using the ascii art; Source
  • Vector art
AI Illustration Prompts
vaporwave high contrast vector art portrait; source
  • Low poly
AI Illustration Prompts
low poly meme; source
  • Layered paper
AI Illustration Prompts
Yoda from star wars made out of paper; Source
  • Sticker
AI Illustration Prompts
hedgehog aviator thumbs up sticker illustration; Source
  • Digital painting
AI Illustration Prompts
Rush hour in post apocalyptic Tokyo, digital painting, 4k render; Source
  • Storybook
AI Illustration Prompts
A colorful children’s book illustration of a young elephant in pyjamas going to bed by candle light, with a smiling moon seen through its window; source
  • Screen printing
AI Illustration Prompts
vaporwave bonsai tree, silkscreen print; source

Illustration X Education

  • Blueprint
AI Illustration Prompts
the blueprint of a vintage kodak camera; Source
  • Patent drawing
AI Illustration Prompts
Air Jordan 1 and Subway collaboration, patent art; Source
  • Cutaway
AI Illustration Prompts
A detailed color cutaway illustration of a futuristic  spaceship from the year 2038 in the style of the science fiction magazine art from the 1930s, with different parts of the spaceship labeled and numbered and a numbered list of what; Source
  • IKEA manual
AI Illustration Prompts
A colored diagram showing how to build an ikea cat from a kit; Source
  • Instruction manual
AI Illustration Prompts
photo of multilingual instructions for installing a devariolator in a 1956 mandistar; Source
  • Botanical illustration
AI Illustration Prompts
hand-made collage from an old botanic encyclopedia; Source
  • Map
AI Illustration Prompts
World map of the Mandelbrot set; Source
  • Scientific diagram
AI Illustration Prompts
a technical drawing showing the cross-section of a lizard monster; Source
  • Voronoi diagram
AI Illustration Prompts
Voronoi diagram of the Mandelbrot set; Source

Illustration X 3D

  • Isometric 3D
ai Illustration Prompts
isometric kitchen, blender render; Source
  • 3D render
AI Illustration Prompts
An ice cream melting and dripping in summer. In the background, we can see the beach. 3D render, trending, high quality; Source
  • Claymation, Aardman animation
AI Illustration Prompts
a photo of a claymation robot mech, 8k, award-winning; Source
  • Felt pieces
AI Illustration Prompts
felted figure of the Beatles; source
  • Fabric pattern
AI Illustration Prompts
complex fabric pattern with the theme of tiki Darth Vader; source
  • Black velvet, Edgar Leeteg
AI Illustration Prompts
An old man in mountains, a colorful “black velvet art” painting; source
  • Scratch-art, foil art, gold on black

AI Illustration PromptsA man and woman sitting together, scratch art 

  • Lego Art
AI Illustration Prompts
An Avocado Armchair made out of legos; source
  • Tatoo
AI tatoo Prompts
bicep tattoo of a volcano erupting, color, polaroid photograph; source

Illustration X Cartoon

  • Anime
AI Illustration Prompts
A high detailed high contrast illustration of an anime girl with white hair and red eyes wearing a shrine maiden outfit, digital art; source
  • Pixar
AI Illustration Prompts
A photorealistic picture of Carl Fredericksen and Ellie Fredericksen from the Pixar movie “Up”, high quality, 4k; source
  • Comic book art
AI Illustration Prompts
Comic book panel of a superhero flying above a dense cityscape, colored ink on paper; source
  • Character reference sheet
AI Illustration Prompts
character design sheet, anime, game, teen girl, very short hair, boyish, sporty, high quality, ultra detailed, full body; source
  • Studio Ghibli
AI Illustration Prompts
3D Render of a quaint Japanese townhouse next to a calm ocean with the sunset in the background in the style of Studio ghibli raytraced, 8K, trending on artstation; source
  • Vintage Disney
AI Illustration Prompts
1992 TV still of a Disney Afternoon cartoon starring humanoid armadillos; source
  • Pixel art
AI Illustration Prompts
Nikola tesla working on a Gadget, pixel art; source
  • Scooby Doo, Hanna Barbera, etc.
AI Illustration Prompts
Scooby Doo locked in jail for his crimes against humanity, digital art; source

Easy way

If you are intimidated by the above-mentioned modifiers, you can simply use “In the style of your favorite cartoon or illustrator artist

AI Illustration Prompts
A pen in the style of Homer Simpson; source

Illustrator Artist’s Names to use:

  • Beatrix Potter
  • Quentin Blake
  • Hayao Miyazak
  • Bill Watterson
  • Maurice Sendak
  • Ralph Steadman
  • Norman Rockwell
  • Dr. Seuss
  • Tove Jansson
  • Wanda Gág
  • James Gurney
AI Illustration Prompts
A man and woman sitting together on the beach, in the style of James Gurney

Conclusion

Creating prompts to get illustration art requires a great skill of prompt engineering and patience. With this article and the sheer amount of consistency, anyone can get illustration art from DALL.E, Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, etc.

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