The Midjourney Prompt Handbook Series, Book 0
The Midjourney Prompt Handbook
AI Art Guide for Beginners with 50 Copy-and-Paste Prompts, Parameters, Lighting Techniques and Painter Styles for Stunning Images
Your first Midjourney image is a draft, not a result: this is the five-layer method that turns a vague idea into a picture you actually meant to make.
Why this book matters
Great images improve almost everything you make. A website with a strong first image feels trustworthy. A menu with a warm cover invites people in. A slide, a catalogue or a pitch becomes easier to love when the picture is right.
Midjourney makes such pictures possible for almost anyone, but it does not read your mind. Most people stop at the first grid that looks "good enough". This book shows you why that first image is only a draft, and how to turn it into a deliberate result.
- Build every prompt from five layers: subject, setting, mood and light, style and medium, details and parameters
- Use ten parameters (the "dials") with confidence
- Name the light, choose the material and borrow the way of seeing of ten historic painters
- Finish three complete images in two passes and fix problems one change at a time
It is a hands-on course with 50 copy-and-paste prompts, and every prompt comes with a note on why it works. You learn the method once, and it keeps working when the tool changes.
From the practice
This book came out of an advisory practice.
See how that worksWhere to buy
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About this book
Your first AI image is a draft. This handbook shows you how to turn it into a picture you actually meant to make.
You type a prompt, four pictures appear, and none of them quite match what you pictured. The problem is rarely the tool. It is usually the way the idea is described. The Midjourney Prompt Handbook gives you a clear method, so you can stop guessing and start deciding.
Whether you run a café, a shop or a small studio, or you create visuals for a website, a menu, a slide deck or a poster, great images make almost everything you publish easier to trust and easier to love. This hands-on course teaches you to describe decisions, not decorations.
Inside, you will learn how to:
- Build every prompt from the five-layer method: subject, setting, mood and light, style and medium, details and parameters
- Use ten parameters, the "dials", such as aspect ratio, stylize, chaos, seed and raw, and know which one fits which goal
- Name the light by direction, quality and colour
- Choose the material (photograph, oil painting, watercolour, 3D render, flat vector) before the mood
- Borrow the way of seeing of ten historic painters, from Rembrandt to Hokusai, without copying a single picture
- Finish three complete images in two passes and fix problems by changing one thing at a time
You get 50 copy-and-paste prompts, each with a short "Why it works" note, plus a quick reference and a try-it-yourself exercise at the end of every chapter. The appendix adds a parameter cheat sheet, a lighting and style vocabulary and a glossary. Along the way you meet a small group of fictional makers whose problems you will probably recognise as your own.
The book was tested on Midjourney V8.2 in October 2026. It teaches a method, so you can adapt when buttons move and versions change.
This is Book 0 of The Midjourney Prompt Handbook Series, the foundation for every Midjourney Prompt Workshop.
Ready to draft first and decide later? Get your copy today.
Independent guide. Not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by Midjourney, Inc. Midjourney is a trademark of its respective owner.
Contents
# Table of Contents - The Midjourney Prompt Handbook - Foreword - Acknowledgements - Copyright, Disclaimer and Version Note - A Short Note on AI Images, Copyright and Commercial Use - Welcome from Leila Bakari - About the Author - How to Use This Book - The prompt block - The five-layer method in one paragraph - How to work through the book - Optional depth - The Series at a Glance - 1. The First Image Is a Draft - 1.1 The Menu Cover Nobody Liked - 1.2 What Was at Stake - 1.3 What Happens When You Press Enter - 1.4 Draft versus Decision - 1.5 Try It Yourself, and a Late Arrival - 2. Describe Decisions, Not Decorations - 2.1 Ten Adjectives and a Worse Picture - 2.2 What Was at Stake - 2.3 The Five Layers - 2.4 Why Specific Beats Vague - 2.5 Building a Prompt, Layer by Layer - 2.6 Try It Yourself - 3. Words and Dials - 3.1 The Lighthouse That Lost Its Top - 3.2 What Was at Stake - 3.3 Words Say What, Dials Say How - 3.4 Words and Dials - 3.5 Try It Yourself - 4. Name the Light - 4.1 The Flat Bowl - 4.2 What Was at Stake - 4.3 Light, the Quiet Half of the Prompt - 4.4 Name the Light - 4.5 Try It Yourself - 5. Pick the Material Before the Mood - 5.1 Epic, and a Muddle - 5.2 What Was at Stake - 5.3 The Material Comes First - 5.4 Material Before Mood - 5.5 Try It Yourself - 6. A Way of Seeing, Not a Picture - 6.1 The Wall That Needed Art - 6.2 What Was at Stake - 6.3 Ten Painters, Ten Ways of Seeing - 6.4 Method, Not Mimicry - 6.5 Try It Yourself - 7. Two Passes Beat One Perfect Prompt - 7.1 Nearly Right - 7.2 What Was at Stake - 7.3 The Method: Two Passes - 7.4 Draft First, Decide Later - 7.5 Try It Yourself - 8. Change One Thing at a Time - 8.1 Three Changes at Once - 8.2 What Was at Stake - 8.3 Typical Problems and Their Fixes - 8.4 One Change, One Result - 8.5 Try It Yourself - 8.6 What to Read Next - 8.7 See the Images Online - Outro - Appendix - A. Prompt Index - B. Parameter Cheat Sheet - C. Lighting and Style Vocabulary - D. Glossary - E. Keep ExploringScan to open on a phone
