Prompting guide: write better prompts

A good prompt is a list of concrete, ordered details, not a vague sentence. This page covers the habits that make prompts reliable in the Generate tab of tendre.red.

1. Be concrete

Name the subject clearly, then add style, lighting and framing, for example portrait of a woman, soft window light, 85mm photo, shallow depth of field, in the Prompt (in English) field. The model weighs earlier words more heavily, so put the subject and its most important trait first.

2. Use the Shot framing dropdown

Above the prompt box, the Shot framing dropdown (Close-up, Medium shot, Wide shot and more) inserts the chosen term right at your cursor, so you can build a prompt without memorizing camera vocabulary.

3. Let the AI assistant rewrite it

Click the small sparkling AI button in the corner of the prompt box (tooltip "Optimize prompt (AI)") to have the built-in assistant turn a rough idea into a fuller prompt. If you prefer the original, the undo arrow next to it restores exactly what you typed.

4. Use the negative prompt

The Negative prompt field tells the model what to avoid, for example blurry, extra fingers, watermark, low quality. It does not compete with your main prompt, so use it freely.

5. Emphasize a detail

If a detail keeps getting ignored, wrap it in parentheses with a weight, like (red hair:1.3), instead of repeating the word or padding the prompt with synonyms.

6. Iterate in small steps

Change one detail at a time (light, pose, outfit) and press Generate again rather than rewriting everything from scratch.

Once your prompt is close, lock the seed to refine it, or apply a style preset on top for a consistent look.