Acing AI Prompts for Storyboards When You Don’t Have a Script
As each day passes, AI can accomplish more complex tasks while pushing the boundaries of what is already possible. That said, little of this is achievable without your input.
This input, or prompt, is the first building block that predetermines much of your end result, regardless of the industry.
Video creators, filmmakers, and animators who know the ups and downs of storyboarding and aren’t taking advantage of AI prompting are missing out. But, while working from a script won’t go out of fashion soon, knowing how to use AI prompting when you’re without one has never been more critical.
Whether you’re new to AI prompts for storyboards or a seasoned wordsmith, it’s time to discover what it takes to be a prompting master.
However, if you’re a director with a fully fleshed script, Shai’s AI storyboard generator can skip the complex prompting process altogether.
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Here’s what we’ll cover:
- What goes into AI prompting for storyboarding
- The criteria for effecting AI prompting
- How to prompt AI for storyboards
- 8-step guide to AI-prompted storyboards
What goes into AI prompting for storyboarding?
It’s impossible to imagine a satisfying pre-production journey without thinking about your storyboarding. Traditionally, storyboarding didn’t happen overnight, and there’s a good reason for that. Captivating visuals don’t just happen; they need the right words to ignite the imagination and fuel the imagery.
These words were usually found in the pages of extensive scripts that took hours, days, weeks, and months to complete. Nowadays, AI prompting is cutting down on the time it takes to turn words into visuals, but there’s a fine line between a good and a bad prompt.
While Shai offers a script to storyboard feature, which is undoubtedly the most convenient process, you can also prompt your way to a fantastic storyboard. By adding your prompt to our “Or directly type your story here…” section, you don’t need a completed script to start your storyboarding journey.
With that in mind, let’s have a look at what makes a great storyboarding prompt.
Sidequest. Here’s everything you need to know about AI storyboard generators.
Prompt used in Shai: An eerie forest during daytime
The criteria for effective AI prompts
Your main goal is to avoid lousy prompting as much as possible. The key to this is knowing the do’s and don’ts of effective AI prompting.
Be specific and direct
Unlike other AI models, Shai is intuitive, extracting key details and elements like expected shot size and camera level to create storyboard images from your prompts. If you want the best results, though, you’ll need to be direct, precise, and concrete with your choice of language. The fewer words, the better.
Provide appropriate context
AI needs the appropriate context, background, and purpose of your project to create a fully realized storyboard. This means feeding the AI exact and relevant information about scenes, actions, shot details, and cast descriptions.
Guide AI with conversational prompting
Whenever you think of prompting an AI for your storyboards, the golden rule is to structure them like you would a natural human conversation. For storyboard AI, this means breaking down large-scale ideas into smaller, manageable steps that create a blueprint for the AI to follow.
Adapt the AI’s approach to your genre
Catering to various ideas and concepts often involves adapting your tone and style, and as it turns out, the same is needed for AI prompting. Tweaking your AI’s persona to match your film’s genre is how you can quickly achieve a specific scene’s tone, style, and perspective.
Determine the output
The beauty of AI prompting for storyboards is its functionality, allowing you to determine the precise image you envisioned when you began. Consider it like telling the AI to focus on key points, including or excluding them.
Fortunately, you can easily adjust the output of your storyboard image even after submitting it to Shai. Simply editing the image description or its shot details will help you generate the correct image, taking these edits into account.
Outline all exclusions
Speaking of exclusions. Sure, prompting your AI with a direct and concise story scene, including context, tone, and style, sounds like a done deal, right? Not quite. Outlining exclusions in your prompts is sometimes a step that is unintentionally forgotten, but if included, it is a game changer.
Prompt used in Shai: Eira and her companion, Kellen, venture deeper into the mysterious forest.
AI Prompting like a pro | Let’s see it in action
When you’re using an AI model, like Shai, developing effective prompts is super important and can make or break a project. Keep the following attributes in mind when creating your prompts:
- Scene description
- Camera angle/Shot type
- Lighting and atmosphere
- Style specifications
- Additional inclusions
- Any exclusions
Here’s a basic structure to illustrate how all of these can be included in a prompt:
“[Scene description], [Camera angle/Shot type], [Lighting and atmosphere],[Style specifications], [Additional details], [Exclusions].”
Now, let’s throw in some actual words.
Scene Description: A police officer arriving at a crime scene,
Camera angle/ Shot type: wide-angle view,
Lighting and atmosphere: bright, sunlit day,
Style specifications: comic book style,
Additional details: the 1980s era
Exclusions: bystanders
Put all of that together, and “A police officer arriving at a crime scene, wide-angle view, on a bright, sunlit day, in a comic book style from the 1980s era, without any bystanders.” sounds pretty great.
If we keep following the same structure, with different elements, themes, etc., there are endless possibilities for what you and your AI can create for your storyboards.
Here are some more of the best AI prompt examples:
“A group of female superheroes stands around a table, wide-angle view, in a darkly-lit room, using a noir comic book style from the 1940s.”
“Two young men enter a hotel lobby, close-up view, bright and dazzling overhead lighting, in sepia tones, set in the year 2040.”
“An epic battle scene between a swordsman and a dragon, over-the-shoulder view, in an eerie and horrifying cave, in a fantasy style from the 12th century, with dramatic lighting.”
Using the formula suggested, prompting for storyboards doesn’t seem so intimidating anymore as long as you keep it to the point.
Prompt used in Shai: Eira reluctantly agrees to the deal, though unsure of the price she will truly pay.
The 8-step roadmap to successfully AI-prompted storyboards
Pair the prompting technique mentioned above with this 8-step process, and your storyboards will come to life in next to no time.
Step one: Character definition
Like any great story, characters are essential to a standout AI-prompted storyboard, and their creation is where you should start. Their defining features, relationships, physical features, and how they affect the story’s narrative should be priority #1.
Simply kick things off by detailing each character involved. Include descriptions touching on things like their appearance, personality, age, and gender. Specificity is key here, so add clothing styles, demeanors, and characteristics.
Step two: Setting and context
Next up, let’s talk about settings and context. Yes, they’re important and the second addition to your storyboard, but don’t over-complicate things. Clearly describe the environment, and include relevant objects or elements that you want present in each scene.
Step three: Mood and atmosphere
Once you’ve established your characters and setting, you can move on to prompting the mood and atmosphere you envision. You can choose an overarching mood or detail each scene by scene. Remember that mood and atmosphere are two elements that can heavily influence things like your color palette, lighting, and overall feel.
Step four: Character interactions
Your storyboard characters shouldn’t be static and lifeless, which makes describing their interactions (and actions) vital. Detail how they interact with one another and their surroundings; as always, be specific. Is the interaction physical, is it verbal, does it involve multiple characters, etc?
Prompt used in Shai: Eira faces a spectral figure cloaked in shadows, who claims to know the location of one of the crown’s shards.
Step five: Narrative flow — one step at a time
This might seem like an obvious one, but it is crucial to ensure that your prompts contribute constructively to the overall narrative. Each scene has to keep the story going, and your prompting should reflect this. Picture the sequence of events and evaluate their logical flow, tweaking your prompts as you go.
Step six: Exclusions and limitations
AI has limitations, which become apparent when discussing aspects like cultural and contextual nuances. Thankfully, you can use prompting to exclude or limit the use of specific visuals or visual elements.
Step seven: Use of action and emotion
The next step is a short and sweet one. Never leave action and emotion out of your prompts. Incorporate action verbs and emotional descriptors that not only increase the complexity of your output images but also add a sense of life to them.
Step eight: Iterative refinement
This is less of a must-follow step and more a word of wise advice, but when all is said and done, be open-minded enough to adapt your prompts based on what the AI gives you. Prompting is collaborative! The first image you get may not look as impressive as the next one, but you’d never know if you gave up on prompting after one try.
Top Tip: Learn more about how to storyboard with our in-depth guide here.
Prompt used in Shai: A dark, ancient forest said to be alive with old magic.
Key takeaways: AI prompting for storyboards
Set to redefine the approach many creatives take to AI storyboarding, prompting is rapidly becoming a time-saving and innovative way to bring words to life.
Integrating AI models, like Shai, into your pre-production process unlocks seamless AI prompting that produces high-quality scenes without any hassle. Regardless of where you stand in your AI journey, you can never know enough about AI prompting, and your storyboards will thank you for it.
Reach out to us to find out how Shai can speed up your pre-production process and let your stories shine.