Maybe you've just signed up for MidJourney and are struggling to generate your images or perhaps you're just wondering what MidJourney might be like. Here's my take on prompts specifically for coloring books.

I've been primarily using MidJourney to create coloring books. I have had lots of ideas, but have been limited by what MidJourney can currently do. To illustrate the point, I tried eight slightly different prompts in my quest to generate a simple black and white image of an ape. All images above in the photo gallery with descriptions below.
​
Prompt #1) "coloring page for young children, thick bold lines, no color, no shading, no background, simple, a basic realistic happy Ape, cartoon style -- quality 0.25" Notes here: "no shading" doesn't tend to work. I've had this confirmed by other users too. Also, you can play around with the quality of the MidJourney output and only go to full quality once you've upscaled an image. However, I found that going any lower than 0.75 really affects what it can generate.

Prompt #2) "cartoon of a friendly ape, thick bold simple lines, white background, children's coloring page style -- quality 0.25
Notes here: note how much quality at 0.25 affects the generations. Also, leaving out "realistic" and focusing on friendly and cartoon drastically change the images.

​Prompt #3) "cartoon of an ape, thick bold simple lines, white background, children's coloring page style" 
Notes here: Images 2 and 4 had some potential, but the hands/feet were off and it wasn't quite the image I was after. If I liked everything except the hands/feet I would've carried on with regional editing.

​Prompt #4) "cartoon of an ape, children coloring book page, white background"
​Notes here: notice how coloring book page turned into actual coloring materials. Oh Midjourney! I think this happened because of how little information I included in the prompt otherwise. 

​Prompt #5) "coloring page for young children, no color, no shading, no background, simple image, thick bold lines, a basic realistic happy Ape, cartoon style -- quality 0.25"
Notes here: I was playing around with Prompt #1 but changing the order of some of the prompts as Midjourney does put most importance on the beginning words. Also, you can see the 0.25 at play here again. And you can see that the "happy" and "cartoon" overweighed the "realistic." I find that happens quite often. 

Prompt #6) "coloring page for young children, thick bold lines, no color, no shading, no background, simple outline and shapes, a basic realistic happy Ape, vector style."
Notes here: not much difference between 5 and 6. Maybe "vector image" was helpful in my attempts for a simple but bold image?

Prompt #7 "an ape for a coloring page for kids, no color, vector cartoon style --quality 0.25"
Notes here: Hopefully MidJourney will learn all things hands, feet, fingers, toes, paws, etc soon. But for now, be prepared to have to regionally edit those.

Prompt #8 "style of coloring book, vector lines, thick bold outline, simple basic image, black and white, ape --quality 0.25
Notes here: I would argue that none of these are simple basic images. This is where I stopped attempting this specific line of images. I have found that MidJourney struggles to make simple images and prefers to cook up intricate, detailed images instead.

I hope that helps! I'm currently taking a hiatus from Midjourney until I've built up multiple ideas so that I can get my money's worth out of the month's membership. Cheers, Jess

Last year I read 72 books. This year I had a baby and didn't quite hit 20. That's life for you! A good portion of my books this year were read in hopes of feeling prepared for labor and motherhood. I consumed far more non-fiction than in past years and think I will continue that trend in 2024. As always, let me know if you want to chat about any of these reads as some of them would make fantastic conversation starters.

1. How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu
- heavy, poignant, Cloud Atlas meets Cloud Cuckoo Land
2. The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell
-detailed, intimate, slowly and subtly suspenseful
3. Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth by Ina May Gaskin
-informative, helpful, full recommendation to all pregnant people!
4. Red Seas Under Red Skies and Republic of Thieves by Scott Lynch
-started this trilogy in 2022, 2nd book was a layered pirate heist, 3rd was "eh", honestly has put me in the mood for more NF reading
6. Mind Over Labor by Carl Jones
-interesting, a little woowoo
7. Pleasure Activism by adrienne maree brown
-very much outside of my comfort zone, interesting, broadening
8. Mutant Message Down Under by Marlo Morgan
-love this short adventure so much I re-read it, mind-bending, expanding
9. Baby Catcher by Peggy Vincent
-informative, helpful, and also gets my recommendation for preggos :)
10. How to Change Your Mind by Michael Pollan
-listened to this one and it took. me. forever. really interesting content though!
11. How Far the Light Reaches by Sabrina Imbler
-yummy yummy ocean creatures
12. Hunt, Gather, Parent
-highly recommend for parents of kids older than 2 (will be rereading later)
13. Cribsheets by Emily Oster
-***my number 1 recommendation to expecting parents, super informative
14-16. Beartown Trilogy by Fredrik Backman
-Backman can be so very dark and so very heavy even with his reflections and lighter elements. This series felt like a burden on my heart, though it was beautifully written and immersive with the characters and towns. 
17-19. Golden Compass Trilogy by Philip Pullman
-John and my nightly read-alouds for most of the year