Prompts

Negative Prompts

Use negative prompts to suppress common defects, artifacts, and unwanted objects—without fighting your main brief.

What negative prompts are for

They answer: “Assume I never want X unless I ask.” Typical targets:

  • Watermarks, logos, UI overlays
  • Extra limbs, mangled hands, duplicated faces
  • Blurry faces when you need sharp portraits
  • JPEG artifacts when you need clean edges

Keep negatives specific

Prefer “deformed hands, extra fingers” over “bad quality.” The latter is vague and can flatten desirable texture.

Avoid contradictions

If your main prompt asks for heavy film grain, a negative of “grain” will fight you.

Order and quantity

Start with 3–7 high-value negatives. Long laundry lists often dilute focus and surprise you with odd side effects.

Pair with positive language

Sometimes a positive clause is better:

  • Negative: “no text”
  • Positive: “clean background, no typography, no signage”

Google’s image docs call this semantic negative prompting: describe the scene you want (including “empty of X”) rather than only forbidding lists. That tends to produce cleaner composition than long “no …” chains alone. See Gemini API — image generation.

Product-specific features

If the app exposes preset negative packs (portrait, product, typography), start there and customize.