I recently started a Substack newsletter called Sparkly Dark. I created most of the visual brand in Midjourney. (The wordmark I created in Affinity Designer). Below are my tips on how I did it.
Note: Midjourney recently added Style Tuner which probably would be better than this method.
Tips
1. Get the $10/mo plan. This lets you add the bot to your own Discord server, which is easy to set up, and you can create channels to organize your work.
2. Keep playing with variations until you find one that gives you the feeling you like. I generated LOTS of unicorns to find one I liked…it seems to have the same problem getting the horn in the right place that it has with hands. I got two-horned and 5 legged unicorns. Just keep regenerating and be patient.
3. You will always get 4 options initially. If you like one, click Upscale and then Vary (Subtle) to get slightly different variations. This can help you find the exact expression you want.
4. Add emotional words. For the larger unicorn image here, I used, “character of dark purple unicorn with light colorful mane on dark background, kind gentle emotional peaceful sparkly dark” – after playing around with a lot of different prompts, this one finally gave me one with the emotional tone I wanted.
5. Re-use the same prompt with variations to create a themed style. This is how I made the cartoon characters:
cute young unicorn on white background, logo simple –no realistic details
cute young deer on white background, logo simple –no realistic details
cute young brain on white background, logo simple –no realistic details
cute young mythical creatures on white background, logo simple –no realistic details
6. Use Clipdrop to remove backgrounds if you’re not comfortable with a design program. It can also upscale images.
