AI image generators continue to make new advances almost by the day. Last week, it was the launch of Ideogram with its improved text rendering. Now it seems Midjourney may have just solved one of the biggest problems holding back text-to-image AI: consistency across images.
Specifically, Midjourney has added a tag that's intended to create more consistent characters. Since diffusion-based AI image generators create new images every time, even when using the same prompt, it can be very difficult to create two (or more) images in which a character looks like the same person. This has made it hard to use AI for storyboards or anything that requires that consistency, but the long-requested new feature tells the AI when to try to respect the appearance of the character in a reference image.
BIG UPDATE: Midjourney released consistent characters.Tested it...love it.Here’s how to use it.01. Generate an image02. Copy image URL03. Build a prompt.04. Add --cref parameter 05. Paste image url06. Use --cw to modify reference weightControl the Reference Weight… pic.twitter.com/Upwxt87O6IMarch 12, 2024
Midjourney's solution is a new character reference tag: -cref. You generate an image in Midjourney (the tag seems to works best with Midjourney images), copy the URL, create a new prompt and then add -cref as a parameter along with the URL of the original image. While it doesn't appear to be perfect, it does seem to generate much more similar looking facial features, body shape and clothing for characters across a series of images, based on early examples that users have been sharing.
#MIDJOURNEY NEW CHARACTER REFERENCEHOW IT WORKSType --cref then character image URLYou can use --cw strength from 100 to 0Strength 100 (--cw 100) is defaultAt strength 0 (--cw 0) will just focus on faceLet me know if you have any questions in the comments below! 💯 pic.twitter.com/lA0jXsWyOWMarch 12, 2024
Midjourney just released the "Character Reference" feature.How it works- Type --cref URL after your prompt with a URL to an image of a character- You can use --cw to modify reference 'strength' from 100 to 0- strength 100 (--cw 100) is default and uses the face, hair, and… pic.twitter.com/AuRWOBi2VbMarch 11, 2024
🚨#BreakingNews🚨And there we have it, Character Reference is finally available on #Midjourney! Here's a first video of my initial tests. The UX on the alpha version site is really cool. Check it out and share your thoughts!How it works on Discords• Type --cref URL after… pic.twitter.com/k4fj8yKrF7March 12, 2024
Character consistency with AI is a thing now?MidJourney's new Character Reference (--cref) feature makes it easier.9 good examples of the new feature in action: pic.twitter.com/yi195OD1lzMarch 12, 2024
CREF released by MidjourneyMidjourney's attempt at a (sort of) character consistency. It could be more consistent, I think, but it's quite good to start with. The strength might lie in combining cref with sref to contain consistency in character and style. More on that below. pic.twitter.com/eOYhZHAkotMarch 11, 2024
The approach could eventually solve similar problems for other subjects in AI image generators. I predict that Midjourney could aim to further develop the feature to recognise more than just human characters. See our round up of AI art tutorials to learn more about image generators.
