# Create an image style

> An image style is a type — photo, illustration, product or graphic — and a direction of your brand’s own. Start from a gallery idea, from images you like or from your own words, see three previews in your brand, then pick the style one image at a time.

Updated 2026-10-06

The images in your posts aren’t all described the same way. A software carousel alternates a photo of customers at work with a visual of the product; a bakery may want photos for the bakehouse and an illustration for a recipe. An **image style** says how an image is made: a **type**, which picks the rules sent to the model, and a **direction**, the mood that is your brand’s own. A brand has up to five, and each image takes its own.

## Where it happens

“Brand” page, “Styles” tab, between “Profile” and “References”: how the image is made on one side, who or what appears in it on the other. The tab opens on “How the images in your posts are made.”

Each style has its card there: its three previews, its name, its type, its direction, how many images and posts use it (“6 images · 2 posts,” or “Not used yet”) and where it comes from — “Suggested by the analysis of…,” “Idea from the gallery,” “From 2 images,” “Written in your words.” **The first one is the default**: drag a card by its handle to change the order, or pick “Make default” in its menu.

> **You probably have one already**
>
> The [analysis of your website](/en/guide/analyze-your-brand-from-your-website/) suggests one or two typed styles — for software, a photo of your customers at work and a product style — and the brand interview suggests some too. They arrive in a “Suggested image styles” card: “Keep both” makes their three previews in your brand, “Remove the suggestions” sets them aside.

## Four types

The type isn’t guessed from the text: you choose it, and it decides the rules of the prompt.

| Type | What it does |
|---|---|
| Photo | a real scene — people, places, objects, light that comes from somewhere; the grain and imperfections of a real photo; brand colors in the scene, never as a filter |
| Illustration | a drawn or painted image, in a single technique, a single line, a single finish; the brand palette, held from one image to the next |
| Product | components of your software — a card, a notification, a chart, a table row — with short, legible text; one to three components, never a full screen; no people, no devices, no desks |
| Graphic | shapes, textures and patterns, no subject: calm where the slide places its text, it serves as a background for numbers and quotes |

> **The product type, for software**
>
> Image models botch full screens: fuzzy fake text, approximate alignment. They do well with isolated components when they’re given the words. So before each product image, the AI picks one to three components and writes their text from the slide, in the post’s language — two to six words per line, sample numbers inside the components, none in the spotlight unless it is on the slide. The story is in [the Journal](/en/journal/software-images-you-can-finally-read/).

## Create a style

“New style,” at the top of the tab, as long as one of the five spots is free. The window offers three starting points, and says so up front: “Nothing is saved until you’ve seen three previews in your brand.”

1. **An idea from the gallery**

   “Or start from an idea”: twelve ideas — natural light, studio, film, flat color, line art, isometric, gouache, risograph, components, dark glass, abstract 3D, shapes —, filtered by type and ordered by your brand’s industry: software sees components, dark glass and abstract 3D first, a bakery natural light, film and gouache. An idea is never applied as is: “Adapt to…” writes it for your colors and your subjects.

2. **“My style from…”**

   Images you like — a poster, an account, a website: drop one to four, or paste a link under “Or a link.” “What you like” is optional (“The overlapping colors, the paper grain”). “Read these images” returns a sheet, “What the AI sees”: Technique, Material, Shapes, Framing, each editable line by line, and the suggested type, which you can change. Under “What comes from…,” two switches take your brand’s colors and subjects instead of the images’. Then “Compose the style.”

3. **“In my own words”**

   You know what you want: one sentence will do — “flash photos, bold colors, tight framing.” “Write the style” works out the type and the direction.

4. **Three directions**

   “Adapt to…,” “Write the style” or “Compose the style” suggests **three directions** drawn from your starting point, which differ by style alone — matter, light, level of detail, color treatment — never by composition. Each is shown by a preview, on the same example from your brand: you compare styles, not subjects. “None of these?” suggests three others, and a sentence steers them (“more graphic, less realistic”).

5. **Three previews, then “Save the style”**

   “Continue with…” makes the other two previews of the chosen direction, on [your examples](#three-examples-from-your-brand). “In a post” shows them placed in your slides; “Adjust” fixes what’s off in one sentence. The name can be edited; “Other previews” makes three more. Nothing exists until “Save the style.”

> **A technique, never a signature**
>
> The sheet describes a technique — a line, a texture, a framing —, never an artist, a studio or a brand, even a recognizable one. Your starting images stay with the style, under “Starting images”: they were used to read it, and are never sent with a generation.

## A style’s page

Click a card to open the style:

- **“Previews”** — the three previews, each with the caption of its example, “Images · In a post” to see them under a title, “Other previews” to make new ones, and [“Adjust”](#adjust-in-one-sentence).
- **The name**, **the type** and **the direction**. Changing the type changes the prompt rules: the three previews are made again, with the cost shown first. The direction is the mood of this style for your brand, in your language; “See what goes to the model” shows its English version, rewritten on save from the new direction.
- **“What the … type does”** — the type’s rules, read-only.
- **“Make default”** and **“Delete the style.”** A style in use can be deleted without breaking anything: its images keep their version, its posts go back to the default style.

## Three examples from your brand

A style’s previews don’t show a random scene: they show **three examples from your brand**, drawn from your rendezvous, then your products, then your keywords — “Saturday bake: the loaves come out of the oven,” “Hands in the bakehouse: shaping the loaves,” “Seeded bread: a close look at the crust.” Each has its own shot: a wide view, something being done (hands or several people, never one person in the spotlight), a detail. Its caption shows under the preview.

They’re written on their own, once, with the first previews (✦ 1) — nothing to manage — and serve all your styles: you compare the photo style and the gouache on the same bake. A product style shows three things your product does; a graphic style, the same examples turned into shapes.

> **“In a post”**
>
> Above the previews, “Images · In a post” places each one in a slide in your look, with your colors and fonts and the example’s caption as the title. The question is no longer “is it pretty?” but “will my title hold on it?” Nothing is generated: it’s free.

## Adjust in one sentence

Under the previews of a style, and when creating one, an “Adjust” field: “more morning light,” “a finer line,” “less red,” or an idea from the chips. Click a preview to choose it (otherwise: the first one).

> **A style, not a composition**
>
> A style says how an image looks: its technique, matter, light, colors and level of detail. It never says how the image is composed — each image in a post has its own, from its slide. A composition request (“a single group of shapes”) becomes its style side (“simpler shapes”); framing is decided image by image, in the description.

1. **Ask**

   The assistant rewrites the direction — it keeps what you don’t change and adds only your request, in blue under “Suggested direction” — then turns your sentence into precise qualities of the style — matter, light, level of detail, colors — and redoes **one preview**, on the same example, with the adjusted style. That’s what your next images will look like.

2. **Compare**

   “Before · After” switches the preview. A color outside your palette is pointed out: the assistant keeps it to an accent, and reminds you that brand colors can be turned off.

3. **Keep or go back**

   “Keep” saves the direction and the preview; the other two are marked “Outdated,” and “Redo them” redoes them on your examples. “Go back” changes nothing. “Versions” brings back a previous direction.

## Your screens, for a product style

On a product style’s page, “Your screens” takes up to three screenshots of your software. They go with every image in this style: the generated components pick up your shapes, your corner radii, your density. They are never shown as is — the model draws components, not your screen.

> **The style sheet**
>
> An illustration or a graphic holds better with images than with words. Their three previews, put together into a single image, make a style sheet, attached to the image that opens the series in that style: the model picks up the technique, the line and the inks, never the subjects or the composition. The next images follow the series. A photo doesn’t need one: words are enough to hold it.

## Pick the style of an image

The post has a **default style**, chosen in “New post” (“Image style”) and changed in the “Post” tab, “Post images” section, “Default style” setting. Changing it leaves alone the images that have their own: “1 image has its own style: it keeps it.”

When the brand has several styles, generating a post picks the one for each slide — the photo for people at work, the product for what the software does. And any image can switch:

1. **From the field’s header**

   In the “Image” panel, the description field opens with the style: its previews, its name, its type, and where it comes from — “same as the post” or “its own.” “Change” opens the list: “Same as the post,” the brand’s styles, and “Manage styles,” which takes you to the tab.

2. **From the keyboard, with #**

   Type `#` in the description: the list of styles opens, filtered by what follows. Picking a style changes the header and removes what you typed — nothing stays in the text. `@` still calls [references](/en/guide/call-a-reference-in-an-image/); the foot of the field reminds you of both.

3. **Or just ask**

   Ask the editor’s assistant: “make this image an illustration,” “a product visual for slide 3.” In a message, `#` calls a style by name, as `@` calls a reference: “generate a visual for slide 3 in #watercolor.” There, the style stays in the message.

The same field is used wherever an image is described: slides, the beats of a film, the image of a text post and “Try in a scene.” In the slide column, an image with its own style shows it.

> **A series stays in its style**
>
> An image only follows the series anchor if the anchor is in the same style. In a carousel that mixes photo and product, each style has its own anchor, and the recipe says so: “Series: none, different style” for an image that is alone in its style.

## What it costs

> **Before, then after**
>
> Composing a style and making its three previews: ✦ 5, shown on “Adapt to…,” “Write the style” or “Compose the style.” Reading images you like: ✦ 5 more. “Other previews”: ✦ 5. Rewriting the direction: ✦ 1. Writing your examples, once: ✦ 1. “Adjust”: ✦ 5 per round, one preview included. After that, a product image adds the writing of its components to its cost, under one Spark, and each attached style sheet or screen counts as an attached image. The actual cost shows after each action, and goes into your organization’s history.

## What’s next

With your styles in place, [generate a series](/en/guide/generate-a-consistent-image-series/): each image follows the anchor of its own style. And for the same person or product to come back from one image to the next, add a [reference](/en/guide/create-a-reference-from-photos/) — the style says how, the reference says who.

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Source: https://joli.studio/en/guide/create-an-image-style/