Aspect Ratio in Midjourney, Part 1: Cinematic Aspect Ratio
Three-part series on aspect ratios and how to use them effectively in Midjourney (and other AI image generation tools)
Published in
9 min readFeb 7, 2023
This is the first part of a 3-part series on using aspect ratios. Here’s what we’ll cover in this post:
- Using aspect ratio to meet a medium’s requirements
- Using aspect ratio as an “aesthetic backdrop”
- Cinematic Aspect Ratios possible with the latest Midjourney model (V4)
What are aspect ratios?
As humanity has evolved into a civilization crazy about communicating via rectangular screens, at some point we needed terminology to describe the different sizes of our beloved devices. Thanks, aspect ratio!
The aspect ratio describes the relationship between the width of a screen and its height. It is commonly written in “colon notation” with width and height separated by a colon, as in “16:9”. In Midjourney the default aspect ratio is “1:1”. To change this, you add the “ — ar” parameter to your prompt. For example, to set an aspect ratio of 16:9:
/imagine prompt: [scene description] --ar 16:9How to use aspect ratio effectively
You choose a particular aspect ratio to accomplish at least one (often both) of two things:
