Print Process intermediate graphicflatdecorative

Woodblock (Ukiyo-e)

Flat keyblock outline with separate colour blocks, wood grain showing in the broad areas.

What it does

Hokusai and Hiroshige worked with a carver and a printer: the artist's drawing becomes a keyblock of black outline, then a separate block per colour, each registered by kento notches cut into the wood. Colour is flat and unmodelled except for bokashi, a gradient wiped by hand at the block. There is no perspective shading. Wood grain prints through the larger flat areas, which is the detail most imitations forget.

The prompt

[Subject] as a Japanese woodblock print. A black keyblock outline of even weight enclosing every shape, with flat unmodelled colour areas printed from separate blocks, slight registration offset at one edge. A hand-wiped bokashi gradient in the sky going from deep indigo down to nothing. Visible wood grain texture printing through the large flat areas. Mineral pigments on absorbent washi, no shading and no cast shadows.

Replace [Subject] with what you are shooting. Everything else is deliberate: the gear, stock and lighting are what push a generator towards this look.

Works well in

Midjourney, FLUX, Stable Diffusion

Pairs with

Linocut Reduction Two-Ink Discipline

The Prompt Atlas

Every prompt here is a starting point. The Prompt Atlas is the full system: hundreds of production-ready prompts organised by outcome, with the reasoning behind each one so you can adapt rather than copy.

See The Prompt Atlas

Back to the Graphic Design Prompt Library