Midjourney for Designers: AI Image Generation for Concept Exploration

Midjourney is an AI image generator that creates images from text descriptions (prompts). Unlike most design tools, you don’t draw or manipulate pixels directly. You describe what you want, and the AI interprets your words into images. The results tend toward the artistic and stylized rather than photorealistic, which makes Midjourney popular for concept art, mood boards, and creative exploration.

Key Specs

How Designers Use Midjourney

Midjourney fits into the early, exploratory stages of design work. Here’s where designers find it most useful.

For Mood Boards and Visual Research

Generate dozens of variations on a concept in minutes to explore visual directions. Type a prompt like “brutalist concrete architecture, golden hour lighting, moody atmosphere” and get 4 images. Upscale the ones you like, remix them with new parameters, or use them as reference for your own work. Mood boards that used to take hours of stock photo hunting now take 20 minutes.

For Concept Art and Illustration Styles

Explore illustration styles without committing to full execution. Want to see what your app would look like with a hand-drawn aesthetic? Or how your product packaging might look in a retro-futuristic style? Midjourney lets you test visual directions before hiring an illustrator or spending days on execution. Product designers use this to pitch visual concepts to stakeholders.

For Placeholder Images and Marketing Visuals

Create unique hero images for landing pages, blog posts, or social media when stock photos feel generic. Midjourney images have a distinct look that stands out from typical stock photography. Use them as placeholders during design sprints, or as final assets for projects with no budget for custom photography or illustration.

For Creative Inspiration and Overcoming Blocks

When you’re stuck, Midjourney acts as a creative partner. Generate unexpected combinations to break out of visual ruts. Designers use it like Pinterest on steroids, creating personalized mood boards that reflect their specific project needs rather than relying on what others have already posted.

Midjourney vs. Alternatives

How does Midjourney compare to other AI image generators?

Choose Midjourney if: You want the most aesthetically polished, artistic outputs and don’t mind Discord or prompt engineering.

Choose DALL-E if: You need photorealism, text in images, or want AI image generation integrated with ChatGPT conversations.

Choose Stable Diffusion if: You’re technical, want full control over models and parameters, or need to run locally for privacy.

Choose Adobe Firefly if: You’re already in Creative Cloud and need images that are trained only on licensed content for legal safety.

Choose Leonardo AI if: You’re creating game art, characters, or assets and want fine-tuned control over consistency.

Getting Started with Midjourney

A quick start to generating your first images:

Step 1: Join the Discord server

Sign up at midjourney.com and join the Discord server. You’ll land in a newbie channel where everyone’s images appear together. Find a channel like #newbies-1, or create a Direct Message with the Midjourney Bot (click the bot’s profile, then Message) for a private workspace.

Step 2: Write your first prompt

Type /imagine and press Enter. A prompt field appears. Describe what you want: “cozy coffee shop interior, warm lighting, plants, large windows, morning atmosphere.” Hit Enter. Midjourney generates 4 variations in about 60 seconds. Your images appear in the chat feed.

Step 3: Upscale and refine

Below your 4-image grid, you’ll see buttons: U1-U4 (upscale image 1-4 to higher resolution) and V1-V4 (create variations of image 1-4). Click U2 to upscale the second image if you like it. Click V3 to generate 4 new images similar to the third. Iterate by adjusting your prompt and regenerating.

Midjourney in Your Design Workflow

Midjourney works best as an early-stage exploration tool, not a final execution tool.

• Before Midjourney: Define project goals, gather requirements, sketch rough ideas on paper or in FigJam
• During exploration: Midjourney for visual direction, mood, style tests
• After Midjourney: Bring references into Figma for UI design, or hand off to illustrators for custom execution

Common tool pairings:

• Midjourney + Figma for using AI-generated backgrounds or illustrations in interface designs
• Midjourney + Photoshop for refining AI outputs (removing artifacts, compositing elements, adjusting colors)
• Midjourney + Notion for documenting visual research and mood boards alongside project briefs
• Midjourney + Pinterest for combining AI-generated images with curated references into cohesive inspiration boards

Common Problems (and How to Fix Them)

These issues come up regularly when using Midjourney.

“My images don’t match what I described”

Midjourney interprets prompts loosely. Be more specific: instead of “a room,” try “minimalist bedroom, white walls, oak floor, large window with sheer curtains, morning light, clean aesthetic.” Add style references like “architectural photography” or “in the style of Kinfolk magazine.” Use weights (::2) to emphasize important parts: “coffee shop interior::2, plants, warm lighting.”

“I can’t find my images in the Discord feed”

The newbie channels move fast, with hundreds of users posting simultaneously. Your images scroll away within seconds. Solution: create a Direct Message thread with the Midjourney Bot for private image generation, or visit midjourney.com/app and log in to see your personal gallery of all generated images.

“Text in images is garbled nonsense”

Midjourney can’t generate readable text reliably. Don’t use it for logos, posters with headlines, or UI designs with labels. If you need text, generate the background or illustration in Midjourney, then add clean typography in Figma, Photoshop, or Illustrator. Text-in-image support may improve in future versions.

“Images have weird artifacts or distortions”

AI models struggle with hands, text, complex patterns, and architectural precision. When you spot issues, upscale a different variation or regenerate with a modified prompt. Use Photoshop’s generative fill or healing tools to fix small artifacts. For critical work, treat Midjourney outputs as reference material, not final deliverables.

“I’m running out of fast hours”

Standard and Pro plans include “fast” generation hours (images render in ~1 minute). When you exceed your limit, you can switch to “relax” mode (unlimited but slower, 5-10 minutes per image). Type /relax to enable it. Use fast mode for client work and time-sensitive projects; use relax for personal exploration and experimentation.