How to Create Street-Style Photography with AI Tools


Romen Roy
12 Sept, 2025
How to Create Street-Style Photography with AI Tools

Street-style photography captures the raw, unposed essence of everyday life, blending candid moments with artistic flair. With advancements in AI tools, creating stunning street-style images has become more accessible, even for those without advanced photography skills. In this blog post, we’ll explore how to use AI to craft a vivid street-style photograph based on a specific prompt, breaking down the process into actionable steps.

The Prompt

We’ll work with the following prompt to create a street-style photograph:

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A candid street-style photograph of a young man with tousled dark hair, wearing a loose, faded blue t-shirt, light grey sweatpants, and well-worn black-and-white sneakers, casually leaning against a cracked tiled sidewalk. He has a thoughtful expression and one hand casually tucked into his pocket, positioned along a quiet asphalt road lined with lush greenery. Sunlight filters through the dense leaves of the surrounding trees, creating dappled shadows and a soft golden flare, with vibrant summer colors enhancing the serene atmosphere and a blurred background adding depth. The overall scene captures a moment of quiet contemplation on a warm summer day, photographed with a slightly wide-angle lens.
Prompt4u.Site

Step 1: Choose the Right AI Tool

To generate this image, you’ll need an AI tool designed for high-quality image creation. Popular options include:

  • MidJourney: Known for its artistic and photorealistic outputs, ideal for detailed street-style scenes.
  • DALL·E 3: Great for generating creative and nuanced images based on descriptive prompts.
  • Stable Diffusion: Offers customizable outputs, especially when fine-tuned for photorealism.
  • Adobe Firefly: Integrates well with Photoshop for post-processing enhancements.

For this guide, we’ll assume you’re using MidJourney, as it excels at rendering detailed, atmospheric scenes with a photographic quality.

Step 2: Craft a Detailed Prompt

AI image generation relies heavily on the specificity of your prompt. The provided prompt is already rich with detail, but to optimize it for MidJourney, we can refine it slightly to ensure clarity and compatibility. Here’s an enhanced version:

Copy This Prompt
A candid street-style photograph of a young man with tousled dark hair, wearing a loose, faded blue t-shirt, light grey sweatpants, and worn black-and-white sneakers, leaning casually against a cracked tiled sidewalk, one hand in his pocket, with a thoughtful expression. The scene is set on a quiet asphalt road lined with lush green trees, sunlight filtering through dense leaves, casting dappled shadows and a soft golden flare. Vibrant summer colors, serene atmosphere, blurred background for depth, captured with a slightly wide-angle lens, hyper-realistic, 4K resolution, cinematic lighting --ar 3:2
Prompt4u.Site

Key Additions:

  • "--ar 3:2": Specifies the aspect ratio for a balanced, photo-like composition.
  • "hyper-realistic, 4K resolution": Ensures a photorealistic output with sharp details.
  • "cinematic lighting": Enhances the mood with professional lighting effects.

Enter this prompt into MidJourney’s interface (via Discord or its web platform) to generate the initial image.

Step 3: Fine-Tune the Output

AI-generated images may not be perfect on the first try. MidJourney often produces multiple variations, so review them and select the one closest to your vision. If adjustments are needed, use the following techniques:

  • Refine the Prompt: If the lighting feels off, add terms like “soft natural light” or “golden hour glow.” If the background isn’t blurred enough, emphasize “shallow depth of field.”
  • Use Inpainting: If specific elements (e.g., the sneakers or facial expression) need tweaking, use MidJourney’s inpainting feature or import the image into Adobe Photoshop with Firefly for targeted edits.
  • Adjust Parameters: Experiment with MidJourney’s settings, such as “--q 2” for higher quality or “--style 4b” for a more photographic aesthetic.

For our prompt, ensure the young man’s pose feels natural, the sidewalk cracks are visible, and the dappled shadows add texture to the scene.

Step 4: Enhance with Post-Processing

Once you’re satisfied with the AI-generated image, import it into a photo editing tool like Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom, or GIMP for final touches. Focus on:

  • Color Grading: Enhance the vibrant summer colors by boosting greens for the foliage and warming up the sunlight tones.
  • Sharpening: Apply subtle sharpening to emphasize details like the cracked tiles and the texture of the sneakers.
  • Lens Effects: Simulate a wide-angle lens effect by slightly distorting the edges or adding a soft vignette.
  • Background Blur: If the AI didn’t fully blur the background, use a Gaussian blur or lens blur filter to enhance depth.

Step 5: Add Authenticity

Street-style photography thrives on authenticity. To make your AI-generated image feel more organic:

  • Add subtle imperfections, like a slight grain or noise, to mimic real film photography.
  • Adjust the contrast to avoid an overly polished look.
  • Ensure the lighting feels natural by avoiding harsh highlights or unrealistic shadows.

Step 6: Share and Showcase

Once your image is complete, it’s ready to be shared. Post it on platforms like Instagram or Pinterest with hashtags like #StreetPhotography, #AIArt, or #StreetStyle to reach a wider audience. You can also create a blog post or portfolio entry to showcase your process, linking back to the AI tools used.

Tips for Success

  • Experiment with Prompts: Try variations of the prompt to explore different moods or compositions.
  • Learn from Real Photography: Study street photographers like Henri Cartier-Bresson or Vivian Maier to understand composition and storytelling.
  • Iterate: AI art is iterative. Don’t settle for the first output—generate multiple versions to find the perfect shot.
  • Ethical Considerations: Be transparent about using AI tools when sharing your work, especially in professional or artistic communities.

Creating street-style photography with AI tools like MidJourney is a powerful way to blend creativity with technology. By starting with a detailed prompt, fine-tuning the output, and applying thoughtful post-processing, you can craft a compelling image that captures the essence of a candid moment. The prompt we used—a young man in a serene, sunlit street scene—demonstrates how AI can bring a specific vision to life with stunning realism. So, grab your AI tool of choice, experiment, and start capturing the beauty of everyday life!

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