Empty places and dead media image prompts

What this is

This is a way of writing image prompts that build dread from two things: a place with nobody in it, and footage that has aged badly. The first half covers rooms and structures that should be full and are not. The second half covers the texture of old recordings: tape damage, security camera angles, blown-out flash.

What makes it work is specificity. Every prompt pins down a lens, an aperture, a light source and a narrow palette. Vague words like creepy or unsettling do nothing. A 16mm lens at f/4 in a concrete stairwell does a lot.

The look is always ordinary first. Fluorescent tubes, vinyl chairs, painted lines on tarmac. The wrongness comes from repetition, from a light that should be off, or from a detail that belongs nowhere. Keep the scene believable and let one thing slip.

When to use it

Use this for horror concept art, album and book covers, title sequences, game environments and short film look development. It suits anything that needs tension without gore.

It is also good for mood boards when you want a location that feels remembered rather than designed. The camera language keeps results grounded, so models do not drift into fantasy.

How to use it

1. Pick one location and describe it in a single sentence. State what is missing: people, water, furniture, sound implied by stillness.
2. Add camera detail. Choose a focal length, an aperture and whether the shot is handheld or braced. Wider lenses stretch corridors and make ceilings feel low.
3. Name the light. Say where it comes from and what state it is in: half the tubes out, one bulb flickering, flash falling off into corners.
4. Limit the palette to three colours. This is what stops a scene looking generic.
5. Close with three adjectives that describe the feeling, not the objects.
6. For the analog look, add a format line: tape noise, scan lines, date stamp, fisheye distortion, sensor grain.

Example prompt:

A village hall after a jumble sale, trestle tables half folded against the wall, a kettle still warm on a Formica counter, one strip light flickering above the stage. Shot on a 35mm at f/2.8, handheld, high ISO grain. Pale green walls, worn cork floor and cold white light. Left mid-thought, quiet, slightly wrong.

Second example, for the tape look:

A security still from a hotel service lift, wide fisheye view from the ceiling corner, the doors open onto a corridor with no far wall. Low-resolution monochrome, heavy scan lines, timestamp in the lower corner. Grey, white bloom and black. Watched, looping, unresolved.

What a good result looks like

The image should read as a real place before it reads as a scary one. You want a viewer to recognise the location instantly and then notice what is off. Lines should repeat cleanly into the distance. Light should have a visible source. The palette should hold to three colours with no stray saturation.

If a result feels like a set, add one mundane detail: a mop bucket, a stack of chairs, a scuff on the wall. If it feels too clean, push the grain and let a highlight blow out. The best frames sit between documentation and unease, and they leave the exit out of shot.