The White Is the Paper

The White Is the Paper

Produce ONE image, 3:4 portrait: a botanical watercolour poster with a left-aligned type stack. Follow every line. Replace only the FIELDS block; everything after it is fixed.

First — do you have the fields?

If any field below still has braces around it, stop and ask. Put all the questions in one short message, and show the example under each one so they can see the shape of a useful answer. Wait for the replies, then draw. Never fill a brace yourself: a value you invented is a value nobody asked for, and it will look exactly as considered as the ones they did give you.

Ask in whatever language they are writing to you in. Translate the questions and the examples; do not make someone read English to tell you what they want.

The examples are only examples. If someone answers a question, use their answer; never fall back to the example because you prefer it.

If the fields are already filled in, ignore this and carry on.

Fields — replace these six lines only

• The subject, close up: {one part of one plant or natural thing} e.g. a fern frond unfurling, one tight fiddlehead and two opened leaves crossing the frame
• The small title, up to three lines: {a few words} e.g. Library / of / Beginnings
• The display line: {one word or two} e.g. UNFOLD
• The line under it: {one sentence} e.g. Every pattern starts as one curled shape
• The two lines at the foot: {a short phrase, and a sentence} e.g. one prompt, then the whole afternoon · A vibe library for people who build with AI — every screen here began as a description.
• The washes: {two or three colours} e.g. sap green, ochre, and one cool grey

The paper law

Transparent watercolour cannot add light. There is no white paint — every pale area in the picture is paper the brush never touched.

• The brightest part of the subject is exactly the same white as the margin: same tone, same texture, no smoother and no cleaner.
• Highlights are shapes left out, reserved before the wash went down, with pigment stopping crisply around them.
• No white or pale paint laid over a dried wash. No soft glow added on top. No airbrushed lightening anywhere.

This is the test the style always fails. A reference run of this template painted its leaves and water convincingly and rendered its flower as smooth digital gradients with the pale areas shaded rather than reserved — one picture in two media, and the medium is the whole point.

Two kinds of edge

A real watercolour contains both, and the contrast between them is what makes it read as paint:

• Soft — where pigment ran into damp paper and bled, with no boundary at all.
• Hard — where a wash was laid on dry paper and stopped, leaving a crisp line with a slightly darker rim as it dried.

A picture made only of soft edges is an airbrush. One made only of hard edges is a cut-out. Every subject here should show both, usually soft through a form's interior and hard along the edge that faced the light.

Also allowed, and worth including: backruns where water pushed into drying paint, and granulation where pigment settled into the paper's tooth — heaviest at the foot of a wash and where two washes overlap into a third, darker colour.

One medium

Whatever is true of the leaves is true of the flower. If any element is smoothly shaded while its neighbour is painted, the picture is a hybrid and the conceit collapses. Check the softest element against the most textured one before shipping.

The subject

One close crop — part of one plant, not a scene. It enters from a single side and runs off the frame, occupying roughly half the sheet. No horizon, no ground, no vase, no second subject, no background wash.

The type

Everything flush left, in one column, with generous leading:

1. 1A micro line across the very top: a number at the left, a series name in the centre, a year at the right — all tiny. The series name comes from the poster's own subject — reuse the small title, set in capitals. Never the name of this template: a field asking for a series name will otherwise be answered with whatever title is nearest to hand, and the heading above these instructions is the nearest one.
2. 2The small title, up to three lines, in a fine serif.
3. 3The display line, much larger than anything else, in a high-contrast serif with fine hairlines and slightly heavier stems. This is the type anchor.
4. 4The line under it, small, regular weight.
5. 5At the foot: the short phrase, then the sentence smaller again.

Type never sits on top of the painting. It occupies the empty half.

Never

• ✕ white or pale paint used to make a highlight
• ✕ a light area smoother or cleaner than the bare margin
• ✕ only soft edges, or only hard edges
• ✕ smooth digital shading on any element
• ✕ a fourth colour, or opaque paint anywhere
• ✕ a background wash, a scene, or a container
• ✕ centred or justified text
• ✕ the name of this template printed anywhere on the poster

The result

A poster that looks lifted from a painter's sheet: three colours, a lot of untouched paper, one plant crossing the frame, and every light in it a place the brush was careful to avoid.