The Rundown

In this guide you will learn a workflow to turn selfies into professional looking headshots using Google’s Nano Banana Pro. You will learn why most AI-generated headshots look “uncanny” and how to avoid that with our specific prompting system.

Who This Is Useful For

• Jobseekers who want to upgrade their headshot
• Anyone who needs a new LinkedIn photo
• Teams who want to unify their company profiles without hiring an expensive photographer

What You Will Build

What You Need to Get Started

• Google Workspace account

Step 1

A big mistake people make is trying to get AI to fix bad lighting. Oftentimes, bad lighting will trigger AI to generate your face from scratch. We want to avoid that. Here’s what you should do:

• Background: Find a neutral background like you’re taking a passport photo.
• Lighting: Get some sort of direct lighting. If you don’t have a light try your phone’s flashlight or even opening a white background on your second monitor. Find somewhere in your home or workspace where natural light is coming through. You don’t want direct sunshine but being near a window during the day will probably give you enough light.
• Camera: Use your webcam. We don’t want awkward selfie angles. If you use your phone, use the front camera with a timer.
• Composition: We found the AI works better with your upper chest visible. Make sure the lens of your camera is between your shoulder height and top of your head. Anything lower or higher than that will create angles that AI will have a tough time with. If you don’t have a webcam, prop your laptop or phone up to reach the right height.

TLDR: Pretend you are taking a passport photo and use your laptop's webcam. AI will upscale it!

Now, snap a couple photos!

Pro tip: Try rotating your torso 45 degrees and looking into the camera. This was the best pose for Nano Banana Pro besides straight on.

Step 2

Go to aistudio.google.com.

Click Playground. It should tell you you're using Nano Banana Pro.

💡Pro tip: Make sure you click the key and add an API key that has Gemini and Nano Banana Pro enabled.

Step 3

To avoid the deepfake look, we're going to tell Nano Banana Pro to edit our photo instead of generating one from scratch. Upload one of your photos and send this prompt:

Generate: Post-processing enhancement, professional color grading, balanced studio lighting, remove noise and grain, sharpen focus, upscale to 8k, skin texture refinement, subtle dodging and burning, clear and crisp details, maintain exact original facial structure and clothing, photorealistic

Try this prompt with a few photos you took. We tested 20+ before we got a few good ones. When you get one you like you can bump the quality up to 4k under “Resolution”, then prompt the AI to generate the same exact photo again.

💡Pro tip: Start a new chat if you start getting repetitive or low-quality results.

Going Further

To create your own prompt concepts, drop the prompt we gave you into Gemini and ask it to come up with four concepts for headshots using the same principles. Be clear that you want prompts to edit photos, not generate them from scratch.