HomeCasa Prompts

How to write prompts to generate videos

How to describe a shot for Runway, Kling, Sora or Veo: one subject, one action, camera movement, light and mood. And how to plan multi-shot videos.

Generating video with AI is more like directing a film shot than writing text. The model needs to know what is seen, what moves and how the camera moves.

One shot, one action

Video generators produce short clips. They work best when each prompt describes a single shot with one main action. If you need a story, split it into shots and generate each one separately.

  1. Shot type: wide shot, medium shot, close-up, aerial, low angle.
  2. Subject: a concrete visual description.
  3. Action: what it does, at what speed.
  4. Setting: place, time of day, weather.
  5. Camera movement: static, tracking, slow push-in, pan, handheld.
  6. Lighting and mood: soft overcast light, sunset, neon, nostalgic or tense mood.

Example

Close-up shot of an elderly baker's hands kneading dough on a floured
wooden table, slow and steady movements, early morning in a small bakery,
camera slowly pushes in, warm light from a window on the right,
flour particles floating in the air, calm and nostalgic atmosphere

Text-to-video and image-to-video

  • Text-to-video: you describe the whole scene.
  • Image-to-video: you start from an image (generated or your own) and the prompt focuses on motion: “the camera slowly pulls back while the wind moves her hair”.

The second option gives more control over the final look and helps keep shots consistent.

Continuity tips

  • Describe the character with the same words in every shot.
  • Use the same palette and lighting.
  • If the tool supports reference images or saved characters, use them.

Script before prompts

For ads or social videos, write the script and storyboard first (a text assistant can help) and then turn each shot into a video prompt. The library has a prompt for an ad script and storyboard.

Keep in mind

Length, resolution and aspect ratio are set in each tool's interface, not in the prompt. Results vary a lot between attempts: generate several versions. Respect people's image rights and each platform's terms of use.

More examples in video creation prompts.

Learn prompting

  • What is a prompt and how does it work

    A prompt is the instruction you give an artificial intelligence. Learn its parts, why the result depends so much on how you write it, and how to get started.

  • How to create a prompt from scratch

    A 6-step method to go from a vague idea to a clear, reusable prompt, with a complete end-to-end example.

  • How to write effective prompts

    Ten practical principles to write prompts that work on the first try more often: clarity, specificity, examples, format and review.

  • How to write prompts for ChatGPT

    Practical tips to get more out of ChatGPT: message structure, custom instructions, long conversations, files and reviewing answers.

  • How to write prompts for Claude

    How to write prompts for Anthropic's Claude: direct instructions, rich context, long documents, tags for structure and requests for reasoning.

  • How to write prompts to generate images

    The structure that works best in Midjourney, DALL-E, Stable Diffusion, Flux or Firefly: subject, style, light, composition and parameters, with examples.

  • How to improve a bad prompt

    A diagnostic process to find out why a prompt is not working and how to fix it, with a before-and-after example and a prompt to let the AI help you.

  • What are variables in a prompt

    Variables turn a prompt into a reusable template. Learn how to define them, name them and use them on HomeCasa Prompts.

  • What is context in a prompt and how much to give

    Context is the information the AI cannot guess. Learn what to include, what to avoid and how to organize documents and data inside a prompt.

  • How to define roles in a prompt

    What telling the AI “act as…” really does, how to choose a good role, combine it with concrete criteria and avoid roles that do not help.

  • How to structure prompt instructions

    Numbered steps, delimiters, sections and logical order: how to organize a long prompt so the AI does not skip anything.

  • Good and bad prompt examples

    Eight comparisons of real prompts for text, code, image and video, explaining what fails in the bad version and what the good one improves.

  • Common mistakes when writing prompts

    The ten most common prompt-writing mistakes and how to avoid them: from missing context to blindly trusting the answer.

  • Advanced prompting techniques

    Few-shot examples, step-by-step reasoning, prompt chaining, self-critique, structured outputs and evaluation: techniques for more reliable results.