GPT Image 2.5 Flare guide — key art, posters and cinematic stills

GPT Image 2.5 Flare is the louder of OpenAI's two image models on eroq. It keeps the prompt adherence and in-image text of its sibling GPT Image 2.5 Sunburst, then renders bolder: harder light, heavier atmosphere, more presence in the frame. That makes it the pick for key art, posters, album covers and stills from films that do not exist yet. If your brief contains the words "moody", "epic" or "make it pop", start here.

The numbers

• Price: 31 credits / image, the same as Sunburst. About $0.31 an image at the entry pack.
• Speed: typically about 15 seconds a take, like Sunburst.
• Formats: 3:4 and 9:16 for posters and vertical key art, 16:9 for cinematic stills and thumbnails, 1:1 for covers, 4:3 for print ads. Same price at every format.
• Takes: up to four per run, each charged separately; a full run is 124 credits, and any take that fails is refunded.
• Inputs: words only. Flare reads no reference pictures and has no Edit mode on eroq.
• Access: any plan, with no subscription needed.
• Content: its provider moderates prompts upstream; a turned-down prompt comes back as content_blocked, free of charge.
• API id: gpt-image-2-5-flare.

Lead with mood and light

Flare responds to atmosphere, so put it first and the subject second. "A knight in a cathedral" gives you a knight in a cathedral. "Light pouring through a broken rose window into a flooded cathedral, dust and embers in the beams, a knight raising a lantern" gives you a poster.

The dramatic toolkit, in rough order of impact:

• Light with a direction. "Rim-lit from behind", "a single shaft of light from a high window", "low-key, most of the frame in shadow", "backlit by a setting sun".
• Air you can see. Volumetric haze, rain, dust, fog, drifting snow, embers. Atmosphere is what makes light visible.
• A two-color palette. Teal and orange, magenta and deep blue, gold and black. Two colors read as a decision; six read as an accident.
• Scale. A tiny figure against something enormous: a dune, a planet, a wave, a wall.
• A camera with an opinion. Low angle, extreme wide, tight close-up, anamorphic widescreen.

Pick two or three per image, not all five. A frame where everything is dramatic reads as noise.

Name the genre, get its rules for free

Genre words carry composition conventions, and Flare knows them. "Film poster" implies a central figure and room for a title. "Album cover" implies one iconic image in a square and small type. "Movie still" implies a 16:9 frame with no text at all. "Game key art" implies a hero pose and space for a logo. Name the genre, then spend the rest of the prompt on what is specific to your project.

Three recipes

The poster (3:4 or 9:16). Genre, hero subject and pose, setting, light, then the title: the title "X" in [type style] at [position], plus an optional one-line tagline. Ask for the space the title needs ("a clear dark sky at the top for the title"), or the type ends up over a face.

The cinematic still (16:9). Shot size, subject and action, location, time and weather, lens. No text. Write it as if you were describing a frame from a film to the cinematographer who shot it.

The cover (1:1). One iconic image, a texture (grain, print, paper), and small type for the name. The book cover and album art guide goes deeper on covers, and YouTube thumbnails covers the 16:9 click-bait cousin.

Example prompts

1. Sci-fi poster, 3:4. Scale, a cold palette with one warm accent, and a title plus a short tagline.

   A science fiction film poster: an astronaut seen from behind at the edge of a frozen crater, a colossal ringed planet filling the sky, cold blue light with a thin rim of gold along the helmet, drifting ice crystals, the title "COLD ORBIT" in wide-spaced capitals at the bottom, the tagline "No signal. No way back." in small type above it.

2. Western still, 16:9. A frame from a film, with weather and raking light doing the work. No text.

   A wide cinematic movie still of a lone rider on a ridge at dusk, a storm front rolling in behind, lightning on the horizon, dust lifting off the trail, the last orange light raking across the scrub, anamorphic widescreen.

3. Thriller key art, 9:16. One pool of light in a dark frame, with the title placed in the fog where it cannot cover the subject.

   Vertical key art for a thriller series: a woman in a raincoat under a single streetlamp on an empty bridge, heavy fog, her long shadow stretching toward the camera, deep blue night with one warm pool of light, the title "UNDERTOW" in a sharp condensed serif centered in the fog above her.

4. Album cover, 1:1. A surreal single image, pastel atmosphere and tiny type in a corner.

   An album cover: a vintage convertible half-submerged in a calm lake at sunrise, pink and gold mist over the water, a heron standing on the hood, film grain, the artist name "MARLOW" in small white serif in the top left corner.

5. Game key art, 16:9. Heroic pose, god rays and a reserved area for the logo.

   Fantasy game key art: a knight in battered silver armor raising a lantern inside a vast flooded cathedral, light pouring through a broken rose window, floating dust and embers, teal shadows and gold highlights, empty space in the upper left for a logo, epic and hushed.

6. Food campaign, 4:3. Drama is not only for films: hard rim light and a black background sell a burger too.

   A dramatic food advertising shot of a single burger on black slate, a hard rim light from behind making the steam glow, sesame seeds catching highlights, a splash of red sauce frozen in mid-air, deep black background, the word "SMOKEHOUSE" in bold condensed white type along the bottom.

Flare or Sunburst?

Same price, same formats, same handling of quoted text. The difference is temperament: Flare when the image should make someone feel something, Sunburst when it should make someone understand something. When in doubt, run the prompt on both with two takes each, which costs 124 credits in total, and keep the take you prefer. Sunburst vs Flare has side-by-side prompts.

Make the poster move

Key art is already a first frame. Hit Animate on the image in your library and it opens the video studio as the start frame of a clip; then prompt the motion the picture implies: fog drifting across the bridge, the lantern flickering, a slow push-in on the rider. If your poster is 3:4, pick an engine that renders 3:4 natively, such as Seedance 2.0 Mini (45 credits for five seconds at 480p, no plan needed) or Seedance 2.0 (200 for five seconds at 720p, Creator plan); other engines snap the frame to the nearest format they support. The full poster-to-trailer flow is in make a movie poster with AI.

Ready? Open the image studio, choose Flare, and try the thriller prompt in 9:16.

FAQ

What is GPT Image 2.5 Flare best at?

Bold, dramatic frames: key art, film posters, album covers, cinematic stills and campaign visuals that need heavy atmosphere. It keeps the prompt adherence and in-image text of Sunburst with a more expressive rendering.

Can GPT Image 2.5 Flare put a title on a poster?

Yes. Put the title in quotes, name the type style and the position, and leave room for it in the composition, for example "a clear dark sky at the top for the title". Short titles come out cleanest.

Which format should I use for a movie poster or a cinematic still?

3:4 for a classic one-sheet, 9:16 for a phone-first poster or story, 16:9 for a cinematic still or a thumbnail. Every format costs the same, so pick it for where the image will be seen.

Why did Flare refuse my prompt?

Flare is moderated upstream by its provider, which refuses some prompts. A refusal returns content_blocked and costs nothing. Rephrase the scene, or use one of eroq's own engines, such as Eroq Uncensored or Eroq One, which are uncensored within the acceptable-use policy.