# Creative controls

> Pickers set camera, lighting, mood, style, subjects and motion without rewriting prompts. See how they work, how to combine them and where to connect them.

Source: https://nodaro.ai/docs/guides/creative-controls

**Creative controls** are pickers: nodes that each set one part of the look of an image or a video. Examples are the camera angle, the light, the mood and the subject's pose. You choose an option from a grid of pictures. The picker then adds tested wording for it to the prompt of every node you connect it to. A picker never calls a model, so it costs no credits, and you can change the look without rewriting your prompt.

## How a picker works

1. You add a picker from the **Creative Controls** tab of the node picker, for example **Creative Controls › Light & Look › Mood**.
2. You choose an option in the picker's grid. Each tile shows what the option looks like.
3. You connect the picker to an image, video or audio node.
4. When that node runs, the picker's wording is added to the end of its prompt.

To see the exact words a picker adds, switch the picker node to the **Prompt** or **Both** display mode. The settings panel shows the same text under **Will inject into prompt**.

Every picker also has two free-text fields. **Pre Text** is added before the picker's wording and **Post Text** after it. Use them for a detail the catalog does not have, such as `with tears in her eyes`.

## The picker families

| Family | Pickers | Connect to |
| --- | --- | --- |
| **Subject** | [Person](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/person), [Animal](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/animal), [Vehicle](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/vehicle), [Weapon](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/weapon) | **Elements** |
| **Wardrobe & Pose** | [Styling](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/styling), [Pose](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/pose) | **Elements** |
| **Scene** | [Setting](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/setting), [Era / Period](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/era), [Furniture](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/furniture), [Held Prop](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/held-prop), [Material](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/material), [Backdrop](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/backdrop), [Loop Subject](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/loop-subject) | **Look** for Setting, Era / Period and Backdrop; **Elements** for Furniture, Held Prop and Material |
| **Camera** | [Framing](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/framing), [Lens](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/lens), [Camera / Film Stock](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/camera-format), [Exposure Settings](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/exposure-settings) | **Look** |
| **Light & Look** | [Lighting](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/lighting), [Color / Look](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/color-look), [Mood](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/mood), [Atmosphere](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/atmosphere), [Style](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/style), [Photo Genre](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/photo-genre), [Photographer / Artist Style](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/photographer), [Render Quality](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/render-quality), [Aesthetic / Microtrend](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/aesthetic) | **Look** |
| **Motion & Time** | [Camera Motion](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/camera-motion), [Temporal](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/temporal), [Character Motion](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/character-motion) | **Look** on video nodes |
| **Effects** | [Action FX](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/action-fx), [Character FX](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/character-fx), [Composition Effects](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/composition-effects), [Post-Process Effects](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/post-process-effects), [Transition](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/transition) | **Look**, or **Elements** for Action FX on video |
| **Music & Voice** | [Music Genre](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/music-genre), [Music Mood](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/music-mood), [Instrumentation](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/instrumentation), [Voice Character](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/voice-character), [Voice Delivery](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/voice-delivery) | Music and voice nodes |

The Music & Voice family also holds [Suno Voice](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/suno-voice). Instead of adding words to a prompt, it creates a singer persona from a short recording.

## Where to connect a picker

[Generate Image](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/image/generate-image) and [Generate Video](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/video/generate-video) have two inputs for pickers. The editor accepts a picker only on the input that fits its family, and refuses a connection that does not fit.

| Input | What it takes | Examples |
| --- | --- | --- |
| **Look** | Camera and look pickers | Style, Lens, Lighting, Color / Look, Framing, Camera / Film Stock, Mood, Atmosphere, Era / Period, Backdrop, Camera Motion, Temporal, Transition, Character FX |
| **Elements** | Subject pickers | Person, Pose, Animal, Vehicle, Weapon, Furniture, Material, Held Prop, Styling |

The music pickers feed music nodes such as [Suno Create Music](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/audio/suno-create-music), [Generate Music](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/audio/generate-music) and [Text to Audio](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/audio/text-to-audio). The voice pickers describe a voice for [Voice Design](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/audio/voice-design).

You can also connect any picker to a [Text](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/automate/text), [Combine Text](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/automate/combine-text) or [Prompt](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/automate/prompt) node, to use its wording inside a longer text.

## Combine pickers

Connect as many pickers as you need to one node. Each picker adds its own wording to the end of the prompt.

Workflow: Framing and Lighting set the look, Person sets the subject, and Camera Motion moves the camera in the video.

- Text → Generate Image (prompt)
- Framing → Generate Image (look)
- Lighting → Generate Image (look)
- Person → Generate Image (elements)
- Generate Image → Generate Video (start frame)
- Camera Motion → Generate Video (look)

- **One picker, many nodes.** Connect one picker to several image or video nodes to keep the same look across a whole series.
- **One picker per scene.** In a story, give each scene its own picker, such as its own Mood, so each scene can differ.
- **Stack light, color and mood.** A melancholic [Mood](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/mood) with blue-hour [Lighting](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/lighting) and a cold [Color / Look](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/color-look) reads stronger than any one of them alone.
- **Use Compact when many pickers feed one node.** The prompt stays short, and each choice keeps its professional term.

## Full or Compact

Every catalog picker can add its choice in two ways. Both describe the same choice.

| Mode | What it adds | Example for Framing, medium close-up | Use it when |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| **Full** (default) | The longer description | `medium close-up, subject framed from the chest up` | The model needs more to work with, or the picker is the only look control |
| **Compact** | Only the short professional term | `medium close-up` | Many pickers feed one node, or the model already knows the term |

Switch the mode with the **Prompt hint** toggle at the top of the picker node. The same toggle sits beside the **Will inject into prompt** preview in the settings panel. **Pre Text** and **Post Text** are added in both modes. The mode is saved with the node, so it survives copy and paste, [presets](https://nodaro.ai/docs/concepts/presets) and [export](https://nodaro.ai/docs/guides/import-export).

**Transition is the exception.** A transition is always written as its term followed by its description, in both modes. Video models did not perform a transition from its term alone.

The nodes in the **Generation Settings** tab have no **Prompt hint** toggle, because no catalog wording stands behind them. Examples are [Provider](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/settings/provider), [Aspect Ratio](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/settings/aspect-ratio), [Duration](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/settings/duration) and [Tone](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/settings/tone).

### Pickers inside pickers

[Camera Motion](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/camera-motion) and [Transition](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/transition) can take other pickers on their start-state and end-state inputs, and write one sentence from all of them. When you set Camera Motion or Transition to **Compact**, the pickers connected to it follow, so the sentence stays at one level of detail. A connected picker whose own mode you set explicitly, even to **Full**, keeps its own mode.

## Real renders or illustrations

On Nodaro Cloud, the Look and Camera pickers show each option as a real render: the same base picture put through that option. Camera Motion shows a short, silent clip. [Camera Motion Lab](https://nodaro.ai/docs/research/camera-motion-lab) explains how its wording was tested, move by move. Each of these pickers also has a drawn illustration, and you choose which one a node shows.

- **Which pickers.** Camera Motion, Color / Look, Style, Lens, Lighting, Atmosphere, Camera / Film Stock, Framing and Mood. Era / Period and Composition Effects have no illustration, so they always show the render.
- **Where to switch.** Hover over the node in the **Picks** or **Both** display mode. A two-icon switch sits beside the selected option's title: a film icon for the real render and a pen icon for the illustration. The settings panel and the full-screen picker have the same switch.
- **What it changes.** Only the pictures. The wording added to the prompt stays the same.
- **What is remembered.** The choice is saved on the node. Your last choice for each picker type is remembered in your browser for the next node of that type.
- **In apps.** A published app's input shows the creator's choice, with no switch.

Self-hosted installs show the illustrations only.

## Use a picker's choice inside a prompt

You can also put a picker's choice in the middle of your own sentence. Write the picker's label in curly braces, such as `{Mood}`, and the prompt gets the picker's current wording at that place. `{person || man}` uses the connected Person picker when there is one, and the word "man" when there is not. Read more in [Prompt variables](https://nodaro.ai/docs/concepts/prompt-variables).

## Fill pickers from a picture

The [Describe to Picker](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/image/describe-to-picker) node looks at an image and fills in the pickers you connect to it. It works with [Person](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/person), [Styling](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/styling), [Framing](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/framing), [Lens](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/lens) and [Camera / Film Stock](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/creative-controls/camera-format). Use it to copy the look of a reference picture into your own pickers. It costs 10 credits per run, however many pickers you connect.

## Pickers from code

The same choices are available to code and to AI assistants. The image and video generation requests accept a `direction` object of picker option ids, such as `{ "shotSize": "wide-shot", "timeOfDay": "golden-hour" }`. Nodaro writes the matching wording into the prompt. To build Nodaro's pickers into your own app, read [Picker catalogs](https://nodaro.ai/docs/developers/picker-catalogs).

## Frequently asked questions

### What is a picker in Nodaro?

A picker is a node from the Creative Controls tab, such as Mood, Lens or Lighting. You choose an option from a grid of pictures, and the picker adds tested wording for it to the prompt of every node it is connected to.

### Do pickers cost credits?

No. A picker never calls a model. It only adds words to a prompt, so you pay only for the generation node that uses it.

### Where do I connect a picker on Generate Image?

Connect camera and look pickers, such as Lighting, Lens and Mood, to the Look input. Connect subject pickers, such as Person, Pose and Styling, to the Elements input. The editor refuses a connection that does not fit.

### What is the difference between Full and Compact?

Full adds a longer description of the choice, which gives the model more to work with. Compact adds only the short professional term, which keeps the prompt short when many pickers feed one node.

### Why do my pickers show drawings instead of example photos?

Real example renders are available on Nodaro Cloud. Self-hosted installs show drawn illustrations only. On Nodaro Cloud, the switch beside the selected option changes between the two.