light-pop-portrait

Imported from okou-ai/vm0-skills (illustration-template/light-pop-portrait/SKILL.md). Install upstream with npx skills add okou-ai/vm0-skills --skill light-pop-portrait. Copyright stays with the author.

/light-pop-portrait — locked light hand-drawn character portrait style

This style produces single-character portrait illustrations on a fully saturated solid color block. The mood is light and playful (chunky hair, big shiny eyes, star-sparkle blush, one expressive prop). The format is pop (one saturated solid color filling the canvas, ~5-color palette, no gradients). The line quality is light — thin, slightly wavy, hand-drawn — never thick or stamped.

Each invocation swaps a small set of dials. The locked frame (character anatomy, line quality, surface, background-as-block, star-sparkle blush) never moves.

Prompt interpretation

The user will usually give a short brief — sometimes just an expression ("sleepy"), sometimes a pose plus a palette ("cheering arms up, magenta"), sometimes a near-complete mini-portrait ("zen androgynous kid with a beret holding a tiny bird, deep teal"). Translate that into a full portrait brief without stopping to ask:

1. Pick an expression — the emotional anchor of the piece (cheerful, sleepy, surprised, sly, laughing, zen, pouty, daydreaming, teary, embarrassed).
2. Pick a hairstyle from the catalogue (blunt bob + bangs, twin braids, fluffy afro curls, mushroom bowl cut, spiky bedhead, side-parted slick, high ponytail, double buns, side braid).
3. Decide gender register — girl, boy, or androgynous; always in the child-to-tween age range.
4. Pick a pose that fits the expression (head-and-shoulders, chest-up, leaning on hand, both hands up, hugging-prop, full-body seated, side profile).
5. Pick one saturated background hue — the single color filling the entire canvas behind the character.
6. Optionally add headwear (bucket hat, beret, hairband + bow, headband, glasses, none).
7. Pick one signature prop that the character interacts with (umbrella, popsicle, cherry, frog, bunny, bird, balloon, lantern, book, instrument).
8. Pick the outfit register (striped tee, overalls, sweater, pajamas, raincoat, sundress, hoodie).
9. Honor the locked frame — anatomy, line quality, flat fills, saturated background, star-sparkle blush — those never move.

Bias toward playful character moments where one expression + one prop carry the whole composition. Avoid crowded scenes, multiple characters, or heavy environmental staging — this style is a portrait, not a scene.

Locked style axes (NEVER vary)

Character anatomy

• Single character per piece — never a group, never a duo
• Child-to-tween proportions — large head relative to body, shoulders and chest fit comfortably in the frame
• Round face shape with a soft pointed chin; cheeks rounded but not exaggerated
• Big round shiny eyes — black filled pupils with a single small white glint per eye, thin black lashes above (never below)
• Tiny round red nose — a small red circle dot, centered between eyes and mouth, ~1/6 the size of an eye
• Small expressive mouth — a short curved line for closed smiles, a small rounded shape for open mouths; teeth shown only for big laughing grins
• Hair is glossy chunky black — solid black fill, never gradient, slight glossy highlight allowed as a thin lighter stroke on the crown
• Hair always has a small flyaway strand or two — one or two stray wisps sticking out from the silhouette to keep it from looking stamped

Line quality

• Thin delicate slightly-wavy black contour lines — light hand-drawn feel, NOT thick, NOT bold, NOT uniformly stamped
• Lines have small natural irregularities — the contour breathes; perfect arcs feel wrong here
• No double-stroke, but minor variation in line weight along a single contour is welcome
• The whole canvas should read as if drawn by a confident but light hand

Star-sparkle blush

• Two pink five-point-star sparkles on the cheeks — small five-point stars, ONE per cheek, sitting just under the eye
• NEVER solid round dots — this is the most commonly-failed locked detail; specify "five-point stars, not circles" if a model drifts
• Stars are a soft warm pink, slightly transparent or fully filled — never red, never saturated magenta

Surface

• Flat solid color fills only — no gradients, no airbrush, no shading, no halftone, no riso grain, no paper texture
• The canvas is plastic-clean — no organic texture anywhere
• Subtle cel-shading is acceptable as a single flat shadow tone on the prop or under the hat brim, but is optional; most pieces are pure flat

Background

• One fully saturated single hue filling the entire canvas — no gradient, no vignette, no second color band, no horizon strip, no border, no frame
• The character sits cleanly on top of the color block with no environment behind them
• Hue is one from the palette dial below

Composition

• Square 1:1 canvas (1024×1024 recommended)
• Single portrait — the character is the only subject; the prop is held by or near the character, not staged independently
• Character occupies the center of the frame, head + shoulders to upper torso minimum, full body for full-body seated
• Clean negative space around the silhouette — the color block must breathe
• No text, no logos, no captions, no headlines

Palette discipline

• Limit ~5 total colors per piece — background + hair-black + skin tone + 1-2 outfit colors + the prop's primary color
• Skin is a soft warm beige or peach, slightly desaturated; never bright orange, never pale white
• Hair is always solid black with optional one-stroke gloss

Variable axes (the eight dials)

These are the only things that should change between pieces.

Brief template

When generating, expand the user's input into this internal brief before describing the image to the model:

Expression: <one phrase — what emotion the face carries>
Hairstyle: <cut + length + any small detail like a braid or bow>
Gender register: <girl / boy / androgynous, child–tween>
Pose: <verb + body language>
Background hue: <one saturated color filling the canvas>
Headwear: <bucket hat / beret / hairband / glasses / none>
Prop: <the one object held or near the character>
Outfit: <one or two layered pieces in a flat palette>
Color count: 5 max

Worked examples

Six locked-style portraits, each holding the frame and varying the eight dials.

Example 1 — cheerful girl · yellow bucket hat · mushroom umbrella · cobalt

cheerful girl with mushroom umbrella, cobalt

• Expression: cheerful, small upturned smile, big shiny eyes
• Hairstyle: blunt bob with bangs + one tiny side braid tied with a pink bow
• Gender: girl
• Pose: chest-up, holding the prop in front of her
• Background hue: cobalt blue
• Headwear: mustard-yellow bucket rain hat with a tiny white duck patch
• Prop: small red mushroom-shaped umbrella with curly handle
• Outfit: green-and-cream horizontal-striped collared shirt

Example 2 — surprised boy · spiky bedhead · frog · mint

surprised boy with frog, mint

• Expression: surprised "O" mouth, eyebrows up
• Hairstyle: spiky messy bedhead, clumpy black tufts
• Gender: boy
• Pose: chest-up, both palms raised near the face in surprise
• Background hue: muted mint green
• Headwear: none
• Prop: tiny green frog perched on one palm
• Outfit: tomato-red short-sleeve tee

Example 3 — sleepy girl · fluffy afro · stuffed bunny · peach

sleepy girl with bunny, peach

• Expression: sleepy half-lidded droopy eyes mid-yawn, one hand softly covering the mouth
• Hairstyle: big fluffy round black afro
• Gender: girl
• Pose: chest-up, hugging the prop against her
• Background hue: warm peach coral
• Headwear: none
• Prop: small white stuffed bunny held to her chest
• Outfit: pastel pink pajamas with tiny stars

Example 4 — sly boy · mushroom bowl cut · popsicle · lavender

sly boy with popsicle, lavender

• Expression: sly smirking smile, one cheek pulled up
• Hairstyle: glossy mushroom bowl cut with blunt straight bangs
• Gender: boy
• Pose: chest-up leaning sideways with chin propped on one hand
• Background hue: lavender purple
• Headwear: none
• Prop: half-eaten orange popsicle dripping slightly
• Outfit: navy striped overall over a white tee

Example 5 — laughing girl · twin braids · cheering · magenta

laughing girl with twin braids, magenta

• Expression: huge joyful open laughing grin showing the top row of teeth, eyes squeezed into happy crescent curves
• Hairstyle: two very long thick black twin braids tied with red ribbons
• Gender: girl
• Pose: chest-up, both arms thrown up in a cheering pose with fists in the air
• Background hue: hot magenta pink
• Headwear: none
• Prop: implied (no physical prop — the celebration itself is the focus)
• Outfit: sunny yellow dress with a white collar

Example 6 — zen androgynous kid · beret + bird · deep teal

zen androgynous kid with songbird, teal

• Expression: peaceful serene closed-eye zen smile
• Hairstyle: side-parted neat black hair
• Gender: androgynous
• Pose: full-body seated cross-legged, one hand raised
• Background hue: deep forest teal
• Headwear: small dark green beret tilted on top of the head
• Prop: tiny yellow songbird perched on the index finger
• Outfit: cream turtleneck with a tiny gold pin

Anti-patterns

• ❌ Solid round dots for blush — must be five-point pink stars, this is the most commonly-failed detail
• ❌ Thick, bold, stamped, or uniform-weight outlines — must be thin, delicate, slightly wavy
• ❌ Multiple characters in the foreground — one character per piece, always
• ❌ Gradient background, vignette, second color band, scenery photo — the field must be a single flat saturated hue
• ❌ Photorealism, 3D modeling, soft airbrush, halftone, riso grain, paper texture, pencil shading — flat only
• ❌ Crowded composition with no negative space — the color block must breathe around the character
• ❌ Headlines, captions, in-image text, or logos — never any baked-in typography
• ❌ Adult proportions — the character is always in the child-to-tween age range
• ❌ Open mouths with full teeth detail unless the expression is a big laughing grin
• ❌ Stamped, perfectly symmetric hair silhouettes — there should always be one or two small flyaway strands

Output evaluation checklist

Before declaring a piece done, verify:

• A single character is present in child-to-tween register
• Hair is glossy solid black with at least one small flyaway strand
• Big round shiny eyes with a single white glint each, tiny round red nose, expressive mouth
• Pink five-point star sparkle blush on each cheek (NOT solid dots)
• Thin delicate slightly-wavy black contour lines, hand-drawn feel
• Background is one fully saturated solid color filling the canvas edge-to-edge
• Flat solid fills only — no gradients, no texture, no shading
• One signature prop interacts with the character; no second character
• Color count stays at roughly five total
• No text, no logos, no captions in the image
• Composition has breathable negative space around the silhouette

Portability note

This style is described at the semantic level — what the image must look like, not which model produces it. It generates cleanly on broad-distribution image models when given the anchor reference plus the brief expansion above. Models with strong character-anatomy coherence (nano-banana edit, GPT-Image-2 with reference, Seedream 5) tend to preserve the star-sparkle blush and the light line quality most reliably. If a model drifts the blush into solid pink dots, repeat the constraint twice in the prompt ("five-point star sparkles, not solid dots"). If a model drifts the line weight thicker, repeat "thin delicate slightly-wavy hand-drawn lines, NOT thick or stamped" near the end of the brief.