I compared Google's New Imagen 3 with Midjourney V6
Comparing Imagen 3 and Midjourney V6 using 10 prompts. Which one is better?
At the Google IO 2024 event, Google announced a slew of brand-new products and huge AI updates. One of the major announcements was the brand new version of its text-to-image AI tool, Imagen 3.
Based on what they showcased during the announcement, there has been a significant improvement in visual quality. Imagen 3 has reached a level where it can easily compete with Midjourney v6.
But how do these two AI image generators compare side by side?
Let’s dive in and find out.
Prompt #1: Three women laughing
Three women stand together laughing, with one woman slightly out of focus in the foreground. The sun is setting behind the women, creating a lens flare and a warm glow that highlights their hair and creates a bokeh effect in the background. The photography style is candid and captures a genuine moment of connection and happiness between friends. The warm light of golden hour lends a nostalgic and intimate feel to the image
Both images look gorgeous, and the people in the frames are incredibly photorealistic. If I had to choose between the two, I’d still prefer the image generated by Midjourney. The specular reflection looks better, and the skin texture is smoother, giving a more natural feel to the candid moment.
Prompt #2: Bouquet of flowers
A large, colorful bouquet of flowers in an old blue glass vase on the table. In front is one beautiful peony flower surrounded by various other blossoms like roses, lilies, daisies, orchids, fruits, berries, green leaves. The background is dark gray. Oil painting in the style of the Dutch Golden Age.
Imagen 3 takes the win here. The softer and warmer tone of the overall image makes me want to hang it on my wall. While Midjourney also did a great job, it often uses wildly saturated colors that can take away from the naturalism of the result.
Prompt #3: Digital cartoon
A weathered, wooden mech robot covered in flowering vines stands peacefully in a field of tall wildflowers, with a small bluebird resting on its outstretched hand. Digital cartoon, with warm colors and soft lines. A large cliff with a waterfall looms behind.
Imagen 3 did a better job on this one. Despite trying several times, Midjourney continuously fails to adhere completely to the prompt — the robot does not stretch its hand and is not looking at the bird, which diminishes the emotional impact present in the first image.
Prompt #4: Human hands
A view of a person’s hand as they hold a little clay figurine of a bird in their hand and sculpt it with a modeling tool in their other hand. You can see the sculptor’s scarf. Their hands are covered in clay dust. a macro DSLR image highlighting the texture and craftsmanship.
I remember the days when everyone was talking about how bad AI image generators render hands and limbs. Today, almost all AI models have improved a lot in that aspect and the examples above represent that progress.
Comparing the two images, the sculptor’s hand is covered in clay dust in the Midjourney-generated image, while it’s very clean in the Imagen 3 version.
Prompt #5: Text rendering on a speech bubble
A single comic book panel of a boy and his father on a grassy hill, staring at the sunset. A speech bubble points from the boy’s mouth and says: ‘The sun will rise again’. Muted, late 1990s coloring style
In this example, to be fair to Midjourney, I tried generating the image five times but failed to get the correct text rendered. Even after adding quotes to the text to fit Midjourney’s text rendering rules, it wasn’t able to render the text properly.
Prompt #6: Fine details
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