Ideogram V4.5 Edit: change one part of a photo, keep the rest
Ideogram V4.5 Edit changes a photo from a written instruction, with masks and high precision. Five myths about AI edits, and prompts that work.
Ideogram V4.5 Edit takes a photo you already have and a sentence about what should change. It can also take up to four guidance pictures, a mask that marks the exact area to touch, and a precision switch that puts back every pixel you did not ask to change. People come to editing models with a few beliefs that cost them retries. Here are five of them, and what this model actually does.
Myth 1: an edit always redraws the whole picture
With the default regular precision the model works from your instruction and may adjust the picture around the change. Switch edit precision to high and it restores the unchanged pixels afterwards, so a face, a logo or the grain of a wall stays as it was. One rule comes with it: leave the size field empty when you use high precision.
Myth 2: you have to paint a mask for every edit
You do not. For many changes, a clear sentence is enough: replace the sky, make the jacket red, add snow to the roof. A mask is worth the effort when the area is small or the photo is busy and the model keeps touching the wrong thing.
Replace the grey overcast sky with a clear late afternoon sky, soft orange light near the horizon. Keep the buildings, the people and the street exactly as they are.Myth 3: any black and white picture will do as a mask
The mask must match the source in size, and the colours have fixed meanings: black marks the area to edit, white marks what to keep. It must contain both. An all-black mask is not a shortcut to a full redraw; it is simply rejected. The mask sits under the advanced settings.
In the masked area, replace the coffee cup with a small glass vase holding three white tulips. Match the window light and the shadow direction of the table.Myth 4: guidance pictures are a style filter
Reference images guide what the new content should look like: a specific lamp, a pattern, a colour of paint. You can add up to four, or three when you also use a mask. Name them in the prompt, the lamp from the first guidance image, so the model knows which detail to take from where.
Replace the plain wall behind the sofa with the patterned wallpaper from the first guidance image. Keep the sofa, the cushions and the floor lamp unchanged, and keep the room's warm evening light.Myth 5: higher quality is always worth it
Quality has four steps, very low to high, and it is also the price tier. Very low and low are good for checking whether the model understood the instruction at all; medium is the default; high is for the version you keep. The size field lets you set an output like 2048*2048, or stay empty to match the source.
What it does not do well
It edits; it does not invent a new photo from nothing, so start from a picture that is already close. Large changes to people, such as a new pose or a different face, tend to look pasted in. If your job is lettering on a sign or a poster from scratch, Ideogram V4.5 and its typography guide fit better, and for swapping words inside an existing picture see changing text in an image. More on wording in the edit prompts guide.
Questions
What does high edit precision do?
It restores the pixels you did not ask to change, so the rest of the photo stays as it was. Leave the size field empty when you use it.
Which colour marks the edit area in the mask?
Black is edited, white is kept. The mask must be the same size as the source and contain both colours.
How many guidance images can I add?
Up to four, or up to three when you also upload a mask.
