Prompt library · Travel posters

Travel poster prompts that leave room for the lettering

Ten tested prompts in the mid-century and art deco travel poster tradition — funicular, chalk cliffs, canyon highway, fjord aurora, night train. Each card shows the unedited artwork, the model and the price, with the title space already reserved.

01How to prompt

How do you prompt for a vintage travel poster?

Three ingredients, then the scene. First the tradition: “mid-century screen-print travel poster”, “1930s railway poster”, “WPA national-park poster”, “1920s art deco poster” are four distinct visual languages, and naming one gets you its shapes, its stylisation and its printing artefacts. Second the palette, capped and listed: “limited palette of rust, ochre, dusty violet and cream”. Third the texture: “flat gouache colour blocks, subtle halftone grain, visible paper grain” is what makes it look printed rather than rendered. Only then describe the place — “a red funicular carriage climbing a steep alpine slope, snow peaks layered behind in flat bands, pine forest in the foreground”.

The fourth clause is the one people forget: reserve the type space. Every prompt here ends with “open sky band at the top and a clear strip at the bottom for typography” plus an explicit “no text, letters or numbers anywhere in the image”. Ask a model for the destination name and you get warped pseudo-lettering that no amount of squinting fixes; ask it to leave the space and you get artwork you can set real type on in five minutes. All ten below are unedited first outputs generated on BananaBanana, and four of them cost three cents each.

Can you make a poster of a real destination?

You can get remarkably close to the feel of a place, and remarkably far from its facts. Ask for a named city or landmark and the model returns a confident approximation: the right general silhouette, the wrong number of towers, a bridge that belongs to another river, a mountain that has drifted a few hundred kilometres. That is fine for evocative wall art and for series work where mood is the point — the deco skyline below is precisely that, a city that reads as a city and exists nowhere. It is not fine for a tourist board, a destination campaign or anything a traveller might use to recognise a place.

So the working method is: prompt for the geography rather than the name — “sheer dark cliffs falling into still black water with a cluster of lit wooden cabins on the shore” instead of a place name — and add the name yourself with the typography. That also keeps you clear of the other trap, which is asking for the style of a named living illustrator. The traditions above are broad historical movements, not one person's signature look, and that distinction matters if the poster is going to be sold.

02The prompts

10 prompts, real results

Every image below is the unedited output of the prompt on its card — no cherry-picking across dozens of attempts, no retouching. The model badge shows exactly what generated it and what it cost.

AI-generated travel posters example — Alpine funicular, made with Nano Banana 2 on BananaBanana

Alpine funicular

Nano Banana 2$0.06 / image

Vintage travel poster illustration in mid-century screen-print style: a red funicular carriage climbing a steep alpine slope, snow-capped peaks layered behind it in flat bands of teal, indigo and cream, pine forest in the foreground, a low sun disc behind the summit. Bold simplified shapes, limited six-colour palette, visible paper grain, gentle geometric stylisation. Wide empty sky band at the top and a clear strip along the bottom reserved for typography. Absolutely no text, letters or numbers anywhere in the image.

AI-generated travel posters example — Chalk cliffs and lighthouse, made with Nano Banana 2 on BananaBanana

Chalk cliffs and lighthouse

Nano Banana 2$0.06 / image

Vintage travel poster illustration in 1930s railway-poster style: a white lighthouse on the edge of tall chalk cliffs, turquoise sea breaking into flat white foam shapes below, gulls as simple marks in a pale sky, a grassy headland in the foreground. Flat gouache colour blocks, limited palette of chalk white, sea green and warm sand, subtle halftone texture. Empty sky across the upper third and a clean band at the bottom for typography. No text, letters or numbers anywhere in the image.

AI-generated travel posters example — Canyon highway, made with Nano Banana 2 Lite on BananaBanana

Canyon highway

Nano Banana 2 Lite$0.03 / image

Vintage travel poster illustration in WPA national-park style: an empty two-lane highway curving between towering red sandstone buttes, long shadows across the desert floor, sagebrush dotting the foreground, a huge sun low over the horizon. Flat stylised colour blocks in rust, ochre, dusty violet and cream, hard-edged shapes, screen-print texture. Clear open sky at the top and an uncluttered strip at the bottom for typography. No text, letters or numbers anywhere.

AI-generated travel posters example — Tropical lagoon, made with Nano Banana 2 Lite on BananaBanana

Tropical lagoon

Nano Banana 2 Lite$0.03 / image

Vintage travel poster illustration of a tropical lagoon: a curving white sand spit, water shading from pale mint to deep teal in flat bands, three leaning coconut palms on the left, a small wooden outrigger boat pulled up on the sand, layered green hills across the bay. Mid-century screen-print style, limited palette, simplified shapes, subtle paper grain. Empty sky at the top and a clean lower band for typography. No text, letters or numbers anywhere.

AI-generated travel posters example — Fjord under the aurora, made with Nano Banana Pro on BananaBanana

Fjord under the aurora

Nano Banana Pro$0.11 / image

Vintage travel poster illustration of a northern fjord under the aurora: green and violet ribbons of northern lights sweeping across a deep navy sky, sheer dark cliffs falling into still black water, a tiny cluster of lit wooden cabins on the shore, snow on the ridgelines. Art deco stylisation with flat layered shapes, limited palette of navy, jade, violet and warm lamp yellow, fine screen-print grain. Large open sky band at the top and a clear strip at the bottom for typography. No text, letters or numbers anywhere in the image.

AI-generated travel posters example — Rice terraces at dawn, made with Nano Banana 2 on BananaBanana

Rice terraces at dawn

Nano Banana 2$0.06 / image

Vintage travel poster illustration of terraced rice fields at dawn: curved contour terraces stepping down a misty valley, each flooded paddy catching pink and gold reflections, a single figure in a conical hat on a narrow path, layered blue hills fading into haze behind. Mid-century screen-print style, flat layered shapes, limited palette of jade, rose, gold and slate blue, soft paper grain. Open misty sky at the top and a clean band at the bottom for typography. No text, letters or numbers anywhere.

AI-generated travel posters example — Night train platform, made with Nano Banana Pro on BananaBanana

Night train platform

Nano Banana Pro$0.11 / image

Vintage travel poster illustration of a night railway platform: a streamlined blue sleeper train standing at the platform with warm glowing windows, steam curling around the wheels, a station canopy of iron arches receding into the dark, a single traveller with a suitcase silhouetted against the light. Art deco stylisation, dramatic perspective down the platform, limited palette of midnight blue, brass and lamp gold, screen-print texture. Dark open band at the top and a clean strip at the bottom for typography. No text, letters, numbers or signage anywhere.

AI-generated travel posters example — Sailing regatta, made with Nano Banana 2 Lite on BananaBanana

Sailing regatta

Nano Banana 2 Lite$0.03 / image

Vintage travel poster illustration of a coastal sailing regatta: three sloops heeling over in a stiff breeze, plain white and cream sails as bold overlapping shapes, choppy navy water with flat white crests, a distant rocky headland and a clean bright sky. 1930s poster style, hard-edged flat colour, limited palette of navy, sky blue, cream and signal red, subtle halftone grain. Empty sky across the top and a clear lower band for typography. No text, letters, numbers or sail markings anywhere.

AI-generated travel posters example — Balloons over the valley, made with Nano Banana 2 on BananaBanana

Balloons over the valley

Nano Banana 2$0.06 / image

Vintage travel poster illustration of hot air balloons over a river valley at sunrise: five striped balloons at different heights and scales, patchwork fields and a winding river below, low mist lying in the hollows, layered hills in flat bands of lavender and blue. Mid-century screen-print style, simplified geometric shapes, warm palette of apricot, coral, cream and dusty blue, paper grain. Generous open sky for typography at the top and a clean band at the bottom. No text, letters or numbers anywhere.

AI-generated travel posters example — Art deco city skyline, made with Nano Banana Pro on BananaBanana

Art deco city skyline

Nano Banana Pro$0.11 / image

Vintage travel poster illustration of a generic art deco city skyline at dusk: stepped skyscrapers in flat silhouette layers, warm lit windows scattered across them, a sweeping suspension bridge crossing the foreground water, radiating sunburst rays behind the towers. 1920s art deco poster style, strong symmetry, limited palette of deep teal, gold, coral and cream, fine screen-print texture. Open sky band at the top and a clear strip at the bottom for typography. No text, letters, numbers or signage anywhere.

03Technique

What makes these work

Name the poster tradition

“1930s railway poster”, “WPA national-park poster” and “1920s art deco poster” are three different sets of shapes, palettes and printing artefacts. Without one of them you get a generic digital landscape with none of the period's flatness.

Cap and list the palette

“Limited palette of rust, ochre, dusty violet and cream” is what makes a set of posters look like a series. Left open, each generation invents its own colour scheme and the wall they hang on falls apart.

Reserve the type band, never ask for the type

End every prompt with the empty sky band, the clean bottom strip and an explicit “no text, letters or numbers”. Generated lettering is warped in a way that is obvious at poster size; real type takes five minutes in any layout tool.

Prompt the geography, add the name yourself

Named landmarks come back approximately wrong. Describe the terrain — cliffs, terraces, buttes, fjord — and put the destination name in the typography, where it's accurate by construction.

04More prompts

Keep browsing

05Learn more

Guides from the blog

06FAQ

Travel posters prompts, answered

How do I add the destination name?

In any layout tool — Figma, Affinity, Canva, InDesign. Place the artwork, set the name in the sky band the prompt reserved and a smaller line in the bottom strip. A condensed geometric sans or a period slab both sit naturally against this style, and you can retitle the whole series in minutes.

What size should I generate for printing?

Generate at 2K on Nano Banana 2 or Pro for anything you'll print. An A2 poster at 200 dpi needs about 3300 pixels on the long edge, so 2K plus a light upscale covers most home and print-shop work. Lite's 1K is fine for social, thumbnails and choosing between concepts.

Can I sell posters made this way?

You own what you generate on BananaBanana, so yes in principle. Two cautions: don't ask for the style of a named living illustrator, and don't present an invented view as a real place — print-on-demand platforms increasingly ask you to declare AI-generated work, and answering honestly is not a barrier.

How do I keep a series consistent?

Fix the tradition clause, the palette list and the texture clause, and change only the scene. That trio is the series' identity; rewriting it for each destination produces ten posters that don't belong together.

Which model is best here?

Flat, limited-palette illustration is the easiest thing for a small model to get right, so Lite at $0.03 holds up well — three of these are Lite. Step up to Nano Banana 2 for layered depth and mist, and to Pro for the ones with fine screen-print grain and dramatic perspective, like the aurora, the night platform and the deco skyline.

Copy a prompt, make it yours

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