An attempt at pulling Illustrious towards semi realism. Worked well enough for my use case, I use it for original character design/concept ideation.
Works best with hires.
Versions are not 'updates' they're different styles.
V1 - More anime and 2D with clear line art and shading.
V2 - More realistic/ semi realistic than anime. you can push it either way.
Add to prompt: masterpiece, best quality, amazing quality,
(works without these as well)
Ratings: general, sensitive, explicit
(no guarantees of course)
Works well with DMD2 lora + LCM beta sampler for faster results.
4 steps + hires with 5-6 steps. (CFG at 1, Hires denoise at 0.3 - 3.5)
If you don't like DMD2 or need to squeeze more creativity and prompt adherence,
12-15 steps + hires with 15-25 steps with Euler or DPMPP2. (CFG 5 - 8, Hires denoise 0.3 - 0.65)
Resolutions that I use:
512x768 hires 2x
680x1024 hires 1.5x - 2x
512x1024 hires 15x - 2x
384x1024 hires 1.5x - 2x