# Contrast in four levels

Story / Hook / Visual hooks and animations. Checked 2026-11-13.

Tells you before you generate whether an idea is strange enough to stop a scroll.

- Use when: Scoring a concept for a still or an opening shot.
- Phrase: level 1, the delivery robot slumped at a bus stop; level 2, the same robot in a fur coat; level 3, holding a wilted flower and looking down the empty road
- Page: https://directorchair.ai/hook/contrast-ladder
- JSON: https://directorchair.ai/api/hook/contrast-ladder.json

## Watch out

- The four levels: in the place it belongs, in an unexpected situation, plus unexpected styling, plus feeling. The creator's claim is that social images stop the scroll from level 1 up; not measured by us. (practitioner; Director Chair notes on Seedance 2.5 realism (Dan Kieft))

## Prompts

### Nano Banana Pro

```
[your subject] in [your setting]. Level 1, the delivery robot slumped at a bus stop; level 2, the same robot in a fur coat; level 3, holding a wilted flower and looking down the empty road.
```

### Nano Banana 2

```
[your subject] in [your setting]. Level 1, the delivery robot slumped at a bus stop; level 2, the same robot in a fur coat; level 3, holding a wilted flower and looking down the empty road.
```

### GPT Image 2.5

```
A photograph of [your subject] in [your setting].
People and framing: level 1, the delivery robot slumped at a bus stop; level 2, the same robot in a fur coat; level 3, holding a wilted flower and looking down the empty road
Exclusions: no extra text, no watermark, no logo.
```

### Seedream 5

```
[your subject] in [your setting]. Level 1, the delivery robot slumped at a bus stop; level 2, the same robot in a fur coat; level 3, holding a wilted flower and looking down the empty road.
```

### Seedance 2.5

```
Scene: [your subject] in [your setting]. Level 1, the delivery robot slumped at a bus stop; level 2, the same robot in a fur coat; level 3, holding a wilted flower and looking down the empty road.
Shot 1 (0:00 to 0:05): one continuous shot
```

### Seedance 2.0

```
Scene: [your subject] in [your setting]. Level 1, the delivery robot slumped at a bus stop; level 2, the same robot in a fur coat; level 3, holding a wilted flower and looking down the empty road.
Shot 1: one continuous shot
```

### Kling 3.0

```
[your subject]. Level 1, the delivery robot slumped at a bus stop; level 2, the same robot in a fur coat; level 3, holding a wilted flower and looking down the empty road. The scene is [your setting].
```

### Veo 3.1

```
[your subject] in [your setting]. Level 1, the delivery robot slumped at a bus stop; level 2, the same robot in a fur coat; level 3, holding a wilted flower and looking down the empty road. Framing and subject stay as in the start image.
```

## Goes well with

- The image nobody could film: https://directorchair.ai/hook/impossible-image
- The object that should not be there: https://directorchair.ai/hook/curiosity-object
- Subject built from a symbol: https://directorchair.ai/composition/semantic-compounding

## Source

Own words from Director Chair notes on Seedance 2.5 realism (Dan Kieft)

Text CC BY 4.0, Director Chair (directorchair.ai). Reference clips and their card texts belong to their makers.