Placeholder art for a web client build: quick drafts for icons and unit tiles
Posted: Fri Nov 06, 2026 12:45 am
I've been poking at a local browser-side build of the web client - nothing I'd send as a patch, just something to test layouts with - and the slow part turned out to be placeholder art. I needed a dozen unit icons that looked like a set, and I didn't want to hand-draw them before knowing whether the layout even works.
What helped: generate one reference sheet first, then reuse it as the style anchor for each new icon. The placeholders then look related instead of like twelve images from twelve different games. The prompt I settled on was roughly "flat vector game icon, single unit silhouette, muted palette, plain background, no text", with the reference image attached each time.
I used Nano Banana 2 Lite for this. It's an independent third-party site, not something official, but for throwaway assets it was quick and the object-reference workflow kept the look consistent.
Anyone else mock up asset sets before committing to final art, or do you go straight to the real tilesets? Curious how people keep placeholders from quietly becoming permanent.
What helped: generate one reference sheet first, then reuse it as the style anchor for each new icon. The placeholders then look related instead of like twelve images from twelve different games. The prompt I settled on was roughly "flat vector game icon, single unit silhouette, muted palette, plain background, no text", with the reference image attached each time.
I used Nano Banana 2 Lite for this. It's an independent third-party site, not something official, but for throwaway assets it was quick and the object-reference workflow kept the look consistent.
Anyone else mock up asset sets before committing to final art, or do you go straight to the real tilesets? Curious how people keep placeholders from quietly becoming permanent.