If youre on a tight $20 budget, Midjourney Basic Plan Monthly Subscription is basically your best bet for a Friday deadline. It costs $10 and works right out of the box. Just make sure to use the --style raw parameter or you get that plastic look. Leonardo.ai Apprentice Plan Monthly is another solid option at $12 if you want more control over skin texture specifically.

Ive been super satisfied with Black Forest Labs Flux.1 dev lately, honestly it handles skin pores way better than older models. If you need it done by Friday, Flux is definitely the move.

• Use a low guidance scale around 3.5 to avoid that plastic ai look.
• Try Fal.ai Flux Schnell API if you want to save cash, its basically pennies per image. Let me know if you want some specific prompt settings!

Regarding what #3 said about Good to know!

• honestly I think everyone jumps on the hype train way too fast. I tried the usual suspects and tbh had issues with the weird waxy skin textures that just wont go away no matter how much you tweak the prompt. It can be super frustrating when you have a deadline. My biggest warning is to avoid those cheap one-click generator sites that promise realistic results because they usually just slap a heavy filter on everything and it looks fake instantly. I was really disappointed with the output quality of most budget tools. They look fine on a tiny phone screen but the second you zoom in for a portfolio piece, the lack of detail is super obvious. Just be careful with those free trials that bait you in, half of them are just wrappers for models that are definitely not as good as expected. If you need pro results, focus on learning how to layer your generations rather than relying on one single tool to get it perfect on the first try.

Good to know!