Nano Banana Pro Manga Experiments: 3 Creative Use Cases Showcased by the Reddit Community

With the leak and subsequent testing of Nano Banana Pro (widely believed by the community to be the Google Gemini 3 Pro Image model), the AI art community on Reddit has begun exploring the limits of this new model. Although Nano Banana Pro is not a tool designed specifically for manga and currently cannot "one-click generate" complete comic books, creative netizens have uncovered its amazing potential in assisting manga creation through a series of experiments.

Based on test cases shared by Reddit users, here are the three most compelling application scenarios for Nano Banana Pro in the manga field today.

Case Study 1: Novel Visualization — From Pure Text to Manga Storyboards

For many novelists, transforming words into images is a constant challenge. Netizens have found that while Nano Banana Pro cannot directly "read" a whole novel and draw it, it excels at "Storyboard Visualization" when paired with a specific workflow.

The Workflow Explored by Netizens:

1. Text Pre-processing:Users do not feed the raw novel text directly to the image AI. Instead, they use the Gemini text model first to convert chapter content into detailed "Visual Descriptions."

2. Storyboard Generation:These descriptions are then used as prompts for Nano Banana Pro. Netizens discovered that it can understand complex composition instructions, such as:

In a black and white Dragon Ball Super style manga create this:
or
Create a black and white Dragon Ball Super style manga page...

• Followed by detailed definitions of character positioning and expressions for each Panel.

Key Discovery: A Breakthrough in Character Consistency

Typically, maintaining character likeness is difficult for AI, but Reddit users shared an effective trick: Uploading Concept Art.

• Users upload a "concept design" image of a character as a reference.

The prompt explicitly states: "Reference: uploaded image is that of [Character Name]".

• Result: Feedback suggests this method maintains excellent coherence across multiple turns, allowing even original characters to be recognizable across different storyboards.

Case Study 2: Auto-Coloring for Black & White Manga — Giving Visuals a "Cinematic Feel"

This is currently one of the highest-rated features of Nano Banana Pro. Many netizens tested uploading classic black-and-white manga panels and asking the AI to color them.

Effects Showcased by the Community:

Netizens discovered that complex color palettes or masks are not needed—simple natural language commands yield stunning results.

Common Command: "Color this in as best as you can and make sure it looks epic and cinematic."

• Feedback: The model didn't just fill in colors; it automatically understood lighting relationships, adding volume and atmosphere to originally flat black-and-white drawings.

Tip for Style Uniformity

Users pointed out that to prevent the color style from "jumping" randomly between pages, showing the AI an already colored page as a reference (Style Reference) helps maintain a unified tone for subsequent pages.

Case Study 3: Raw Manga "Translation + Typesetting" Experiment

This is an ambitious but currently imperfect experimental direction. Some netizens tried to make Nano Banana Pro do two things simultaneously: Coloring and Translation.

Experiment Results:

• Translation Capability: The model can identify text within manga bubbles and translate it into the target language. This shows great potential for obscure manga that hasn't been officially translated.

• Layout Issues: This is currently the "disaster zone." Netizens reported that while the translation is often correct, the AI frequently messes up the Text Bubble Layout, sometimes confusing the reading order or obscuring key artwork.

Conclusion: Currently, it is better suited as an auxiliary translation tool rather than a final typesetting tool.

Technical Limitations Feedback from the Community

While the demos on Reddit are exciting, netizens objectively summarized the current "fatal flaws" to remind everyone not to overhype the tool:

1. Action Scene Struggles: When handling intense fighting or combat scenes, the AI still tends to "break," with frequent errors in anatomy and perspective.

2. No PDF Support: Currently, the model cannot directly read manga books in PDF format; users must convert them to image formats first.

3. "Hallucinated" Backgrounds: During coloring, the AI sometimes "ad-libs" by adding elements like rain, clouds, or changing background details, which is interfering for creators aiming to stay faithful to the original.

4. Difficulty in Modification: If a generated image has a small error (like an extra hand), it is very hard to fix via prompt tweaking. Users are often forced to regenerate from scratch.

Summary:Nano Banana Pro is not yet a fully automated "manga artist," but experiments by Reddit users prove it is already an extremely powerful "Creative Co-pilot." Whether coloring black-and-white pages or rapidly visualizing novel plots, it demonstrates capabilities far beyond previous models. As the technology iterates, the dream of "Text-to-Manga" might truly be realized in the future.