How to use my workflows. A Comprehensive Breakdown

Introduction:

I got into ComfyUI about 6 months ago. I'm an engineer and a carpenter, so I get a lot of enjoyment out of building really cool stuff. Hopefully you can appreciate my efforts.

In this guide, I'll cover the following:

1. A brief overview of each setion and it's capabilities.

2. Setup & Installation of custom nodes, including errors or issues.

3. Initial setup and run, including a breakdown.

4. Hi Rez fix, Upscalers, Detailers, & Post Production

5. Troubleshooting and common issues.

6. Advanced Options.

1. Overview

I've used my ZIT all in one workflow as an example for this. They are all similar. I will break down the differences in the detailed area.

• Prompt assist and controlnet module:

  

• Main user input area:

  

• Draft Area (still rolling this out at the time of publication. Stay tuned)

  

• Hi Rez Fix/ Ultimate Upscaler:

  

• Detailer Group (Note; I'll address the NSFW Anantomy correction version of this in another article)

  

• Seed VR2 Upscaler:

  

• Post Production Suite:

  

• Save Group:

  

2. Setup & Installation:

Notes:

• Start with this section when initially loading. I have them in both English and Chinese.They are broken out as follows:

  • Basic instructions

  • Directions for each section

  • Useful nodes and downloads

  • Folder location

• This area should answer the majority of your questions on how to use. You will also find detailed instructions in each Module

Custom Nodes:

• This is a very node heavy workflow. The initial "You are missing the following nodes" message can be intimidating. This is because I basically have 8 workflows in one, so instead of several small "you are missing" messages, you get one very large one. Take the time to download and install them. You'll need most of them for other people's workflows as well.

• Custom Node Manager:

  • Almost all of the missing nodes can be found here. Just click on the "Install missing custom nodes" button in the ComfyUI manager.

    

• Missing Nodes:

  • I have tried to go through and remove all the specialty nodes that are not in the current manager.

  • Go to the "Notes" section. Here you will find a list of the repositopries for all of the nodes:

    

  • Click on this button here to download it with GIT

    

  • Once downloaded, go to the " ComfyUI_windows_portable\ComfyUI\custom_nodes\(Name of custon node folder) " and open it.

  • Open up the Command prompt (windows 11, right click and "open in terminal") and type ' python.exe -m pip install -r requirements.txt '

    

  • The requirements should all download and install:

    • Note: The desktop version (which you should abandon and go to portable due to the ComfyUI upgrades) will sometimes give you a "Numpty" error. This means you are running on a newer version of Python than is supported by ComfyUI. You will get this error globally.

      • Option 1: Create a Venv (virtual enviornment) based on the version of Python ComfyUI is running

      • Option 2 (overwhelmingly the best option): Switch to Windows Portable.

    • Some node folders do not require this. Look for the "requirements.txt" file.

3. Inital Setup and Run:

• 🛑🚫✋Do not manually bypass anything! There are switches for everything.

• In the center of every workflow (in whatever color I was feeling that day) You'll find the Master Bypasser. I'll go through each grouping. Note that they may be slightly different, depending on the workflow and modules:

  

  • Initial usage. I'll initially start out with the bypasser looking like this:

    

  • If you are using prompt assist, then the Image (or I2I) and Prompt assist need to be on. Otherwise, leave them off

  • 💾 Nothing saves unless it is turned on!

    • I almost always leave the "Save Draft" switch on. This way if I mess up, I can just reload the workflow in that image.

• Models: Each Platform has it's own unique section, but generally they are all the same. This is where you make your intial selections of what you want to bake with.

  

• Prompt (Illustrious shown for reference. Sorry Flux and ZIT. No negative prompt, no style selector 😢)

  

  • Enter yor prompts here.

  • ⚠️ IF you are using Prompt assist, leave blank or put any changes only.

  • Style selector: You can use what you want. Hover over the image to see what it adds and subtracts.

    

• Lora Loader:

  

  • This loader does NOT need trigger words (i.e. JEDDTTL2). It does it automatically.

  • You can have as many as you want loaded. Just turn them on and off. Saves a lot of time

  • Weight is distributed evenly across the model and clip

    • Note: In some special cases (such as lightning Loras and Control Loras), you want them to only cross the model. If that's the case (such as my WAN models), you'll see a seperate Lora Loader for those.

  • ZIT: ZImage hates a lot of added crap. When experimenting, use one at a time, then add the other. Don't set them to 1.0 or below 0.4

  • ⚠️ Loras are noise. The more weight you put on a model, the dirtier it gets. If you are trying to get detail, use a workflow that has detailers or Sigma schedulers in it.

    • I have several options for this.

• Draft Mode (does not apply for Anime & Realism ZIT)

  

  • At the top of the draft window is this set of controls. The play sound will "beep" when the image is baked to this point and teh run will stop here until you hit the Stop/Pause button.

  • The draft image gets saved.

  • Make any corrections before going forward. This includes addeing (or turning off) any detailers/ hi rez fix/ Seed VR2, etc.

• This should cover everything. You will find additional information in the "Notes" section as well as in each area.

4. Hi Rez Fix, Detailers, Seed VR2, Post Processing:

• Hi Rez Fix:

  

  • There are several different versions of this as each model works slightly different:

  • Upscale Model:

    • which upscaler you use matters.

    • I prefer Anime sharp for Anime

    • Remecri, or Ersgan for Realistic people

    • Nickleback for a good low VRAM all around

    • 4x Ultrasharp for cyber/ architectural/ non human.

    • NMKD if I want to increase the size of the image.

  • Image size slider:

    • This determines your tiling sizes (how big or small it breaks the image up to work with)

    • 1 is none (Heavy VRAM)

    • 1.5 is still okay (8gb)

    • 2.0 for 6gb or smaller machines (still kinda okay)

  • Upscaling factor (Hi Rez Fix):

    

    • Under every Aspect ratio in the main area should be a slider that says either prescale or Hi rex fix. This determines how much UPscaling happens in the Hi rez fix model. I've found that moving it up TOO high causes issues down the line. 1-1.5 seems to be best. 

    • Let SEED VR2 do most of the heavy upscaling work.

• Detailers: (SFW Version shown)

  

  • ZIT & Flux2 workflows:

    

    • As the base model does not work with the detailers, you will have some version of the models here:

    • Checkpoints: Make sure to adjust the checkpoint to match the style you are using

      • I.e if you are doing Anime, it will look wierd if she has a realistic face, and vice versa

  • Detailer (hand, eyes, face):

    

    • The Uralytics detector determines what is being caputred

    • Denoise slider: This is the amount of noise added to each Image. The more noise, the more it changes the actual image.

      • I typically set it at 40-50%

    • Prompt: (eyes only): This is really good for adding detail to eyes (i.e piercing green eyes, looking at viewer, half closed). Leave blank in normal circumstances.

  • Expression Detailer:

    

    • There are two options:

      • Use the image and it wil match it (turn the switch on).

      • Adjust the settings.

      • ⚠️ Will give you an error if there is no image (when not bypassed).

• SEED VR2 (Upscaler):

  

  • The first time this runs, it will download the models, so it takes a few minutes:

  • The Upscale factor is controlled in the Aspect Ratio node in the main area:

    

  • VAE settings: Encode and decode tiles determine the size of the tile it works with. The smaller the number, the lower the VRAM it requires, but the more overlap and integrity it loses.

  • See instructions in "Notes"

  • High VRAM users: Turn off Tile encode and Decode.

• Post Processing (my favorite):

  

  • This takes an image from okay to Epic. I'll touch on the high points, but read the notes in the lower right corner for more detail.

  • Smart Effects (Denoise):

    

    • Either in the upper lefthand corner or the last node (later versions will have in the upper lefthand corner) This node removes excess noise from an image.

  • Color Match to Image:

    

    • This will match to whatever image you have loaded.

    • ⚠️ Will give you an error if there is no image (when not bypassed)

  • Read the notes in that section for more information.

• Save Nodes:

  

  • Nothing saves unless it is turned on!

  • You can change the folder locations by just renaming them (the tan nodes in the pic above)

  • Metadata node automatically saves the information to post on CivitAi

5. Troubleshooting & Common issues:

• Eden Nodes:

  

  • This node is used so that you can use the same scheduler and sampler globally. They are in the Hi Rez Fix area as well as in the Detailers (and in the Sampler areas in Ilustrious)

  • YOU CAN DELETE THEM, but you will have to manually enter the sampler and scheduler for each node.

• Image empty (4 locations)

  • Load Image (or I2I)

  • Load Mask

  • Expression

  • Color Match (post processing)

• "ModelPatchLoader node : Cannot access local variable 'model" where is not associated with a value"

  • Update ComfyUI to the nightly version, which includes the necessary fixes:

    1. Open ComfyUI Manager (if installed).

    2. In the left column under "Update", switch from "ComfyUI Stable Version" to "ComfyUI Nightly Version".

    3. Click Update/Restart ComfyUI.

    4. Fully restart ComfyUI after the update.

    Alternative methods if using portable/manual install:

    • Run "git pull" in your ComfyUI directory to fetch the latest changes.

    • Or run the update_comfyui.bat (Windows) or equivalent update script.

• Florence will give you an error if you do not have "Load Image" Turned on

• The "Save Mask" node will turn red and give you an error if Controplnet is of and you have 'Save Mask" switched on.

• OOM errors

  • Hi res fix:

    • turn the upscale down or increase the tiling

  • Detailers:

    • It happens occasionally, especially with the face one. Just hit run again.

  • Seed VR2

    • Read the notes in that area.

    • Decrease upscale resolution

6. Advanced Options:

• This workflow is modular.

  • You can take any part of it and move it to another workflow.

  • You can change the order in which groups are processed

  • You can add or delete sections entirely.

• Getset Nodes:

  

  • Each section has a set of nodes that is relilant on the other: Common nodes include:

    • Seed

    • Scheduler

    • Prefix

    • Height

    • Width

    • etc.

  • Module swap:

    

    • In each section is a Get Image and a Set Image Node. Yo can change the order or completly delete a section simply by adjusting these. For example.

      • The image above is the detailer. It gets its Image from the Hi Res (Upscale Image) then labels it as Detail Image.

      • If I were to change the GetNode to anther module (say Seed VR2), it woud process it after that. Bear in mind you would have to change the other module as well.

    • You can also completly remove modules in the same fashion.

Summary

I hope that this was helpful and coveed everything. If you have any questions, Please message me.

Also, if there are errors in this or you have an idea on how to improve it, I always welcome feedback.

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/synth.studio.models/

This represents many of hours of work. If you enjoy it, please 👍like, 💬 comment , and feel free to ⚡tip 😉

Thanks,

"True Nothing is. Permitted Everything is"- Yoda Ezio, Assassin's Wars

Jay (Lonecat)