Google Gemini
Google's Gemini powers Brut's images (the Nano Banana family) and doubles as a text/planning model for Refine and the cinema crew. It's the cheapest place to start — a Nano Banana 2.1 render is about $0.034.
Get a key
Create an API key at aistudio.google.com/apikey, then paste it into ⚙ Settings → Google Gemini.
Enable billing. The free tier has 0 image quota — a first-call
429 RESOURCE_EXHAUSTEDmeans billing isn't on, not that you're being throttled.
Image models
| Model | Notes |
|---|---|
| Nano Banana 2.1 | The Flash-tier workhorse since October 2026: 1K → 4K, edits, up to 14 reference pictures, stronger text and multi-character consistency, ~$0.034 at 1K, $0.05 at 2K, $0.076 at 4K |
| Nano Banana 2 Lite | Fastest & cheapest (~$0.034, 1K) — text-to-image only |
| Nano Banana 2 | Retires on 2026-10-29 (Google's shutdown date). Its successor is Nano Banana 2.1, at half the price; 512 was its tier alone |
| Nano Banana Pro | Studio-quality up to 4K, precise text |
| Nano Banana (legacy) | Kept for image edits only — still the cheapest edit (~$0.04) |
Nano Banana 2 Lite replaced the legacy model on the Text→Image menu: newer, faster, slightly cheaper. The legacy model can't be picked for new text-to-image runs but stays on the Image→Image / Inpaint menus, because Lite cannot edit images. Set the aspect ratio and image size on the node.
Nano Banana 2 retires on October 29, 2026. Google released Nano Banana 2.1 on October 6 and named it the replacement: the same request, the same menus (minus the 512 size), half the price per image, and it is what Annotate & Correct and the Correction Loop workflow now start on. A saved graph keeps whatever model its nodes carry, so a node still on Nano Banana 2 after October 29 fails with Google's own "model not found" on the node: pick 2.1 on it (the node generates again on its next run). The file names of past renders keep their NB2 code; new ones say NB21.
Text / planning models
Gemini also serves planning (Refine presets, Multi-Shot's planner, and any cinema agent set to Gemini): Gemini 3.8 Flash is the default (the newest and most capable Flash, strong at long planning), Gemini 3.7 Flash the proven workhorse, Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite the fastest (2.5 Flash's successor at the same price), Gemini 3.6 Flash the previous code/agentic tier (3.6, 3.7 and 3.8 Flash at Google's introductory $0.75/M in · $3.75/M out through the end of 2026, $1.50 / $7.50 after), with Gemini 2.5 Flash kept for continuity, plus preview tiers.
Gotchas
- Silent content refusals. An edit that Google silently refuses (no image, no clear error) is a content refusal, usually caused by an input image (a real person's name in facade text, a face, a logo), not the prompt. Deterministic — Brut won't auto-retry. Remove or crop the offending image.
- Cut-off plans. A plan that comes back cut off is never passed on half-written: you get the full plan or a clear message.
Veo and Omni ride this key
Google Veo and Gemini Omni (video) use the same Google key by default — you only add a separate key for either to split billing.