Hi friend,
How are you? I hope you had a great week.
After playing with OpenAI’s new Sora App last week, I realized we’re entering a new era of AI augmentation of cool photo moments we come across, like it happened to me the other day.
I was walking down the street in the Miami Design District, looking at the Museum Garage right across from the Institute of Contemporary Art, where I saw its signature artwork of cars attached to the outer wall.
Instead of focusing on what the artist has done, I thought, “How cool would it be if I could move the cars and blend them with the real street traffic below?”
Sora easily fulfilled my wish:
Later, when I browsed the framed artworks and sculptures inside the Institute for Contemporary Art (ICA) museum, my imagination worked hard again and came up with mental AI remixes.
Insane!
Back in September, OpenAI launched the Sora App that allows users to create 10-second clips. I’ve been playing with the app, trying different use cases.
Today, I’d like to unpack a few tips & tricks.
If you recall, I covered Sora when it was used last July for developing the first AI-generated ad for Toys’ R Us:
With this app release, there are a bunch of interesting visual stories you can create, albeit Hollywood is freaking out about breaching its copyrighted content.
Yes, but
First, I would like to urge you not to throw all your eggs into AI and leave clear areas where you do use your brain to express your unique voice in your stories.
For me, writing this newsletter is one of my outlets for 100% brain-generated content. Over-reliance on AI is going to drain your natural creativity.
Why lose it? It gives you a stronger sense of ownership and satisfaction over your projects.
Before I dive into Sora 2, let’s zoom out for a second to appreciate the dramatic change visual AI offers.
You realize that before AI, only three years ago, we all hung out in a “creative desert” limited only by our human capabilities to write, photograph, film, sketch, code, sing, etc.
These natural constraints enabled us to create original work with distinct human voices throughout time.
That’s why it’s important to experiment with new tech but also to keep these skills active.
Now with AI, it’s as if we all grew “superpower creative wings” that allow us to materialize all our secret dreams to tell stories we couldn’t before.
With this thought, I went to test the Sora app and noticed several creative tactics the app offers:
Cameo
Stretching the selfie trend further, users can upload a video of themselves and then plug it into unexpected, funny/bizarre contexts.
This tactic is also employed with AI avatar companies like HeyGen and Synthesia when you create talking head videos.
This a great magnet for people because of the high viral effect when sharing with friends.
Frankly, I haven’t tried it, just because of the possibility of my likeness being reused beyond my control.
Celebrities
Next in the engagement pecking order is the use of celebrities in unlikely contexts.
To bump up the dial even higher, I’ve seen people using their cameo likeness together with a celebrity. Like shooting hoops with Shaq.
Baseline
You upload a photo and provide a prompt to bring it to life in an interesting way, like the cars example above.
In time for Halloween, here is a photo I uploaded with a simple prompt, “add a flying ghost around.”
Baseline with dialog
I uploaded a photo I took a while ago in Miami Beach when I stared at a funny sign, I thought soon enough we should add E-Robots.
I made the change to the sign and uploaded to the Sora app. As you’ll see Sora added a relevant dialog.
Back in time
As a classic Italian cinema fan, I wanted to create a black & white clip in La Dolce Vita style from the ‘60s. The visuals and the Italian script were generated by Sora.
Remix
Taking UGC (User Generated Content) to the next level, users can also use the Remix option on the main feed and add their edits to published clips.
I just added a surfer to an existing giant whale clip I came across. When you publish, the original clip shows up, and on another tab, your remixed creation.
In short
There are endless possibilities, as you can imagine, to recreate your wild ideas. You can include a script or not at all, and Sora will come up with the rest.
You’d be tempted to think you can create an entire short ad by stitching together 3 clips.
The only issue is that if you have a core protagonist, chances are he/she will look different every time you generate it (see public backlash to Toys R’ Us ad).
You can share or download the clips as I just did to enrich your stories or as standalones for social consumption.
Beware, though, if Sora thinks your prompt is risky, you’ll get their violation message, curbing your idea. Otherwise, feel free to experiment and share your creations.
Lastly, the other day I looked at Sora’s main feed and saw this weird sequence.
I saw related content to my posts, but also the same characters I used in my clips now were hired for other people’s creations.
It felt like Sora had a finite cast of “Telenovela protagonists” they constantly reuse 😀
You can see all my other experiments on my Sora channel.
I can clearly see a future where art is evolving into endless threads of public “what if remixes,” where the most original ideas capture the highest attention, and with it, new design sensibilities we’re not yet aware of being born.
It could be a nightmare for intellectual property and copyright lawyers, who are already struggling with the existing reuse of copyrighted content; now they’ll have to deal with a gazillion remixers.
Fasten your seatbelts…
See you next time!
Best,
- Shlomi
Shlomi Ron
Founder, Visual Storytelling Institute
story > visual > emotion > experience
shlomi@visualstorytell.com
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