PONDER US

Many of you have seen the hauntingly grotesque AI generated video of Will Smith eating spaghetti and have consoled yourself that AI video generation is a very long way from “primetime” usefulness. It bears reminding ourselves that despite its humble and unsettling beginnings, AI is a fast learner, and videos are already getting sooo much better. I’ve messed around with Runway a bit but wanted to try the new Veo, from Gemini-Goodle I’ve been reading about. My prompt for the above clip was: “a dark haired teenage boy drives his silver 1967 Chevelle SS slowly down a quiet suburban street whistling as he passes at a couple of young teenage girls walking down the sidewalk.” Despite the people being a lot younger than I imagined (scary young), I’d call the results impressive. No three-legged or 12-fingered humans, got the make and model of the car right, and the camera work is not bad.

Feeling cocky I thought I’d see if I could make the car do a common, Dukes of Hazard style stunt with the prompt, “A silver and black 1967 Chevelle SS does a stunt jump off a cement median, getting airborne and flying over a cop car in a high-speed chase through Atlanta.” It did it, but with some weird artifacts. Note that the median it launches over becomes continuous after the car is airborne.

Still encouraged, I tried something more complicated. “A silver and black 1967 Chevelle SS, is chased by a half-dozen Atlanta police cars down a Midtown street. In trying to cut a corner it does a barrel roll and crashes into a storefront window as the police cruisers come to a halt.” Here is the result:

OK. I found a limit. But while there are many, many problems with both of these videos, and it is clear that Gemini has been watching too much Grand Theft Auto, I am impressed at the progress made in just a matter of months. Crazy fast progress IMHO.

While I don’t see the above as a near-term substitute for live action production, it is clear that very soon this Chevelle will drive across the uncanny valley into a host of productions. While that will spell the end of many careers, it is also possible that it will launch many in the same way Youtube did. New filmmakers and commercial directors will emerge and use the tools for telling their stories without needing a hundred million dollars, or an A-List actor. Since budgets, and the laws of physics don’t apply to the scenes created by AI, the only limit on these productions will be the creator’s imagination and for now I’ll consider that a net positive.