AI is changing the way companies create video content. Find out which categories of AI-powered tools can help you create videos faster, the pros and cons of each, and the many ways using this technology can help you meet your business goals.
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What is AI powered video?
While smartphones, webcams, and simple video editor apps have made it incredibly easy in the past few decades to create simple video content for personal use, creating professional-grade videos at scale has remained, for many companies, a serious logistical challenge.
Fortunately, that’s about to change. With the arrival of powerful new generative AI technology—including advanced AI chatbots, text-to-image and text-to-video generators, AI avatar makers, and AI-powered animated video creation software, content creators have more tools at their disposal than ever before to help them create business videos quickly and affordably.
There’s a difference between what AI tools and humans can create, of course. Generative AI models are able to mine the gigantic datasets they’re trained on to create content that reproduces linguistic and visual styles that people have spent centuries perfecting. However, AI text generators are still unable to come up with original ideas, reason through difficult puzzles, and often serve up answers that are categorically false. And image and video generators often struggle to translate text-based prompts into content that both reflects the requester’s intentions and is of a high enough quality to use as is.
Still—even in its infancy, Generative AI tools are already making it much easier for professionals with limited video production experience to create professional videos. You don’t need years of design, directing, and editing experience to get started: all you need is an idea…and a prompt.
Examples of AI video maker tools
From text-to-audio synthesizers to video generators that transform visuals from one style to another, there’s a huge range of AI tools out there. Here is a quick breakdown of the types of tools that today’s content creators can take advantage of.
Text tools for creating AI videos
To create an engaging video, first you need a great script. Text-based AI tools like ChatGPT and Bard are advanced LLMs (Large Language Models) that can quickly generate scripts based on text prompts you provide. The prompt is processed by the AI’s deep learning algorithm which formulates a response for the user based on the Internet-sourced data set it’s been trained on–-or based on proprietary information the user feeds it.
As an AI video tool, ChatGPT can help with research, creating a script’s structure, writing on-screen captions, and even suggestions for visuals (though that’s not one of its strengths–yet). Whatever tool you use, it’s now possible to generate a script in a fraction of the time it used to.
Watch “Write Better Video Scripts Faster with ChatGPT” On-Demand
Image tools for creating AI videos
Video creators can use AI-generated static images to quickly create storyboards, or even use the elements directly in their final videos.
AI image generators like Dall.E 2, or Stable Diffusion Online and MidJourney draw on the internet’s rich source of photos, illustrations, and graphics to produce new imagery in response to a user’s prompt. Dall.E 2 also allows you to fill out or extend the area around your preferred image (outpainting) and fill in missing or incomplete areas by evaluating the existing imagery and formulating content that matches the content and style (inpainting). While this feature isn’t offered within MidJourney and Stable Diffusion Online as of mid-April 2023, you can import images created on those platforms into Dall.E 2 and manipulate them there.
Also, both Dall.E 2 and Midjourney now allow you to upload your own images and include them as a reference in your prompt. This allows you to also ask for variations of existing, preferred reference images, instead of having to only work with outputs created based on text prompts.
Audio tools for creating AI videos
Need a voiceover but don’t have the budget to hire voice talent and book a recording studio? Some AI tools can step in to generate a realistic sounding voiceover in a variety of languages by collecting text input and delivering a synthesized audio stream in a process known as “text-to-speech.”
Other AI tools can remove background noise from recordings, or even create background music from scratch. Simply choose the genre, mood, length and tempo for a video with a unique, royalty-free soundtrack.
AI video generation software
Some AI video tools apply a similar approach to those for text, image and audio, taking either text or visual input and generating an output of original video content.
Meta’s Make-a-Video creates video from both text-based prompts and static images. Phenaki uses proprietary technology to create longer videos when given a sequence of textual prompts.
Other AI-powered tools offer the ability to use human-like avatars to deliver scripts directly to the camera. While these tools allow you to generate content at volume, it’s worth noting that most deepfake human avatars suffer from the ‘uncanny valley’ effect: people register that what they’re seeing and hearing is close to, but not quite human, which can be off-putting.)
Lastly, AI-powered animated video software platforms like Vyond provide a more holistic solution, using multiple AI-driven features (like Photo-to-Character avatars, Text-to-Speech generator, Visual Search for assets, and Speech Enhancer) to help teams quickly create engaging, professional-looking animated videos that never suffer from the “uncanny valley effect,” since most animation isn’t meant to look photorealistic.
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Generative AI video tools: the pros and cons
AI powered video tools are revolutionizing the workplace but they aren’t without their faults. Here are some of the benefits and limitations of AI tools used to create text, video, images and audio.
| | “It’s inspiring that AI is making its way to all corners of society, with many applications large and small.”Andrew Ng, Founder and CEO of Landing AI | | While there’s no doubt AI is going to transform the economy, it still has limits and specific use cases. It can’t do everything. And it may not always be the right tool for a business.”Marketing AI Institute | |
Benefits of AI-powered text tools
- Helps you brainstorm ideas. When you’re staring at a page with no idea where to start, an AI chatbot can be a lifesaver. While these won’t produce the final copy, they’re great at providing you with a first draft to play around with.
- Saves serious time. Writing good copy takes time, and with research, writing, and editing, that time quickly adds up. With an AI text generation tool, simply enter a prompt and you’ll have output to start editing and developing in seconds.
- Can imitate a wide range of styles. In your text prompt, you can add direction on style and tone and include proprietary copy you’d like it to learn from and imitate. This capability can help you with creating “on-brand” content, and can help spark ideas for new ways to solve creative problems.
Limitations of AI-powered text tools
- ChatGPT is only trained on information found on the Internet prior to October 2021. As a result, its responses don’t reflect the most up-to-date information on topics, especially those that evolve quickly. This is another reason to always review its output before you hit publish.
- They don’t understand your audience like you do. AI will never be able to understand your audiences’ needs and preferences the way you do – what makes them tick, or pushes their buttons. This is another reason it’s so important to review and adjust their output.
ChatGPT Prompts for Business Videos
Benefits of AI-powered audio tools
- Generates narration quickly and affordably. There’s no need to hire a voice actor, source expensive equipment, or book recording time. With a high-quality AI-powered audio tool you can generate realistic audio with a quick turnaround.
| | “You can’t have somebody producing a new audio version of one article every time it’s updated. But with […] synthetic language, there’s hardly any additional cost to production at all.”Andy Webb, head of product for the voice and artificial intelligence team at the BBC | |
Limitations of AI-powered audio tools
- Some AI-generated narration sounds…off. Emotions can be hard for an AI audio tool to replicate. While output is constantly improving, humans generally still possess more range.
- Accent choices are often limited. Many AI audio tools can’t offer you as many accents and dialects (spoken by people of various genders and ages) as you might like.
| | Vyond’s AI audio capabilitiesVyond’s text-to-speech AI feature provides 600 AI voice options across 71 languages, in male and female varieties–and, as of May 2023—allows you to adjust the audio track so it reflects the emotion you want conveyed. Vyond’s Instant Translation features also allow you to instantly and automatically translate all the text in your videos, including scene text, dialog text entered for text-to-speech, and recordings, into every one of those languages. Try Vyond for Free | |
Benefits of AI-powered image and video tools
- Anyone can be a creator. Whether you’re a professional designer or someone who can’t draw a stick figure, you’ll be able to generate useful images and video content quickly.
- Inspires fresh ideas. When you’re struggling to visualize an idea, AI image generators can provide options that help you clarify what you want.
- Easy to replicate visual styles. From Van Gogh to Andy Warhol to [fill in your favorite artist here]—with a simple prompt (containing either text or a combination of text and image references) you can imitate an incredibly diverse set of styles
Limitations of AI-powered image and video tools
- Their output doesn’t always hit the mark. When the visual delivered to you doesn’t match what you were imagining in your mind’s eye, you have the option to keep prompting for other alternatives. And if you’re using Dall.E 2–you can try adjusting its output with its inpainting or outpainting tools. Even so, these efforts may not give you exactly what you wanted.
- They’re not reliable for creating “on-brand” visuals. For the reasons above, you’re likely not going to be able to lean on these tools to create visual content that perfectly aligns with your company’s brand style—yet.
- There are ethical concerns around copyright. While an artist’s work may be accessed freely on the internet, it’s unlikely they gave permission for their art to be used in the AI’s learning model. Currently, in the US, AI-generated work isn’t copyright protected because it isn’t technically made by a human.
The business benefits of using generative AI
Companies of all kinds can reap the benefits of using an AI tool to create professional videos. Here are a few of the most common:
Support your company’s employee retention goals
The simplicity and time efficiency of AI video helps L&D professionals keep up with industry changes and internal demands for new or updated training materials for their entire workforce.
This is especially valuable because timely, effective training is proven to have extremely positive effects on retention. According to a LinkedIn study, 94% of employees say that they would stay at a company longer if it invested in better training.
Create mission-critical content more quickly
While we know that L&D teams regularly create videos to engage their workforce, they aren’t the only department that can benefit from the speed of AI-powered video tools.
- HR teams can use AI-powered video tools to ensure they’re communicating effectively about policies or business changes in a timely manner
- Sales departments can use generative AI video tools to keep up with the demand for creating highly personalized, tailored versions of general sales video content to share with prospects. (As we know from both academic and industry research, personalized strategies are more effective.)
- The speed of AI-powered video tools can help marketing teams keep up with the demand for engagement-boosting video content for blog and social media posts–and respond instantaneously to urgent news or trends with right-time, right-place video content. Additionally, the time saved in creating videos from scratch also frees up marketing teams to spend more time A/B testing their video content and making tweaks to boost engagement.
Empower all your employees to communicate better (and have fun doing it)
AI-powered video tools are becoming so easy to use, even employees with no writing and design capabilities now have a way to create engaging video content quickly.
Not surprisingly, when creating videos is easy, it’s also more fun. In fact, many of our customers have said that using Vyond has made creating videos one of the most enjoyable parts of their job, instead of a time-consuming and intimidating chore.
The future of AI video maker tools
Sure, today’s generative AI video tools still have some kinks to work out. And as always happens when a new kind of technology hits the market, some tools will hit big and flourish, while others will drop off the radar.
But as the landscape continues to evolve, one thing is for sure: creating high-quality business videos has never been easier, and the world of content creation will never be the same again.
To get started making great animated business videos quickly and easily, join 20,000 companies already using Vyond. Sign up for our 14-day free trial or book a demo to get access to 200+ fully scripted templates, 200+ starter templates, more than 2,300 scene templates, and all of our time-saving AI features.
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