If you’ve looked into artificial intelligence (AI) in any amount, you’re likely familiar with OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT and DALL-E. They have consistently been at the forefront of AI developments, and their various AI tools are used far and wide.
One of the more recently available tools from OpenAI is Sora, an AI video generation tool. Sora is capable of making highly realistic videos, which is particularly useful for internet marketers looking for things like stock video footage for ads, guides, or their informational videos.
Stock video can be expensive, and you might not always be able to find exactly what you want, leading to a lower quality result for your video marketing. With Sora, however, you can quickly generate whatever you might need, and tweak it to your exact specifications.
Sora is subscription based, though you also get access to ChatGPT premium, and vice versa, meaning that those with a ChatGPT premium subscription already have access to Sora. For any marketer, these are both powerful tools, and well worth the subscription cost.
Understanding and Accessing Sora
Sora is a simple, easy to use AI video generator. All you have to do is write in your prompt, select the settings you want to use, and you can start generating videos almost instantly.
There are a handful of restrictions on what you can generate, but they should all be obvious to anyone familiar with AI, and none of them should be relevant for any marketers.
In short, you cannot generate anything explicit using Sora, but then you wouldn’t likely have a reason to. To get started with Sora, you’ll have to go to their website at Sora.com – or, if you have the premium ChatGPT, it will appear in the lefthand sidebar.
Here, you’ll see a bunch of different videos that others have made, but in the top right, you’ll see the button to log in. Use of Sora does require a premium account, which you might already have if you use the paid version of ChatGPT.
This premium account gives you base level access to Sora, and gives you a lot of benefits in ChatGPT as well. The basic $20/month version gives you a fair amount of access to Sora.
You get about 50 videos per month, 720p resolution, and 5 second videos. This is plenty for most stock footage applications, but if you need something longer you can use them as transitions for a longer piece.
The higher cost pro version is $200/month. With a price tag like that, it wouldn’t be worthwhile to most users, unless you’re constantly needing to generate dozens of stock videos each day.
It does grant you 500 videos per month instead of 50, higher resolutions, and 20 second videos, though. Still, unless you’re a business conglomerate or an individual making a ton off of videos, this version probably won’t be worth the price.
If you already have a ChatGPT or other OpenAI account, log in with that information. Otherwise, you can sign up with your preferred information. Once you’re logged in, you’ll be greeted with the Sora explore page.
Start Generating Videos Instantly
In order to generate your first video, all you need to do is start off by typing something into the prompt. No matter what page you’re on, you’ll see a box in the center bottom of your screen that says “Describe your video…” which is the part you’ll want to write your video prompt in.
Beneath this, you’ll find a few different options. The plus sign all the way on the left allows you to add your own images or media to be used for new AI videos. There are a few stipulations with using outside images, the main one being that you can’t use pictures of real people.
On the other hand, you could have the AI generate a person without issue, you just can’t use an existing person like a picture of yourself and have Sora morph that image into a video.
These rules apply for almost everybody, and Sora lists them out clearly before you upload any media. Next to that, you’ll see the preset button. There are a few preexisting presets for you to pick from, but you can also add your own.
These are essentially premade instructions that you may want to use over and over again, especially in order to maintain the exact same style. To make your own, click “Manage” on the preset list, and it will open a new window where you can click the other ones to see how they’re described, then press the plus button to make your own.
Having a preset allows you to skip having to describe things like mood, lighting, and camera settings each time. If you find a formula that works, you can just put it all in a preset and then just change the prompt to describe the different scenes you want while maintaining the same visual style.
The next few options are very straightforward. In order, you can choose the aspect ratio, resolution, duration, and how many variations it produces. This just means you’ll have 1, 2, or 4 different examples of the same prompt to pick from.
Finally, on the bottom right, you’ll see an option for a storyboard. This is a great tool for Sora that allows you to plot out things like camera or scene changes in the middle of the video.
With the storyboard, you can add in new scene changes within the same video, such as a camera cutting to something else or a shift in the lighting. Once you have your settings tuned properly for what you want, you can start prompting Sora.
It’s best to give as much detail as possible, like with many other AI programs, so that it’s not having to fill in the gaps anywhere with imagination. In order to get the best results, you should mention all kinds of different things like the camera style, the mood of the video, describe the people in depth if there will be any, and be sure to be very descriptive about things like lighting and color.
For example, you would see a considerable difference in quality between a video prompted with “workplace discussion” and a more in-depth prompt like “Professional office meeting in an upscale conference room, several people discussing profits in professional attire. Even lighting, no depth of field, serious mood.”
If you needed a video for senior entrepreneurs, you might give details like: “Scene of a senior gentleman enjoying his morning coffee on the porch with his laptop open. He appears happy. The man has short, neatly combed gray hair, wearing a light blue button-down shirt and khaki pants. The camera angle starts wide, capturing the lush property. Lighting is natural and golden. The mood is cheerful as he begins typing on his laptop. The overall tone should feel authentic and relatable. End the video with the camera slowly zooming in on his smiling face showing a fulfilling and happy lifestyle.”
Use the Explore Page for Prompt Ideas
If you find yourself struggling to find the right words for the prompts you’re trying to do, consider looking over the explore page. While it is optional, all Sora videos are published publically on the explore page by default.
If you don’t want yours published, you can opt out, but most people seem to leave theirs on without changing it. As you scroll through all of the various videos people have generated, you can click on any of them to read the prompt they used.
If something with a certain style catches your eye, be sure to check what kinds of phrases or terms they used in their prompt so that you can use it in your own prompts moving forward.
The explore page can also give you a great deal of insight as to what does and doesn’t work well in Sora. As you scroll through, you may notice that it does a fantastic job with things requiring a bit less detail, like nature stock footage, but has a harder time with things that need a lot of detailed movement.
When it comes to people, it seems to have an easier time with less movement. Some videos that were generated of things like news anchors talking seem very realistic, because news anchors rarely move very much.
On the other hand, you’ll catch a lot of flaws in videos people have made of people dancing, for example, because the AI has a harder time distinguishing all of the fine details of the motion involved in dancing.
If you’re using it for a quick snippet, these flaws will probably go unnoticed by most, but if you plan on holding on that video for more than a few seconds, it may be more obvious that it’s an AI generated video.
Another thing Sora struggles with is text. You’ll find that many users try to generate videos with text on screen like you would see in a commercial, or they try to integrate their own branding into the video, but it rarely comes out right.
Most AI programs still have a difficult time with text, and Sora is no exception. That being said, this would be something easy to edit in to any video, so you could do it yourself fairly easily.
When you’re browsing the explore page, switch back and forth between the “Recent” and “Featured” sections. While the recent section is more varied, the generations are generally lower quality, since it’s just everything that everyone is creating. The featured generations are higher quality and more distinct, which would make them a prime source of inspiration for your prompts.
Implementing AI Video for Marketing
AI videos are a powerful tool for many marketers, especially since there’s such an emphasis on short-form video now. Platforms like TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts are prime targets for many marketers to advertise, and they all require a significant amount of video.
While these videos are all short, they often require a lot of cuts between many different pieces of footage in order to better hold attention. Holding on one scene for too long may cause you to lose the attention of your audience, which might prevent them from seeing important things like your links or calls to action.
Without AI video, getting a ton of footage would be rather expensive since you would need to purchase bulk stock footage, but platforms like Sora make it easy to produce plenty of videos for only $20/month.
One benefit many marketers find using AI videos is faceless marketing. Many people don’t want to use their own likeness for one reason or another, and with AI videos, you don’t have to.
You can simply generate an endless number of people to represent you rather than having to appear in videos yourself. Even if you still use stock footage, AI videos can be a great supplemental source for when you just can’t find the right stock video you want.
This is a common problem for anyone who has tried to use stock images or videos, because often times you just want to tweak it ever so slightly, but that’s difficult to do through traditional editing methods.
Sora is an ideal choice for many marketers because many people already utilize ChatGPT. Even if you don’t use it to write your content fully, you might use it to bounce ideas off of or get inspiration for new products.
Since Sora is tied to a ChatGPT premium account, you’ll be able to benefit from two different AI platforms with one convenient subscription. As a marketer, you don’t want to miss out on the advantages of publishing anything from guides to ads on short-form video platforms.
They’re by far the most currently used social media platforms, and you’ll be able to maximize exposure for your business by creating videos for them. AI video generators like Sora make this process much faster and easier, allowing you to capitalize on the ever-growing trend of short-form video.