TikTok’s Parent Company Has a New Text-to-Video Generation Tool

TikTok could soon have its own, in-stream text-to-video creation tool, with parent company ByteDance launching a new app called “Jimeng AI” in China, which enables users to create short videos via AI, based on written prompts.

As you can see in this example, taken from the Jimeng AI website, the platform enables users to create very short video clips (most are less than 5 seconds long) based on whatever text prompts you choose. You can also create images in the same app.

And a lot of them are, as you would expect, weird as heck, but at the same time, a lot of them also look pretty impressive, providing simple animation to AI-generated characters and scenes, which add an extra sense of life to your prompts.

I mean, they do look AI-generated, with that unnatural, hyper-real quality. But they’re also better than basic images of the same, and as the technology advances, it’s only going to get better, including capacity for longer video creation and storytelling.

Which is part of the fabled promise of AI, that eventually, we’ll all be able to create our own animated movies, based on our own concepts and ideas, putting Hollywood, eventually, out of business. Which won’t happen, because most people can’t actually put together a cohesive, engaging narrative to animate, which is why so many fail at creating such in the first place.

But even so, the advancing capacity of AI tools to facilitate idea creation is amazing, and ByteDance’s text-to-video tool definitely looks set to be another player in this evolving race.

Which then leads to TikTok.

TikTok is already working to incorporate a range of generative AI features, including chatbots, search tools, music generation options, and profile picture simulators.

Text-to-video could be another engaging iteration on the same, and it seems likely that ByteDance would look to incorporate such functionality into TikTok, as opposed to launching Jimeng outside of China as well.

That could lead to all new creative trends, with responses to music, and creators incorporating new kinds of AI animations in the app.

It’s still some way off, as ByteDance has only launched Jimeng AI in China thus far, and it’s still developing its MagicVideo AI creation tools to help fuel expanded efforts.

But it could be coming, as the gen AI war continues to ramp up.