Is your TikTok FYP inexplicably filling up with short clips of AI baby videos? If so, you’re not alone, the AI baby videos are going viral across TikTok, Facebook, and Instagram.
These short AI-generated videos feature a cherubic baby-faced version of well-known figures, from world leaders like French President Emmanuel Macron to the stars of Friends. See also: Vin Diesel in Fast & Furious, Michael Jackson in “Thriller,” and Judge Judy.
So, are these videos cute, creepy, or cringe? Cringe is in the eye of the beholder, and your take on this trend will be informed by your general fondness for both babies and AI in general. Regardless, the viral videos are yet more proof that the AI slop machine is working overtime.
“Slop” is the term for low-quality, AI-generated images and videos, and they can often go surprisingly viral. Some of the people sharing the clips may not even realize the videos are AI-generated, though we hope that goes without saying when you come across a video of baby Ice Cube (Lil’ Ice Cube?) rapping “It Was a Good Day.”
Where are all of these AI baby videos coming from? And how are they made?
The first question is easy to answer. Some videos are surely created by fans and AI enthusiasts, while others are churned out by content farms. Like those men shoveling coal into the Titanic’s engines, the algorithms must be fueled, and content farms shovel a constant stream of memes, AI content, and stolen videos onto social media apps.
This particular trend started a couple of weeks ago, with AI enthusiasts making AI videos featuring talking babies on podcasts. The trend evolved to AI videos of celebrities as babies, which is where we are now. As mentioned earlier, the trend has even reached the highest level of world government.
How to make AI baby videos
Most creators are using a mix of different AI tools to create these baby videos, and you can find tutorials on YouTube and TikTok. However, I know what you’re really wondering: Can I create these AI baby videos for free, and without being a tech wiz? Not really.
I tried creating an AI video using TikTok’s new free AI Alive tool, which turns images into animated videos. The results were, ah, not great!
To create an AI baby video from start to finish, you will need paid subscriptions to some popular AI tools. Some of these steps can be done with the free versions of the tools mentioned below, but generally, you need a paid subscription to generate a video.
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Upload a picture of yourself to ChatGPT (or your AI tool of choice); use a prompt like this: “Create a baby photo based on this image.”
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Write a short script to go along with your video.
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Use the ElevenLabs text-to-speech tool (or a similar tool) to create an audio file for your “baby.”
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Use an AI video tool like Hedra or Dreamina to generate a video based on your photo and audio file.
Of course, all this comes at a cost, and not just for AI subscriptions. According to a new report from MIT Technology Review, generating one 5-second AI video is the energy equivalent of running a microwave for a full hour.
Which AI video tool should you use? Google’s brand new Veo 3 video generator is currently the most advanced video generator, but it also costs $250 a month to access as part of Google’s AI Ultra Subscription. I was able to create a fairly realistic baby video using Veo in Gemini, but that’s not exactly the point of the meme.
Most creators seem to be using Hedra. Per Tech Crunch, Hedra just raised $32 million, and its Character-3 model is powering a lot of these AI baby videos.
