TikTok Introduces New AI Alive Tool to Create Videos From Photos in Stories

TikTok is introducing a new artificial intelligence (AI) feature that will allow users to turn an image into an animated video. On Tuesday, the vertical video-based social media platform announced a new AI feature dubbed AI Alive that uses generative AI technology to create videos from photos. Currently, the tool can only be used to generate videos in TikTok Stories, and not directly to the feed. Additionally, the company said it is taking several steps to mitigate the risk of the feature being abused by users.

TikTok AI Alive Feature Can Turn Your Photos Into Videos

In a newsroom post on its US website, TikTok announced the rollout of the new AI feature. It is the first AI-powered image-to-video generation tool offered by any of the video-focused social media platforms. Instagram, X, and Snapchat do not offer any AI-powered video generation tools. While YouTube Shorts has recently begun testing a text-to-video generation feature, it has not been rolled out widely.

The TikTok AI Alive feature can be found by tapping the blue plus icon (+) on the top of the Inbox page or Profile page. There, users will first have to select a single image from their Story Album. The AI Alive icon is located on the right side toolbar on the photo edit page. It should be placed in the second spot from the top.

Tapping on the AI Alive icon opens another window where users can add a text prompt of how they want the image to be animated. If they are not sure, they can also use one of the many suggested text prompts on the same page. Once done, they can tap the generate button and a short video is created. Users can then post the video, and people can video the story from within the For You and Following feeds, as well as on the user's profile page.

The company said that it has implemented moderation technology to review the uploaded photo, text prompt, and the AI Alive video before it is shown to the creator. A final check occurs when the user posts the video to their Story. Additionally, other users can report videos they think might break the platform's guidelines.

Apart from that, TikTok is also adding a visible AI-generated label to let people know that this is a synthetic video. Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity (C2PA) metadata, a standard among major AI players, is also added to every AI-generated video, the company said.