🎄 WELCOME TO COPPER & STERLING ADVERTISING 🏢

INTERNAL MEMO

DATE: December 30, 2024

PRIORITY: URGENT

TO: Junior Executive, Carbonated Beverages Division

FROM: Creative Director

RE: FROST POP EMERGENCY

It finally happened. After years of pursuing Frost Pop (est. 1872), they called last night. The family-owned soda company needs a TV commercial for New Year's Eve, and they need it NOW. Their previous agency imploded in scandal yesterday, leaving them with only a voiceover track and music.

This is your moment. As our newest Junior Executive, you've been handed the reins. Your task: Write the perfect commercial concept. Our cutting-edge AI production team stands ready to bring your vision to life.

The clock is ticking. Frost Pop is counting on us. Show us what you've got!

Guidelines from the Creative Director:

  • Describe the story you want to bring to life, and the cinematic style you want to achieve
  • You have 20 seconds — enough time to set the scene, show some action, and end with a twist
  • We already have background music and a voiceover. Every commercial will end with a shot of Frost Pop employees waving outside their factory
  • Your creation will be added to the gallery below for your fellow executives to enjoy! 🖼️

❓ Frequently Asked Questions 💡

I use OpenAI's new video generation model, Sora, to turn your input into a video. OpenAI released Sora to the public this December after testing it privately all year.

I also used other AI tools to help me build this year's app, including:

  • Anthropic's Claude chatbot helped me flesh out the "Frost Pop" brand, the voiceover script, and the "Copper & Sterling" copy above
  • I used ElevenLabs to turn my script into a voiceover to use during the commercial
  • These days I write my code with Cursor, an AI-powered code editor, which speeds up my work considerably

For most everything else I used Python, my programming language of choice. (For the Python peeps out there: MoviePy was a fun library I found to help me programmatically edit all the audio and video tracks — definitely recommend!)

The best Christmas card apps I've built over the years have had two qualities:

  1. They used a new technology I was curious to learn more about (and building is the best way for a software engineer to learn)
  2. They provided you, dear family and friends, a canvas with which to express yourselves

OpenAI is far from the only company developing "text-to-video" AI tools, but Sora got the most attention this year — both from technologists and those concerned about how Sora could be misused, whether to spread misinformation or appropriate artists' work without their consent. A group of artists helping OpenAI test Sora leaked its code to the public in protest this fall.

I was curious to try Sora myself and develop my own opinion, and I figured some of you might be too. And I hope your results will be entertaining (whether because Sora followed your direction or because it didn't 😂).

Creating a video from just a few lines of prose is the crudest, simplest way to use tools like Sora. If you're looking to learn more and experience the full power of these tools I recommend creating your own account and trying Sora yourself.

For now, you need a paid ChatGPT subscription to use Sora. My app uses the $200 per month "Pro" plan but the $20 per month "Plus" plan is sufficient, in my opinion, for those just looking to experiment.

On the official Sora site, you'll find many more dials and knobs at your disposal to get the best results from your input. There, you also have the ability to upload photos of subjects you want to feature prominently in your video. OpenAI is yet to allow custom human subjects out of concern for misuse, but the Sora editor should accept, say, a photo of your pet.

Searching online for "Sora prompt guide" or similar terms could also yield some tips, though I'll say I'm yet to find a comprehensive, helpful resource.