AI Video Creation Guide: How to Use AI to Create Videos

Artificial intelligence (AI) is shaking things up for video production. While it won’t replace video producers anytime soon, it can help revamp everything from scripting to editing and make business videos easier to scale than ever.

As the selection of AI tools continues to grow and evolve, it can be tough to pick the right ones and figure out how to use them to produce videos. That’s why we put together this guide! We’ll show you some new video workflows assisted by generative AI and explain how they can help you work faster in every step of the video production process.

What is generative AI?

Generative AI is a type of AI technology that can create new content from a vast library of data and algorithms. This includes written content, text, music, images, and video.

For video creators, generative AI can write scripts from prompts, compose original background music, alter the likeness of a person’s voice, and even generate an avatar of a person, sometimes within a matter of seconds. In other words, generative AI tools emulate the human creative process but on a much larger and faster scale.

How generative AI helps in video creation

For complex processes like video creation, AI won’t give you a perfect video on its own (not yet, at least). While this technology is impressive, it still isn’t advanced enough to replace your team of human creatives. But the right AI tools can empower your team to accomplish more than ever before.

“For me, AI is opening the door to new ideas, new executions, and new visuals that I may not have come up with on my own. It’s expanding my creative palette, not just saving me time.”

Chris Lavigne
Head of Production, Wistia

Let’s dive in!

Pre-production

Even the pros sometimes get stuck at square one. In our AI Video Marketing Trends Report, we found that 51% of marketers use AI to assist them in the ideation stage, or to automate video scripts and outlines.

Ideation

Coming up with compelling topics can often be the toughest part of producing great videos. Writer’s block is a real thing. Even the most creative thinkers get hung up on what their next video project should be about.

Generative AI can help you find video ideas that will actually land with your audience. A good tool can give you video titles and descriptions based on Google searches, similar trending content, and more. Here are a couple of tools worth checking out:

Whimsical’s AI for Mind Maps

Whimsical is already known for their collaboration and brainstorming-friendly templates, and now they have an AI for Mind Maps tool that plays an active role in the process.

Whether you need titles, taglines, or even entire video concepts, this tool gives you multiple options within minutes. No more staring at a blank screen! If you’re at square one, you can even start with big-picture questions like “Which industries are growing the fastest?”

Just be sure to fact-check the info it gives you — like the internet itself, generative AI doesn’t always have the facts straight.

Jasper Chat

AI-powered assistant software Jasper offers a similar brainstorming tool called Jasper Chat.

In the same way you would message a co-worker, you can ask Jasper Chat to drum up video topics or titles, summarize brainstorming notes, and much more. Plus, not only can Jasper learn your company’s branding, voice, and target audiences, but it can also even remember past conversations. That means you can ask it questions like “Jasper, can you give me alternative titles to the video concept we discussed yesterday?”

Scripting

Scripting is different from other kinds of writing, especially if you’re involving multiple speakers. There’s a lot to account for, including telling a cohesive story, hitting all your talking points, and making sure your video doesn’t end up too short or too long.

These AI tools can help speed up the process for you:

ChatGPT

ChatGPT is the most well-known AI text generator right now because it’s both versatile and free — all you need is an account to use it. When we surveyed over 500 marketers for our AI Video Marketing Trends Report, 57% of respondents use ChatGPT the most in their video production process.

The most impressive thing about this tool is how it can write long pieces just the way you want them. It can stick to simple stuff like how many words you need and the feel of the writing, or even handle trickier things like how advanced the language should be and who you’re writing for.

Again, remember that these programs aren’t fact checkers; they’re simply putting together information based on patterns found online. You’ll want to especially make sure that everything being said about your business or anything else is accurate. The last thing you want is to offer services that you don’t provide or make statements that aren’t true.

Notion’s AI Video Script Generator

Productivity and note-taking software Notion has given its platform an AI boost with features like the Video Script Generator.

All you have to do is give this tool directives and details about your brand voice (e.g., “Write a five-minute video script about replacing the needle on a turntable. Keep the tone fun and upbeat.”) and it’ll draft a fully formatted script.

You can even upload in-progress scripts for this script generator to rewrite, shorten, paraphrase, and more.

Storyboarding

Unlike scripts, storyboards never show up in the final video. Instead, they guide the visuals. Today’s generative AI tools can take a single reference image and turn it into a full contact sheet or storyboard grid with cohesive visuals of your characters and environment, as well as alternate camera angles. You can pick your favorite keyframes, explore coverage, identify missing angles, and pressure test scenes faster than before.

We’ve rounded up a few big hitters for generating images with AI:

Nano Banana Pro

Nano Banana Pro is the standout for this style of work right now because of adherence and consistency. You can access it through:

• Gemini for a conversational workflow where you can iterate like, “Make the chair blue,” and keep consistency image over image.
• Higgsfield or Freepik as aggregator UIs that let you run quick tests, remix prompts, and manage assets.

Midjourney

Midjourney (Omni reference mode) is great when you are still searching for look and feel, style, and character direction. It is often part of the earlier phase before you lock a “source frame” that you will storyboard from.

How to do it

1. Pick a strong reference image that represents the world, character, and lighting you want.
2. Use a role-setting prompt that positions the model as a director, cinematographer, and storyboard artist.
3. Ask for a cohesive short sequence as keyframes, delivered as a contact sheet or storyboard grid.
4. Run multiple variations, not because you need options, but because you need surprises. The alternates often contain coverage you would not have thought of.
5. Select the few frames that feel right.
6. Send the contact sheet back into Nano Banana and request upscales of specific keyframes. This is a big practical trick. You get higher resolution frames while keeping consistency.

Why this matters

Instead of debating whether something is worth storyboarding, you can explore the scene visually in minutes and then spend your energy on the real question: is this a good idea and is it worth producing.

Also, the tool is not “replacing storyboards.” It is doing what ChatGPT did for scripting. It accelerates exploration and makes you better at making decisions faster.

Use cases

• Shot blocking for live action
• Previsualization for an ad, launch video, or narrative scene
• Coverage planning when you only have one location and limited time
• Quickly exploring alternate approaches, like late night talk show format, documentary style, or product demo framing
• Locking a visual plan before you move into animation or video generation

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Production

AI can help you achieve the kind of video effects work that normally requires a specialist, but with prompting. It becomes relevant to traditional production, not because you want to generate everything, but because you can fix what you didn’t capture on set.

AI video generation

In today’s AI video landscape, video creation is approached in two ways with:

• Generative video models that create video from prompts, images, or keyframes
• Prompt-based video editors that alter existing footage, like background changes, lighting shifts, and object removal

Generative video models and prompt-based editing tools we use

• Google Veo (Veo 3 and Veo 3.1): Google Veo is a leader in dialogue scenes and lip sync quality. When you need a character to speak and feel believable, it’s a great tool for testing.
• Kling 2.6: Kling’s realism and performance are noteworthy. In some cases, it can feel close to crossing the uncanny valley. We recommend testing side by side with Veo for any scene with speech or acting.
• Sora: Sora is strong for cinematic motion and shot generation, especially when you already have a plan or keyframes. It works well when you use storyboards as inputs and want a more directed output.
• Runway (4.5): Runway continues to be valuable as a bridge between stills and motion, and for video-to-video style and VFX-like workflows. It’s a solid option when you have strong start frames and want controlled motion.
• Kling O1: Kling O1 is great for background replacement, lighting changes, wardrobe changes, cleanup, and post-production fixes, such as removing distractions.

Aggregators and when to use them

AI aggregators are platforms making it possible to access different AI models in one place. Tools like Freepik and Higgsfield can be great for exploration, AI model access, and workflow convenience.

However, from our experience, you will still jump around. Sometimes the aggregator costs are inflated, or the controls are limited. If you know you will use a model heavily, you are often better off going directly to the source.

A healthy workflow is not one platform. It is one repeatable process.

A practical workflow we keep coming back to

1. Storyboard first: Use Nano Banana Pro to generate contact sheets and pick your keyframes.
2. Upscale the winners: Upscale specific frames to preserve consistency.
3. Animate in a video model: Bring the keyframes into Veo, Sora, Kling, or Runway depending on the scene.
4. Edit and stitch: Traditional editing still matters. Pace, audio, and timing are where a lot of the quality lives.
5. Use prompt-based video editing for fixes: If something is off, try Kling O1 style tools before you commit to heavy manual post.

What is changing in the process

AI can help relieve your team’s blockers when it comes to storyboarding, coverage, or visual exploration. You can generate dozens quickly. The new blocker becomes decision-making: what is worth making, what is on brand, what will land with your audience, and what is the best creative choice.

That means taste matters more than ever.

Client work, reality check

AI does not automatically mean faster or easier.

It can enable previously impossible work, like fully AI-generated ads with celebrity likeness work and complex multi-character consistency. But those projects can still take months because the hard part is often not the generation. The hard part is consistency, approvals, iteration, and the creative decisions that make it feel intentional.

The pitch is not “AI is cheap.” The pitch is “AI changes what is possible and shifts where effort goes.”

Brand permission matters

Even if you can generate something, your audience may not want it in every context.

Ads and obviously produced content tend to have more audience tolerance. Personal messages, customer outreach, or anything that implies real human presence has less tolerance. The more a piece asks for trust, the more careful you need to be.

That is not a legal point. It is a relationship point.

AI video cameras

Ever found yourself fumbling with camera settings, trying to get that perfect shot? Well, you’re not alone. Thanks to AI, we now have digital cameras equipped with “smart” software to help you dial everything in like motion tracking, focus, and color balance.

Some good AI cameras can identify the subject, actively remember who they are, and keep them all in focus no matter what’s going on in the shot. Check out our favorites:

Mevo Start

If you’re diving into the world of multi-camera live streaming, Mevo Start is an option worth considering. You can control everything wirelessly with the Mevo Multicam app. And here’s where it gets even cooler: The app’s AI Auto mode takes the reins and seamlessly zooms, pans, and switches between cameras to capture the action as it unfolds in real time.

OBSBOT Tail’s AI-powered Intelligent Composition

Like Mevo, the OBSBOT Tail’s AI-powered Intelligent Composition focuses on the subject and finds the best zoom length, angle, and depth for the shot based on the given environment. You can even prioritize your on-camera personalities and use Power Gestures to control the camera with just hand signals.

AI cameras like these two examples are particularly great for live video events (like webinars) because they’re a major upgrade from just sitting in front of a webcam — and you don’t need a camera crew!

Post-production

Post-production is where your video finally starts to take form, but it’s often the most tedious and time-consuming step even for experienced video creators. Piecing together footage, mixing audio, choosing background music, and fine-tuning visuals can turn just seconds of film into hours of editing.

But here’s the good news: AI can take the pain out of post-production. It not only automates the most complex parts but also makes the whole process more user-friendly than ever.

AI video editing

Back in the day, getting into video editing was tough. The software was expensive, it ate up computer memory, and you had to keep your video and audio files super organized to get anything done.

Now, thanks to AI, video editing has become a whole lot more user-friendly. These days, you can edit a video just as easily as you can edit a Google Doc. Seriously.

Let’s take a look at a few video editing tools with AI-driven features:

Descript

Descript is a game changer for text-based editing and AI voices. When you upload videos to their platform, Descript automatically transcribes the dialogue and lets you edit the video and the dialogue right in the transcript.

Descript has become so popular that traditional video editing software applications like Adobe Premiere Pro and online video editors have followed suit and now offer text-based editing workflows.

Adobe Premiere Pro

Speaking of Adobe Premiere Pro, this video editing software has a host of other AI-driven features, including automatic color correction and automatic audio/video synchronization.

Wistia

If you want to speed up your workflow and enhance your video quality, look no further than Wistia’s AI-powered editing tools.

Our social clips feature built into our video editor quickly pulls the most engaging moments from long-form content such as webinars and interviews by analyzing your transcript. Plus, you can easily refine the content with text-based editing if needed, and we suggest caption copy to make publishing even faster.

Need to edit out awkward silences at the beginning and end of a webinar? No problem! Our intro and outro silence remover automatically detects 2+ second silences at the beginning and end of your videos and lets you remove them in a single click.

AI audio editing and voice emulation

Imagine calling a feature by the wrong name or leaving out an important piece of information while shooting a video. It happens to the best of us. But what do you do when you notice these mistakes well after the cameras have stopped rolling and you’re deep into the editing process?

Before AI, you’d have to reshoot or rerecord the audio, which can be challenging because you’d have to perfectly emulate the environment. Today, you can edit the audio without leaving your desk. You just need an AI-powered voice emulator or audio enhancer.

ElevenLabs

ElevenLabs is a nifty voice-learning software. All you have to do is feed ElevenLabs samples of your speaking voice, type out what you want to say, and bask in the wonders of technology as an AI version of your voice reads back exactly what you typed. We can tell you from experience that tools like this will literally let you “fix it in post.”

Wistia

Even with the right production prep, you’re still prone to audio mistakes — hey, they happen to the best of us. For any video you edit in Wistia, you can also fix audio mistakes. Built-in speech enhancement transforms your rough voice recordings into top-quality audio.

Visual effects

Explosions, superimposed animations, and other visual effects aren’t just for the big Hollywood blockbusters. Even the simplest videos can pop with a bit of visual magic, and now AI makes it a breeze to add these effects to your videos.

Runway

Runway makes the cut for the second time because it has an entire video editing toolkit powered by AI. You’d find AI-driven text-to-color grading, infinite images, erase or replace elements, and more.

With traditional editing software, you’re limited to your technical level of expertise — you either make do with what you can manage or wait until you’re better at it to try more complex stuff.

Runway’s tools, on the other hand, use AI to flatten the learning curve as much as possible so you can let your creative ambitions run wild. Instead of breaking out the how-to guides to erase the camera operator in the shot or add a blockbuster-worthy explosion (because why not?), you can just point and click.

AI video upscaling

If you’ve been in the video-making game for a while or you’ve upgraded your video gear since your first production, consider upscaling your older videos. This means improving their resolution so they look clearer and more current, which helps maintain a consistent, high-quality look across your entire library.

Before the advent of AI tools — which learn from real video clips instead of still images — upscaling was considered a dodgy process that could leave your videos looking overly smooth and unnatural. But now, AI is changing the game by making the process more reliable and your videos more natural-looking.

Topaz Labs

The Video AI software from Topaz Labs uses a combination of deinterlacing, upscaling, and motion interpolation to boost video quality up to 4K with more clarity and accuracy than you could achieve with a manual restoration.

In just a few moments, you can make your grainy childhood home videos look like they were shot on your smartphone last week — or in a more relevant context, upgrade the product demo video you unknowingly shot in 480p to a sleek 4k resolution.

Publishing

Creating metadata and SEO is an often overlooked but absolutely crucial way to set your video up for online success. Around one-third of the respondents we surveyed for our AI Video Marketing Trends Report are using AI to streamline video distribution.

For beginners, this step can feel like trying to read a different language. Navigating keywords, backlinks, rankings, and all other kinds of metadata for even just one video release is enough to make your head spin. But, as you may have guessed, AI is here to help you across the finish line.

Video metadata generation

If you want to reel in viewers and keep those play counts climbing, you’ll need a catchy title, a clear description, a thumbnail that pops, and accurate captions and transcripts. Sound like a tall order? Don’t worry; AI can handle it all.

Jasper AI

For titles, transcriptions in multiple languages, descriptions with SEO keywords, and even social copy to promote your videos, it’s hard to beat Jasper. Plus, the Jasper Everywhere Extension for Chrome gives you easy access to Jasper on any app or web page. That means no more copying and pasting!

Hotpot

Along with the video title, the thumbnail is the elevator pitch for getting someone to click and watch your content. By tapping into Hotpot’s stash of thumbnail templates and AI tools for removing backgrounds, upscaling, and enhancing faces, you can create an eye-catching thumbnail that gets your video the attention it deserves.

3Play Media

Adding closed captions to your video is a simple but effective way to make your video more accessible to viewers. But instead of spending hours manually typing out the spoken content and other sounds in your video, you can use 3Play Media’s closed captioning and audio description services.

3Play Media uses a combination of AI and human editing to make sure your captions are done quickly and accurately — this is a perfect example of using AI to optimize your workflow rather than take it over. The best part is that 3Play Media is integrated into Wistia, which means you can centralize your accessibility requests and automate your workflow.

Wistia

Don’t have time to craft the perfect title and description for your video or podcast before it has to go live? Wistia’s got you covered with our built-in AI tool that’ll analyze your transcript and spin up a title and summary that capture the content’s essence. All you need to do is fine-tune the copy to match your brand’s voice if needed.

Our webinar feature also offers AI-generated event descriptions. Just type a quick summary, select your brand voice, and let AI create a description that matches your brand’s tone and style. You can regenerate the description until it’s just right, apply it to your event, and tweak it as needed.

Video SEO

To get your video in front of as many viewers as possible, you need to optimize it for search engines. That means adding the right keywords and phrases to the metadata so search engines can find and rank your video.

This is how you give your video a chance to land at the top of search results.

And if you’re worried about the nitty-gritty of SEO, AI tools are here to help. We’ve got a couple to look at:

SurferSEO

SurferSEO is a one-stop shop for keywords and SEO. Along with giving your video an overall “content score,” the software also generates keywords related to your video that give you the best odds of outranking your competition. Plus, this software is already integrated with Jasper for easy access.

FCP Video Tag

For Final Cut Pro users, FCP Video Tag is an extension by Ulti.Media that reviews your content, creates keywords based on similar videos online, and uploads that data straight into Final Cut Pro. Your metadata is all set by the time you export the video, saving you a good chunk of time in the process.

Wistia

Wistia’s automated transcription feature uses AI to transcribe your uploaded videos, ensuring transcribed text is recognized by search engines to improve video SEO.

With the rise of learning language models (LLMs), it’s also important ensure AI-powered search engines can “see” your videos, too. Tools like ChatGPT can’t actually see your videos because they aren’t able to execute JavaScript (used to display your video), so when they view your page to return information on a search, it just looks like a big, blank box.

Here’s where Wistia’s LLM-Friendly embed codes come in. They’re designed to seamlessly make your videos discoverable to and readable by tools like ChatGPT, without changing the viewing experience for your audience.

Similar to our SEO embed codes, LLM-Friendly embed codes automatically inject your transcript into the code itself, so LLMs can capture the content and return it in search results.

Is AI in video production here to stay?

AI isn’t capable of everything quite yet. Copy that’s written solely by AI is often dry, AI videos are unimaginative, and AI-generated images have something “off” about them. AI can only work off of what already exists. It won’t take risks, push boundaries, try unconventional methods, or come up with completely original ideas.

In other words, generative AI isn’t human. An unfortunate side effect we’re seeing with the rise of AI is that some companies don’t realize this fact and are flat-out replacing their creative forces with AI software. But the reality is that the human-made work will almost always be stronger than the AI-generated versions because of that idiosyncratic “human touch.”

“Finding the balance between AI-led efficiency and human-driven imagination is the best way for your business to stand out in our current online world.”