Making videos
Making videos with the Assistant from words, an image or several images, playing them on the Canvas, and trimming, editing, upscaling and cutting them out in the video editor.
Choose Video from the mode button at the start of the prompt (see Talking with the Assistant) and describe it, such as “waves at dusk, slow and calm”. The mode decides what is made, not the words: in Image, “a film still of waves” is an image. Right-click an image, choose Use as reference, and describe how it moves (“the light sweeps across the sea”): the video starts from that image and appears beside it, in its shape; the Composer says “Animating Image 1”. Choose several images and the video is guided by them. In an image’s editor, Video animates that image. In Ask, “make this into a video” has the Assistant make one.
Like an image, the video’s place appears at once and glows while it is made (usually a minute or two), then shows its first frame. Press the play button at its bottom left to play it on the Canvas, muted and looping, and press it again to pause: it carries on from where it paused. While you hover the video, a small scrub bar beside the button shows how far it has played: press or drag along it to jump to any moment, playing or paused (with the bar focused, the arrow keys move five seconds). On a video shown too small for it, there is only the play button. It keeps playing while you pan, zoom and select. When it leaves your view, or you switch to another tab, it pauses where it is, and waits for you to play it again.
Select a video and the selection toolbar at the Canvas’s top right has Play or Pause; with several videos selected, Restart sits beside it, and each says how many videos it acts on. Restart, Loop and Mute are also in ⋯ (More), and all of it is in the video’s right-click menu: Play, Pause, Restart, Loop and Mute. Turn Loop off to play it once: it stops at its end, and plays again from the start. Loop is saved with the video, so everyone sees it play the same way. Playing, pausing and sound are yours alone: pressing Play never plays anything for anyone else. Select several videos and Play starts them all together from the start, each looping or playing once by its own setting; Pause and Restart act on all of them, and other videos carry on as they were. In a selection of images and videos, these act on the videos only. It is an ordinary node: move, resize, flip, copy or delete it. If it can’t be made, it turns red like an image does, with Retry. Once it is ready, right-click it and choose Export → Original video to save its MP4 exactly as it was made. People viewing a shared link can watch it, but have no export.
Choose a video’s shape, resolution, length and sound in Settings, the sliders button beside the price (see Settings). Its shape starts on Auto: a video made from an image takes that image’s shape (an image you animate, or the first one you chose), and one from words alone is 16:9; choose a shape and it stays, whatever images you choose. The Assistant uses Seedance 2.0 Fast unless you choose another in Settings:
- MiniMax H3 Turbo: the fastest and cheapest. It always makes sound, and offers 480p, 768p and 1080p.
- MiniMax H3 Max: MiniMax’s quality tier, at twice Turbo’s price.
- Wan 3: up to 30 seconds long, with sound you can switch off.
- Kling 3 and Kling 3 Pro (1080p): cinematic, with sound you can switch off, in 16:9, 9:16 or 1:1.
- Seedance 2.0: higher quality than Seedance 2.0 Fast.
Where a model can, Settings also offer Enhance prompt (it writes your prompt out more fully before making the video; on unless you switch it off). A video made from one image keeps that image’s shape. A video is priced by its length and resolution, and the price beside the send button follows what you set (see Usage and prices).
First and last frames
With images chosen, Settings offer First frame and, where the model can end on an image, Last frame: each lists the images as the Composer names them (Image 1, Image 2…), None, and Auto. Under each image, the Composer says what it is: First, Last, or Not sent.
On Auto, one image is the first frame. Two images are the first and last frames for Kling 3 (which takes no other images), and guide the video for the other models. Three or more always guide it. Choose a frame and the rest follow: an unchosen first frame is Image 1, and an unchosen last frame is what Auto would end on. To have one image guide a video rather than start it, set both to None.
What each model takes:
| Model | First frame | Last frame | Other images beside the frames |
|---|---|---|---|
| Seedance 2.0 and 2.0 Fast | Yes | With a first frame | Not sent |
| Wan 3 | Yes | With a first frame | Not sent |
| MiniMax H3 Turbo | Yes | Yes, even alone | Not sent |
| MiniMax H3 Max | Yes | Yes, even alone | Sent as references |
| Kling 3 and Kling 3 Pro | Yes | With a first frame | Not sent (Kling takes no references) |
Where a model can’t use the other images beside its frames, you don’t need to take them out: they stay attached, shown as Not sent, and the Composer says why, such as “Wan 3 uses frames or references, not both. Image 2 isn’t sent.” A choice the model can’t make, such as a last frame with no first on Seedance, says why before anything is sent. A video’s Metadata says which image was its first frame and which its last.
Videos are muted until you untick Mute. Not available yet: pasting videos, and videos in exported images.
Editing a video
Double-click a video on a Canvas, or right-click it and choose Edit, to open it in the video editor. The video grows from where it was into the middle of the screen, and the address becomes the video’s own (/videos/…); your Canvas stays just behind it. From your library, Open on a video opens it the same way, on its own. It works like the image editor: the video in the middle, its tools down the left, and beneath it the timeline.
- Play and pause with the play button above the timeline, by clicking the video, or with Space. Sound plays here unless you press the speaker to mute it.
- Move to any moment: drag along the timeline, or click it. With the timeline focused, the arrow keys step a tenth of a second (a second with Shift), and Home and End go to its start and end. Once the video’s preview frames are ready (shortly after it is added), the timeline shows them along its length.
- Zoom and move around as in the image editor: scroll to move, hold Ctrl (⌘ on a Mac) and scroll to zoom about the pointer, or drag the video. The buttons at the bottom left zoom in and out; the percentage fits it again. Ctrl with + and − zooms, with 0 fits, and with 1 shows it at its own size.
Trimming
Choose Trim in the toolbar (or press T), and the timeline shows the whole video, its ends now handles. Drag one in and let go: the trim is kept straight away. You can also press I and O to trim the start or end to the playhead. Put Trim down and the timeline is just the part you kept, timed from its start. Pick Trim up again and the whole video is back, with what is left out dimmed, so you can let a trim out again: drag both handles back to the ends and nothing is trimmed.
Trimming is free and changes nothing for good: the whole video is always kept, and a trim is only where it starts and ends. A trim keeps at least a second. The Canvas shows it too, for trims of up to a minute of videos up to 2000 pixels on a side. Beyond that the editor says so, and the Canvas goes on showing the video as it was. Trimming doesn’t make a version (see Versions).
Upscaling
Choose Upscale in the toolbar to make the video sharper and larger: 2× or 4× its size, each showing the size it makes and its price before you choose. Upscaling uses Topaz Video Upscale and works on the whole video: a trim stays as it is, on top of the result.
While it is made (a minute or two), Upscaling… shows on the video itself. Then the result plays in the video’s place:
- Accept makes it what the video is, wherever the video is. It doesn’t make a version.
- Discard leaves the video as it was.
A step that would make it larger than 4K isn’t offered, and neither is upscaling a video longer than a minute. Like every model, it is charged as it is made, whether you accept it or not (see Usage and prices).
Editing
Choose Edit in the toolbar and describe the change (“make it snow”, “turn it into a watercolour”). The whole video is made again as you describe, its motion and sound kept. Its price, by the video’s length, shows before you choose Edit video. It uses Kling O1 and works on videos of 3 to 10 seconds, at least 720 pixels on each side (upscale a smaller one first).
While it is made (a few minutes), Editing… shows on the video itself. Then the result plays in the video’s place: Accept keeps it, Discard leaves the video as it was. An edited video is a new picture, so a removed background doesn’t carry over: remove it again if you need it. Like every model, it is charged as it is made, whether you accept it or not.
Removing the background
Choose Remove background in the toolbar to cut the video’s subject out of the whole video. Its price, by how many frames the video has, shows before you choose. It uses VEED Background Removal and works on the whole video: a trim stays as it is, on top of the result.
While it is made (usually under a minute), Removing the background… shows on the video itself. Then the cut-out plays in the video’s place, over a checkerboard where the background was. Accept keeps it, without making a version; Discard leaves the video as it was. To bring the background back, go back to an earlier version (see Versions).
On the Canvas the video shows cut out too, over whatever is behind it. A trimmed cut-out video isn’t shown on the Canvas yet: the editor says so, and the Canvas goes on showing the video as it was. A video longer than a minute can’t have its background removed. Like every model, it is charged as it is made, whether you accept it or not.
How the video was made
Once you have accepted a change, the steps that made the video are listed beneath its timeline, in order: its Original, then each change you kept, such as Upscaled 2× or Background removed. Open a step to see its settings, what it was made from, what it made (a removed background also makes a matte, the outline it is cut out by) and what it cost. While a step is open, the video shows as it was after that step; choose Back to current to return. Trims aren’t steps: they are where the video starts and ends.
Undo and redo
Press Ctrl+Z (⌘Z on a Mac) to undo your last change in the editor: a trim, or a result you accepted. Ctrl+Shift+Z (or Ctrl+Y) does it again. Undo never makes or removes a version, and going back to a version starts undo afresh.
Versions
A version is a moment you choose to keep: nothing makes one by itself. Versions, at the top, lists the video’s versions, newest first, starting with its Original, and ticks the one the video is while you haven’t changed it since. Choose Create version to keep the video as it is now.
Choose a version to go back to it. The version itself never changes, and anything you did since your last version is kept as Current at the top of the list, so you can go back to that too. Editing on from a version you went back to leaves your other versions as they were.
The video’s own conversation
The Assistant stays beside the video editor with the video’s own conversation, as an image’s does: ask about the video in Ask. Ask it to make the video sharper or larger (“upscale this”), to change it (“make it snow”), or to cut out its subject (“remove the background”), and it offers the editor’s Upscale, Edit or Remove background with its price: nothing is made until you agree. Making something else from a video in Image or Video isn’t available yet.
Press Escape (with Trim put down), or the close button at the top right, to fly the video back to where it was.