The flying car AI trend, with you at the wheel

How to make a flying car video yourself

You do not need this page to make one. This is how the video is put together, so you can build it with any picture model and image-to-video model you like.

1. Step 1

   Draw one still per shot from your photo

   Use a picture model that takes a reference photo and draw five stills from the same photo: the jam, the button, the lift, the car over the city and the ending. Describe the car the same way in every one, its colour, its shape and its glass roof, or it turns into a different car between shots.

2. Step 2

   Say which seat it is filmed from

   The trend's view is someone in the back seat filming forward between the front seats, and the face is best seen from the passenger seat. Describe each still from inside as a photo taken from that seat, in an ordinary cabin: told where a camera is fixed, or that the car is a sports car flying over the city, a picture model draws the car from outside with the roof off. The lift-off reads best from outside, from in front, with the jam below.

3. Step 3

   Animate each still, then cut

   Give each still to an image-to-video model with one line about what moves and one about what does not: the driver stays calm, and only this car leaves the road. Trim each clip to three or four seconds, lay them end to end at 9:16 with hard cuts, and add the caption and the sound on TikTok.

The shots, second by second

Where it goes wrong

• Keep the driver calm

  Left to itself, a video model may have the driver gasp, grip the wheel or stare out of the window as the car takes off, and that kills the joke. Say in every shot that they stay calm and unbothered, as if it were an ordinary commute.

• Say which car leaves the road

  In a street full of cars, "the car rises" does not say which one. Say that only this car goes up and that every other car stays on the road, so the jam stays behind.

• Leave the badges off

  Describe a car of your own rather than a real model. Ask for a minimal electric cabin with one big screen and you may get a real carmaker's dashboard, badge on the steering wheel and all, even with logos ruled out. Describe a cabin no real car has, say the centre of the wheel is blank and that there is no writing anywhere: someone else's trademark has no place in your video.

• Keep the driver inside in the outside shots

  Seen from outside, the driver tends to come out too big for the car, head sticking out past the roof, or twice, once more standing in the street. Tint the glass so the driver is a small shape behind it, say the roof is closed over their head, and say they appear only once, inside the car.

• Show the face from the front at least once

  From the back seat all you see of the driver is the back of a head, which could be anyone. Put the glance back in the first shot and cut to the passenger seat for the button and the ending, so the face the video is about is seen whole.

• Only people who said yes

  Use your own photo or one of someone who agreed. Do not use celebrities, or anyone who has not agreed to be in the video: a realistic video of a real person made without their consent can hurt them, and platforms take it down.

• Label it as AI-generated

  Switch on TikTok's AI-generated content label before you post. A realistic clip of a car lifting out of traffic is exactly the kind people ask about, and viewers trust a post that says so.