Google’s Veo now turns portrait photos into vertical AI movies

Google is making its Veo 3.1 AI video mannequin pay nearer consideration to the reference photos you need generated clips to be primarily based on. The corporate is releasing new visible enhancements for the “Ingredients to Video” instrument that was launched final yr, alongside increasing native vertical video assist and determination upscaling options.

The Substances to Video instrument permits Veo customers to generate movies primarily based on as much as three reference photos, pulling in supplies like character topics, backgrounds, and textures to have extra management over how the outcomes will look. Google says this replace will make movies “extra expressive and artistic,” and supply “richer dialogue and storytelling.” There are additionally consistency enhancements that must be extra perceptible — Veo 3.1 ought to now guarantee a personality seems the identical throughout totally different clips and environments, and can let customers reuse objects, backgrounds, and textures throughout scenes.

Clips generated utilizing Substances to Video will now additionally assist vertical outputs. This follows Google giving builders the power to generate vertical movies in Veo final yr for text-based prompts with out references. Customers can choose to output movies in a local 9:16 side ratio that’s able to add to platforms like TikTok and YouTube Shorts, as an alternative of manually cropping the ends in video enhancing software program.

Google is including Veo’s improved Substances to Video and portrait mode options to the Gemini app beginning at present, and integrating these instruments into YouTube Shorts and the YouTube Create app “for the primary time.”

Lastly, this replace permits Veo 3.1 customers to upscale their generated movies to a 4K decision, up from the earlier 1080p restrict. Google says that 1080p video era has additionally been improved to supply “a sharper, cleaner video.” This isn’t the native 4K decision that Google claimed Veo was able to producing again in 2024 — one thing now we have but to see in any model of Veo that’s launched to the general public — however on-platform upscaling is best than nothing.