strange!
Yes 360
Luma Labs' AI video tool, called Dream Machine, turns still images into videos. Naturally, the internet was quick to use it to turn famous memes into videos, and quite a few of the results are downright nightmarish.
For example, check out the first clip of this terrifying compilation shared on the subreddit r/aivideo: It's an AI zombified video made from the famous “Disaster Girl” meme, showing a young girl grinning at the camera with a confused look on her face while her house burns behind her.
In the original meme, several firefighters are depicted in the background. In the AI version, the firefighters move about in a dreamlike fashion, pattering around the disaster scene. One of them approaches, and to our horror, her face changes multiple times as she gets closer. The AI then settles on the face of yet another young child, Turn around and run towards the fire. (There's also a very random guy who suddenly appears on the side of the screen, and two girl characters actually appear to morph together before running into flames.)
Also on Twitter, there's an AI-created clip of the “distracted girlfriend” meme (a version of the infamous “distracted boyfriend” image), where in the AI reenactment, her head spins 360 degrees like in a horror movie. There's also something very creepy happening to her hands.
The Fifth Beatle
While some of these AI clips are enough to keep us up at night, other AI-animated images that have garnered attention online are decidedly more mundane — and, in some cases, have left netizens wondering why they would need to use AI in the first place.
“We're burning down the Amazon, working our AI magic, and finally getting to know Captain Picard from Star Trek,” one X-user wrote, referring to the generative AI's massive impact on the environment. I told a joke Responses to an AI-animated meme of Captain Picard from the Star Trek series, although the meme was originally taken from a video.
Burn down the Amazon, harness the magic of AI, and finally find out what Star Trek's Captain Picard looked like https://t.co/RVOjiRmF5K
— Stan's account (@tristandross) June 16, 2024
We're also a bit obsessed with this AI animation of The Beatles' Abbey Road cover art, which somehow adds a fifth band member to the iconic quartet.
Anyway, these are really creepy, but I have to admit they do make me laugh – as long as they don't make me shiver in fear, of course. And finally, here's another favorite – the animated “Zuckerberg is watching” meme, which we hope will live on for free in your heads as it does in ours.
More about generative AI: Anthropic's CEO has a framed photo of a giant robot destroying a city hanging on his wall.
