Sora's dazzling AI could democratize filmmaking for the next generation — but it still has lots of limitations

• Business Insider spoke to up-and-coming filmmakers and professors as OpenAI's Sora debuted.
• AI video generation could open the door for indie filmmakers — and more blockbusters.
• Fear of job losses looms, but one professor called AI text tools a bigger threat.

Up-and-coming filmmakers and professors at some of the nation's top film schools say the arrival of OpenAI video generators like Sora signals a democratization of the industry may be afoot, even though the tech is still limited.

Sora rolled out widely on Monday following a February pilot program. The tool generates short video clips — 20 seconds max — from users' text prompts. Sora can also modify existing clips.

For example, say a user wants to create a scene with green monsters in a thunderstorm. To do that, she'd type a prompt, and Sora would spit out a file.

While bold-faced creators are already bracing for impact, early Sora testers told Business Insider it gave them new ways to think about their work — even as others also complained the platform appeared to regurgitate content from a limited database.

Michaela Ternasky-Holland was one of the first directors to create and premiere a short film using Sora. It screened at Tribeca in 2024. She said she's excited about Sora's potential to cut filmmaking's development costs by creating things like sizzle reels, but she's aware of its limitations.

These things are giving you an illusion of control. And no matter how good the generations are, there's still someone behind them prompting it," she said. "Just because someone has a 4K camera, it doesn't make them a Steven Spielberg."

Dana Polan, a professor of cinema studies at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, said AI image generators aren't stoking the same fears as their text-based counterparts.

That's because many in Hollywood see the screenplay as "the first act of creativity," said Polan, who noted that other people in the filmmaking process, including cinematographers, are already seen as "adapters into images of words."

While he remains optimistic about AI in film, George Huang, a professor at the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television — who has experimented with AI tools in his own moviemaking — concedes the technology has a bad rap in Hollywood, which has made countless movies on the topic.

"We think AI is now coming to destroy all of us, and that's a narrative that Hollywood created," he said. "It's embedded in our culture."

Sora's not quite ready for prime time — yet

Industry watchers told Business Insider that they don't foresee Sora or AI image generation appearing widely in finished films just yet given that the image quality still exists in something of an "uncanny valley."

Sora's pace of improvement has slowed down with later versions, Ternasky-Holland said. For example, it still struggles to put multiple characters in a scene no matter how many times it's prompted, she said.

But Polan told BI the tech could come in handy for the previsualization process — or animated storyboards to check pacing and flow. Huang also said he could see it being used as a "pitch reel" for screenwriters.

That said, other AI startups like Runway have created tools already used across the industry to expedite editing, with clients that include "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" and the effects team behind "Everything Everywhere All At Once."

Michael Gilkison, a Lexington, Kentucky-based filmmaker whose latest project, "The Finish Line," is on Amazon's Prime Video, said a free AI app helped create a scene where a car was crushed. "That would have cost a lot more 20 years ago," he said over email. Using AI technology could also create cheaper ways to film period pieces. But it also can negate the need to hire extras, which can deprive a film of its spirit.

"As a producer, I would use it to keep the cost down, but it is all about balance," Gilkison said.

Tahsis Fairley, a creative producing student at Chapman University, said via email he envisions using Sora to expedite storyboarding and illustrate ideas to his team.

"We will be able to test out new visual ideas without investing significant amounts of money," Fairley said.

That said, Huang doesn't believe we're far off from full implementation, saying AI could appear within completed films "by the end of the next year easily."

Cost savings could boost indies and blockbusters alike

The expenses associated with filmmaking can put a damper on artistic vision, Huang said. But students are generally receptive to new technology, Polan said.

ChatGPT Plus subscribers, who pay $20 a month, get up to 50 Sora generations a month that are five seconds maximum. ChatGPT Pro users, who pay $200 a month, get unlimited generations up to 20 seconds in length.

In slashing costs, Huang said platforms like Sora are bound to "almost democratize the filmmaking process, sort of lower those barriers to entry." In addition to more tools for indie filmmakers working in the margins, this could also mean more blockbusters produced at a relative discount by major studios, he said.

Fairley, for his part, sees AI as a "double-edged sword."

While he cheered its efficiency gains, he expressed concern about job losses across the industry — particularly in fields like animation, pointing to a Coca-Cola Chrismas ad created entirely with AI.

OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.