Reviewing Sora, the new video creation tool from ChatGPT

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Reviewing Sora, the new video creation tool from ChatGPT
Apparently Sora is named after the Japanese word for sky to signify its "limitless creative potential". In the future this may be true, but for now we were ... underwhelmed.

Posted by Andy Brown on 31 January 2025

In this blog

Accessing Sora
Licences available
Example 1 of 2 - an ambitious transformation video
Example 2 of 2 - George Orwell walking on Jura
Conclusion

Sora is the new video-creation offering from ChatGPT, which allows you to create your own 5-second or 10-second videos from text prompts:

One of my videos: read on for how to create it, the prompt I used and to see how well Sora interpreted my wishes!

In this blog I'll look at how you can access Sora, the different licences available, how to create videos and consider how good the results are.

Accessing Sora

This is easier said than done. If you go to the Sora website (which is distinct from the standard ChatGPT one, presumably because Sora has different licensing conditions and consumes so many resources) you'll see this in the UK when you click on the Start now button:

Fair enough, but I'm not beaten yet.

So I used a VPN to connect to a server in the States:

I was then able to log in:

I then had to enter my birthday (not sure why!) and confirm my licence (see below), before choosing a user name:

If you see me, wave.

And finally, I was in!

Licences available

When you are logging on, you can choose between these two licences:

I'm not sure what the significance of the different reverse video colours is.

I used the left-hand option, using my current ChatGPT Plus subscription (interestingly, ChatGPT didn't detect the fact that this is for a user in the UK). Here's a quick comparison of what each licence gives:

Feature	ChatGPT Plus	ChatGPT Pro
Cost	$20 per month	$200 per month
Credits	1,000	10,000
Video equivalents	50	500
Maximum length	10 seconds	20 seconds
Maximum resolution	720p	1080p

Although the Sora tables above imply that for a normal ChatGPT Plus licence (which is what I used) you'll have a watermark on any video you download, I can't see this. See if you can for the examples below.

Example 1 of 2 - an ambitious transformation video

I looked at some of the glossy videos produced by other users, and set my expectations high with this prompt:

I used all of the standard settings.

Here are the settings that you can change:

Higher resolution is only available with ... a higher monthly payment.

I went for one video lasting 5 seconds, which took 25 credits:

By default you get two different videos, but I changed this to one.

Here are the results:

It seems to me that this bears almost no relation to what I asked for (Ok, there's a man and a swimming-poool, but that's about it!).

Example 2 of 2 - George Orwell walking on Jura

I decided I'd been too ambitious, and went for something simpler:

"A close-up shot of George Orwell walking near his house in Barnhill in Jura"

Just for a change, I used Archive mode to see what it did. Here's the resulting video:

This is in many ways even more disappointing. The person looks nothing like George Orwell (certainly not at the age when he was writing 1984), the scenery looks nothing like Jura (I know; I've been) and towards the end of the 5 seconds the man seems to step into space!

Conclusion

Based on my two attempts I'd say that Sora is currently pretty much useless. I suspect ChatGPT have released it to gather data on how it's used and to pre-empt the competition. I have no doubt that in 12 months' time I will be marvelling at how astonishing Sora's abilities are, but for now I would stick to filming using your mobile.

Some other pages relevant to the above blog include:

Artificial Intelligence classes

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Accessing Sora

Licences available

Example 1 of 2 - an ambitious transformation video

Example 2 of 2 - George Orwell walking on Jura

Conclusion

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