Pika 1.5's playful presets

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Welcome back, Superhuman

Ever wanted to see your cat running in slow motion like a superhero — or an object of your choice instantly transformed into a cake? It might sound absurd, but Pika’s new text-to-video model makes it a reality, alongside other quirky features like crushing and melting objects.

Today’s Insights

• Pika’s new model melts, crushes, and explodes any object

• Flux image generation gets an efficiency boost

• Tutorial: How to build quick apps with AI

• Everything else you should know today

• 5 new AI tools to boost your productivity

• AI-Generated Images: Live action movie

NEXT IN AI

Pika 1.5 unleashes wave of cinematic creativity

A text-to-video generator that can turn any object into cake might not be at the top of your wish list — but you might just find it to be a surprisingly satisfying feature you never knew you needed.

“Cake-ify” is just one of the presets coming to Pika Labs’ new state-of-the-art model, Pika 1.5: There’s also Melt It, Explode It, Inflate It, and Crush It — which each do just as their names suggest. Are they practical? Maybe not — but who can deny the fun factor? (This video does a pretty good job of showing how each feature works.)

Here’s everything you need to know about the new model:

• Pika 1.5 has only been available for a few days, but already, creators are using it to generate Hollywood-quality, five-second clips

• That’s partly because the model allows for a greater level of control over your shots

• Users can now generate videos using cinematic camera angles, including “bullet time,” “vertigo,” and “crane down”

• Movements like running and flying look more natural now, too

Why it matters: Beyond the playful presets, tools like Pika are helping democratize high-quality video production by giving users more control over cinematic elements and motion. They’re already transforming content creation across industries, from marketing and education to entertainment, by putting professional-grade video capabilities in the hands of everyday users.

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THE AI ACADEMY

How to build quick apps with AI

Read the instructions below or watch the video here.

• Go to LlamaCoder's website.

• Write your prompt in the prompt box. For example: 'Build a quiz app about the American Civil War'

• Wait for a few seconds and you'll see the code on the left side and an app artifact on the right.

• You can even edit the code from the code window and restart the app to apply changes.

•  Simply download the code and run it.

FROM THE FRONTIER

Underrated image generator gets a major update

If September was strawberry season, October is all about the blueberries. Black Forest Labs, the startup behind one of the most underrated text-to-image generators, just unveiled Flux 1.1 — known as “Blueberry mode” during early testing.

The update makes the open-source Flux about six times faster than its predecessor, while offering more art styles and higher accuracy. Early surveys suggest it scores higher than the latest versions of Ideogram and Midjourney, too.

The startup also opened up API access, letting developers incorporate its powerful text-to-image model into their apps. Flux 1.1 is only available on Freepik for now, but we expect it’ll roll out onto more platforms soon — including X, where you can already use the base version via Grok.

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AI & TECH NEWS

Everything else you need to know today

• Che Bello: Microsoft will invest $4.75B into AI and cloud infrastructure in Italy, making it one of the largest data hubs for the tech giant in Europe.

• Fire Power: Amazon unveiled a new Fire HD 8 tablet with AI capabilities, including a writing assistant and wallpaper generator.

• Trading Places: Elon Musk’s xAI is moving into a Mission district office building once occupied by OpenAI.

• Rabbit Reboot: Rabbit’s R1 device received an OS update that lets users perform more complicated tasks, like autonomously scanning websites.

🤖 One Fun Thing: Boston Dynamics showed off a demo of its four-legged robot Spot learning to climb a ladder with a 90% success rate. The company said it’s an important breakthrough since many labor-intensive jobs require climbing across a wide variety of terrains.

🪄 Workspace Wizard: OpenAI is rolling out a new feature called Canvas that aims to be the startup’s answer to Anthropic’s popular Artifacts tool. It’ll help you organize more complex projects and workspaces when more in-depth tweaking might be necessary. You can get feedback on specific lines of code or ask ChatGPT to rewrite a sentence in a friendlier tone without having to craft an entirely new prompt.

PRODUCTIVITY

5 AI Tools to Supercharge Your Productivity

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✅ Mesha: Effortlessly manage clients and payments in one place, and automate tasks like email reminders and follow-ups with AI.

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✅ Costgpt: Generate sitemaps, milestones, and time estimates with an AI platform trained on more than 2,000 projects.

✅ Macky: An AI-powered business consultant that streamlines complex queries into valuable, actionable insights.

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PROMPT OF THE DAY

Friday Funday - Personal chef

Prompt: Adopt the role of a seasoned chef and recipe developer. Your task is to create a variety of quick snack ideas that can be prepared in under 20 minutes. These snacks should be easy to make with common ingredients found in most kitchens. Include detailed instructions for each snack, along with tips for variations and substitutions. Ensure that the snacks are healthy, delicious, and appealing to both adults and children. Consider dietary restrictions and provide alternatives where possible. The goal is to offer readers a range of quick and tasty snack options they can enjoy any time of the day. Please incorporate any specific preferences or dietary restrictions provided by [USER_PREFERENCES] and include ingredients that are commonly available in [USER_LOCATION].

_{Source: God of Prompt}

AI-GENERATED IMAGES

Live Action Movie

Midjourney Prompt: live active movie, realstic, and futuristic architecture. The building is surrounded by a dense cityscape with glowing signs
--ar 9:16 --style raw --v 6.1 --quality 2

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🧞Your wish is my command

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Thanks for reading.

Until next time!

Zain & the Superhuman AI team