Artificial Intelligence has opened a gateway into a fantastic world where things considered impossible two years ago have become as easy as typing an email. A young child can create beautiful images from scratch and animate them without learning any high-end software or design skills. 

There are cheap AI tools that can bring images to life without requiring mastery of animation, design, or coding. 

This tutorial shows you how Midjourney and Runway can quickly animate images. Midjourney is an AI image-generating online service. A written prompt creates a set of images. You can use those images in any way possible. You can use any image, whether a generated one or an actual image. The idea is to create an animated image.

One of the creative ways to use an AI image is to animate it. Here, you can use Runway. This tutorial shows you how to generate an image with Midjourney and animate with Runway. 

‍Objectives

1. Generate a set of images using Midjourney
   1. Explain the image in a prompt
   2. Download the images
2. Access Runway AI
   1. Upload the image in Runway
   2. Use A Prompt To Describe The Animation For The Image
   3. Rewrite The Prompt To Create A Better Animated Image

Generate a set of images using Midjourney

Explain the image in a prompt.

The first step is to access Midjourney. Open the website. Login or register your email. 

Access the ‘Create’ section and write a prompt to generate an image of your choice. In this example, we are generating the image of an ancient warrior. 

Prompt:

Ancient European World, Tall and Brave Warrior with a small sword in his hand, Colorful, High Saturation, War world, Swords, Tent, Depth of Field, Old World charm, Old World 3D Style, 3D Texture, C4D Production, OC Rendering, Blender, HD 8k

Midjourney will generate a set of 4 images.

Here is the result of the prompt:

Download the images

Download all the images. You can select an image to animate or animate all four images. It’s up to you. We are choosing the 4th one for this tutorial. 

Hover over the image and click the download button.

Access Runway

Go to the Runway website and click ‘Try Runway.’ Register your email address, and you’re ready to go. 

Click ‘Get Started’ on the homepage. 

Upload the image in Runway

Now comes the exciting part. Select the downloaded Midjourney image and drag it to the animation window on the page. Crop the image to the supported aspect ratio by dragging the image up or down. Click ‘Crop’.

Use a prompt to describe the animation for the image

The prompt box below the image allows you to describe the animated shot. This step is optional but important nonetheless. Use the following prompt to define the animation. 

Prompt:

Move the head and body to show the warrior is ready to enter the battle and win. Animate the eyes and facial expressions. Show the right hand with the sword going up.

Click ‘Generate’. 

The Runway engine will start generating the animation.

As soon as the video is generated, a little button at the bottom of the video appears that says, ‘Lip sync.’ Click it.

The Lip Sync allows you to animate the image to speak the words you want it to say. As soon as you click it, a prompt box appears on the left side of the page. Select the voice style you want for your character at the bottom of the prompt box.

Type the sentences for the animated character to speak and click ‘Generate Lipsync.’

Once the progress is completed, click the play button to view the animation. 

It came out very good. However, It could have been better. 

You can always rewrite the prompt to adjust the image animation. It depends on how you want the image to be animated. 

Rewrite the prompt to create a better animated image

You can rewrite the prompt and click the Generate button again for a better animation. Try the following one:

Prompt:

Move the head a little bit. Create an expression of anger and revenge on the face and let the right hand with the sword lift slowly as if the warrior is ready to strike. 

Click ‘Generate’

This came out really well. I liked the animation. 

Runway is a fantastic tool that lets you animate any images - AI or non-AI. It all depends on what you want. You can upgrade the free account for more settings and granular control of what Runway can animate. Play with a few images, and you might create a whole animated movie in a few hours. 

Feel free to ask Runway to improve the animated image. This might not be possible with a free account, but with a subscribed account, it can create some fantastic animations.