Midjourney V7 Alpha, Runway Gen 4 Video, ElevenLabs Actor Mode, Krea 3D & Restyle, Adobe Generative Extend, Pika Frames Keyframes
Creative Workflow Roundup: No fluff, no sponsors, no affiliate links, just this week's key AI + creative tech news and my unfiltered lab notes.
In This Week’s Roundup: Midjourney V7’s Draft mode cuts render time while fixing anatomy; Runway Gen-4 holds characters and lighting steady across long takes; ElevenLabs Actor Mode clones your tone from a ten-second sample; Krea now turns sketches into 3D meshes and restyles full videos; Premiere Pro’s Generative Extend patches jump cuts in 4K; Pika and friends add keyframes for smoother motion; GPT-4o image traffic tops seven hundred million in week one as OpenAI warns of GPU strain.
Need to Know: Midjourney V7 introduces a Draft mode that renders images 10× faster at half cost; missing features like upscaling arrive within two months.
Lab Notes: Better anatomy and textures!
Need to Know: Gen-4 keeps characters, props and lighting coherent across shots and is rolling out now to paid and Enterprise users.
Lab Notes: Storyboard-accurate video is finally plausible; fewer continuity fixes in post.
Need to Know: Actor Mode lets you upload a short voice reference and have the AI mimic emotion and pacing; it’s live for all plans.
Lab Notes: Test tonal shifts for branded idents and multilingual dubs.
Need to Know: Krea’s new 2D-to-3D feature converts images to textured meshes in seconds; Video Restyle and a full UI redesign ship alongside a 20 % annual-plan discount.
Lab Notes: Grab a mood-board frame and drop it straight into 3D pre-viz.
Premiere Pro Gets Generative Extend
Need to Know: Premiere Pro v25.2 extends clips up to 2 s in 4K and ambient audio up to 10s.
Lab Notes: Free while Firefly credits last.
Need to Know: 130 million users generated 700 million+ images in GPT-4o’s first week.
Lab Notes: Visual chat is mainstream, plan conversational image workflows.
Need to Know: Sam Altman warns new features may lag and service may slow as the team “catches up” on GPU demand.
Lab Notes: Schedule client demos off-peak to avoid throttling.
Need to Know: Altman says o3 and o4-mini will ship first; GPT-5 will fold them into one unified model within “months,” ending the model picker.
Lab Notes: Get ready to refine prompts for the unified stack.
Need to Know: Upload first and last frames and Pika generates 1–10 s, 1080p transitions with smooth camera moves, paid plans only.
Lab Notes: Perfect for looping logo reveals and social teasers.